First off, I need to disclaimer this post by stating that I am not from Japan, so this list is certainly not meant to be comprehensive but more a subset of Japanese illustrators that happen to speak to my own aesthetic taste. For brevity, I’ll defer to A Brief History of Japanese Illustration for a historical overview of Japanese illustration. Also, see Google Art and Culture’s Ukiyo-e section to see some amazing historical woodblock works.
More effort was put in to curation then commentary this time around since I kept finding amazing illustrators to add. As usual, click through to visit artist’s page!
While I’m drawn to the his more scenic work, I feel I should also mention that Hiroyuki Izutsu has some amazing portrait work as well.
Japan offers so many amazing contemporary illustrators—and these were just a subset—I’d also encourage you to search for Manga, Ukiyo-e, and Japanese woodblock prints, as well as play around on Google Arts and Culture to learn more about the rich history of Japanese illustration.
Previous in series: Background Details. Next in series: Bay Area Illustrators. Also, you may like one of my other illustration teardowns.
Rob Levin is a freelance illustrator. Portfolio: https://roblevin.myportfolio.com/ For illustration work enquiries, collaboration, or to say hi: roblevinillustration@gmail.com.
Also, you may like to read more of the illustration teardowns articles.
