IT’S cartoon fever again! The 9th Asian Cartoon Exhibition has toured Ipoh and Kota Kinabalu, and is now coming to Kuala Lumpur.

The annual exhibition, organised by The Japan Foundation since 1995, aims to introduce societies, cultures and the modes of life of the peoples of Asia from various perspectives, by way of cartoons accessible and understandable to all.

This year’s theme is "How’s IT in Asia?". With globalisation underway in a range of fields, various Asian countries are pursuing development of information technology throughout social, business, educational and industrial activities.

Eight leading cartoonists from Malaysia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, The Philippines and Thailand, have put their keen wit into 80 new cartoon works depicting the IT situations in their respective nations.

The cartoonists are Zhang Yao Ning (China), Posa Surendranath Reddy (India), Wahyu Kokkang (Indonesia), Makino Keiichi (Japan), Shin Myong-hwan (South Korea), See Yew Lee (Malaysia), Bayani "Barry" Jose (The Philippines) and Palangkorn Suradej (Thailand).

Although they have diverse methods of drawing and sketching, the messages contained in the cartoons are similar. They depict everyday situations related to information technology, and how it changes people’s lifestyle.

Zhang, born in 1951, is an art graduate from Beijing. He worked as a cartoonist for China Daily from 1980. His featured cartoon, Save the Children, shows a mother frantically trying to pull her computer-geek son from ‘inside’ the computer.

Wahyu’s piece, A Way of Getting Rich, shows a pauper in front of a computer, presumably symbolising the income disparity between the Internet-savvy generation and the computer-illiterate.

The far-reaching effects of the IT-boom is seen in Palangkorn’s work, Everywhere is Comfort, where a farmer sitting on his water buffalo uses his laptop to catch a football game.

Internet-style romance is the subject broached by See, director of art at United Publishing House and an editorial cartoonist, who portrays the craze of online chatting in Charm of Internet.

The advancement of information technology in Korea and Japan have propelled both countries to new heights in IT-related gadget invention, portrayed in cartoons by Keiichi and Shin.

This exhibition is jointly organised by The Japan Foundation and The National Library of Malaysia. The exhibition takes place at the National Library of Malaysia at Jalan Tun Razak, Kuala Lumpur from Nov 10 till Nov 30. Viewing hours: 10am-7pm (Tuesday-Friday); 9am-7pm (Saturday); 10am-5pm (Sunday). Closed on Mondays. Free admission. Call 03-2161-2104.