A Yoshitaka Amano interlude
A piece from Yoshitaka Amano‘s book “Hiten” serves as a reminder of seasons, while comrade Nadya and I are being scorched by heinous 80 degree November heat here in Angel City. Ah yes, I vaguely recall something about death and rebirth, changes in temperature, nature’s mystery and its cycles changing gears – that sort of thing. It’s fuzzy, like a long-lost dream, really. Until weather takes mercy on us I’ll indulge in all things that remind me of what Autumn and Winter are meant to feel like. At times like these I really miss Moscow. Here’s hoping that today few of us are frying like gutted fish on yellow California pavement and for a swift arrival of rain, too.
November 15th, 2007 at 10:40 pm
The world needs more Yoshitaka Amano interludes. I think I shall reread The Dream Hunters later this evening (book Amano did with Neil Gaiman).
November 16th, 2007 at 2:15 am
Ja, his Sandman stuff won me over!
November 16th, 2007 at 2:45 am
I remember seeing a strange little animation, “Chaos”, featuring the work of Amano, full of oddly warped 2 dimensional images and, of course, his gilded, subtly toxic femmes fatales.
Never found a mention of it again, anywhere.
Alas.
November 16th, 2007 at 3:19 am
I’d totally missed those two were making a book named Thin White Duke with Bowie for main character. Only noticed two days ago.
November 16th, 2007 at 8:24 am
I absolutely love Amano’s work
In ’99 he had a breathtaking show at the Angel Orensanz Foundation just a few blocks from where I was living in lower Manhattan. Neil Gaiman gave a live reading of Dream Hunters along with a slideshow of the artwork for the book. I must have gone back at least three times.
Some years later I had the good fortune of being able to meet Mr. Amano at his studio in Soho. A perfect gentleman, he spoke mostly through a translator. I found myself a little speechless, and can scarcely believe it happened!
Has anyone seen Angel’s Egg, an animated film he designed and Mamoru Oshii directed back in 1985? It’s still one of the most faithful translations of his style to animation I’ve yet seen, and I’ve only recently been able to see the actual film on Youtube…. hopefully it’s still there. Quite extraordinary. The images of enormous coelacanth shadows flowing over the buildings in a ghost town are unforgettable.
November 16th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
I first got to know Amano through Vampire Hunter D and his work with the early Final Fantasy games. When I was in Kyoto in 2000, there was a small art gallery doing an exhibition of his work, and I managed to pick up a bunch of tchochkies. Probably the most interesting one was the tarot deck he designed. There’s only special art for the major arcana and the trumps, while the other cards just have a suit symbol repeated an appropriate number of times. It’s fuck all for divination, but it’s quite a pretty thing to pull out and look at.
July 7th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
Yoshitaka is one of my favorite artists of all time! I just bought his new graphic novel Mateki: The Magic Flute and the illustrations are out of this world! I dont know how he does it! He has a true talent thats for sure !