BLEACH Announces New 25th Anniversary Art Exhibition for 2027

Tite Kubo’s original BLEACH artwork is heading back on the road, with a brand-new touring exhibition announced for 2027 as the manga’s 25th anniversary celebrations continue to grow.

BLEACH began serialization in Weekly Shonen Jump in 2001, following Ichigo Kurosaki after he gains the powers of a Soul Reaper and becomes caught up in conflicts spanning the human world, Soul Society and several supernatural factions.

The manga concluded in 2016 after 74 volumes, but Kubo has continued creating new BLEACH material and illustrations in the years since, while the return of the anime and several new projects have brought the franchise into another major period of activity.

The “BLEACH EX. II” exhibition is scheduled to begin in summer 2027 and will serve as a follow-up to the original “BLEACH EX.,” once again placing Kubo’s artwork at the center of a large-scale exhibition dedicated to the series.

The first “BLEACH EX.” exhibition opened in Tokyo in December 2021 as part of the manga’s 20th anniversary celebrations before traveling to additional locations across Japan, giving fans the opportunity to see original drawings and illustrations from Kubo’s extensive archive in person.

Shueisha has yet to reveal the opening venue, exact dates, ticket information, or complete contents for BLEACH EX. II, making the exhibition one of the biggest new anniversary projects still waiting for a more detailed announcement.

The exhibition announcement arrives alongside the return of one of the largest published collections of Kubo’s work, with Shueisha reviving BLEACH Illustrations JET for the first time in almost eight years.

Image by Charlotte Davis

BLEACH Artbook JET 2026 I and BLEACH Artbook JET 2026 II bring back the artwork collected for the original 2018 JET release while expanding the archive with illustrations Kubo has produced since those books were originally published.

The first BLEACH Illustrations JET arrived in December 2018 as a deluxe made-to-order collection containing more than 700 illustrations, with its limited production eventually making complete copies increasingly difficult to find through regular retailers.

Rather than simply reproducing the previous books, the 2026 editions add more recent BLEACH artwork alongside illustrations from Kubo’s BURN THE WITCH series.

The newer material includes work connected to BLEACH: No Breaths From Hell, known in Japan as Gokui Meimei-hen, the special manga chapter published after the conclusion of the original series.

Shueisha is retaining the same types of ink and paper used for the original JET collection, preserving much of the presentation associated with the 2018 edition while dividing the artwork between two individually sold volumes.

Neither book includes illustrations created specifically for the 2026 editions, with the additional material instead collecting Kubo’s work produced during the years since JET originally appeared.

The BURN THE WITCH bonus comic packaged with the 2018 release is also not included this time, meaning the new books expand the illustration archive without completely reproducing every extra included with the original set.

BLEACH Artbook JET 2026 I contains 304 pages, while BLEACH Artbook JET 2026 II contains 216 pages, resulting in more than 500 pages of Kubo artwork across the two-volume collection.

BLEACH Artbook JET 2026 I is priced at ¥4,400 (approx. $28 USD / £20 GBP), while BLEACH Artbook JET 2026 II costs ¥3,740 (approx. $23 USD / £17 GBP), with both Japanese-language volumes currently available to pre-order through select international retailers.

Both books will officially release in Japan on October 2, 2026.

The JET collection is directly connected to another new anniversary project called BLEACH ART SELECTION, which marks the franchise’s first popularity vote centered entirely around Kubo’s illustrations.

Around 100 pieces featured across the two JET 2026 books have been selected for the poll, allowing fans to choose their favorite artwork from across different periods of BLEACH’s history.

Voting began on August 10 and continues through August 30, with participants able to cast one vote each day throughout the campaign.

The final results will reduce the selection to 25 winning illustrations, with the complete ranking set to be announced on October 2 alongside the release of the new JET books.

Those 25 illustrations will then be assembled into a special promotional video created for BLEACH’s 25th anniversary, turning the fan vote into a larger showcase of Kubo’s artwork rather than simply publishing the results as an online ranking.

The anniversary celebrations are also moving into a very different corner of the BLEACH universe through DON’T BLEACH MY FIST II, with novelist Ryohgo Narita returning for another story set inside the franchise’s alternate school setting.

The concept originally started as an April Fools’ project before Narita expanded it into a genuine novel, with the first DON’T BLEACH MY FIST released in Japan on June 4, 2026.

That story reimagines Ichigo as a new student at Gotei High while powerful students from Stern Cross Academy close in on him, turning familiar characters and factions from the main manga into parts of a deliberately different school-life scenario.

DON’T BLEACH MY FIST II will continue the story through Ichigo’s meeting with Jo Hyouzaki, leading into several incidents that appear to be connected by someone secretly manipulating events.

Shueisha has confirmed that the sequel is in development but has not announced a release date for the second novel.

BLEACH’s 25th anniversary is also unfolding while its anime works toward the conclusion of the manga’s final storyline, with BLEACH: Thousand-Year Blood War continuing through its fourth and final cour, The Calamity.

The Thousand-Year Blood War adaptation brought the anime back more than a decade after the original television series ended, finally bringing the conflict between the Soul Reapers and Wandenreich to the screen with Kubo closely involved in the production.

Bandai Namco is expanding the franchise beyond the manga and anime through BLEACH Mirrors High, an upcoming mobile game featuring an original story set after the events of the Thousand-Year Blood War.

Mirrors High allows players to create their own Soul Reaper, customize their Zanpakuto and fight alongside established characters including Ichigo, Rukia and Renji as another new story begins following the war.

With BLEACH EX. II now joining the expanded JET artbooks, BLEACH ART SELECTION fan vote, Narita’s returning school-life spin-off and new anime and game projects, the manga’s 25th anniversary is developing into a celebration that stretches across Kubo’s original artwork and the wider franchise built around it.

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