LeftField Media to Launch Anime NYC in 2017
The pop culture events company LeftField Media is teaming with Crunchyroll, an online streaming site for anime and manga, to launch Anime NYC, a new Japanese pop culture convention that will debut November 17-19, 2017 at the Javits Convention Center in New York City.
Leftfield Media and Crunchyroll are partnering with Viz Media, Kinokuniya Bookstore and Funimation to provide support for the new anime and manga convention. Anime NYC will offer fans appearances by star anime and manga creators from Japan, extensive screenings of anime, panels and programming on manga, anime, toys, food and fashion as well as lots of cosplay.
Peter Tatara, LeftField’s head of content, said Anime NYC will take over halls 3E and 3D on the main level of the Javits Center.
Anime NYC will be the first Japanese pop culture-focused convention in New York City since the old New York Anime Festival, an anime and manga convention originally launched by Reed Exhibitions in 2007, ended sometime around 2013.
LeftField Media is headed by Greg Topalian, a former v-p at Reed Exhibition, and the original founder of New York Comic Con.
Topalian said “Anime and manga have never been more prolific in America, with anime conventions in other cities bringing together as many as 100,000 attendees. Yet while New York City is the largest city in America, no large event championing Japanese pop culture calls it home. Anime NYC will change this, and once established, we believe Anime NYC has the potential to become the largest anime convention on the East Coast.”
Dallas Middaugh, head of content management at Crunchyroll and former director of manga publishing at Kodansha in the U.S. and at Random House, said, “The LeftField team already has amazing experience working on anime shows, and it’s great to have the chance to help bring the best of anime and manga to East Coast fans at Anime NYC.”
