Yoshitaka Amano: meeting with the teacher at Lucca Comics and Games 2022

Yoshitaka Amano

Lucca Comics and Games 2022 never ceases to amaze with its exceptional guests. The incredible meeting with master Yoshitaka Amano takes place on October 30th. The internationally renowned Japanese artist talks about the highlights of his career, from figurative art to the world of videogames and animation.



Yoshitaka Amano

The beginnings of Yoshitaka Amano

I started as a character designer in the animation sector. I was inspired a lot by Superman and Batman, fictional characters, but linked to the real world. When I was a kid it was very difficult to find American comics. I used to go to a small area of ​​Tokyo to find them, and it was mostly Neal Adams comics.

The first works in the animation sector are very different from the style we know today. So when did Yoshitaka Amano begin to give life to those unique and unmistakable, almost dreamlike and ethereal images?

I wanted to start building my own style. When a person starts doing this work, he can't just look at himself. It is clear that I began to look at others to try to understand how they worked, because I was at the beginning. It wasn't just an internal creative process but I started looking around. Further on, the important thing for a creative was to start facing challenges and experimenting, that's what makes you grow. This formed me.

The birth of Final Fantasy

After his experience at Tatsunoko, he begins an unprecedented journey within the videogame landscape. The video game embraces the art of Yoshitaka Amano in a project of the Square destined to become one of the most loved sagas by the public. It is 1987 and the first chapter of Final Fantasy is born, but the master's work actually begins some time earlier.

I had just left the world of animation and had started my work as an illustrator. They had long ago asked me to create something for an upcoming game. They wanted a main character who wasn't the classic muscular fighter. They wanted him to be thoughtful, doubtful, for a game set in a fantasy world. Almost no one had that setting, after which it became more common in Japan. | ); }

The characters of Amano for the Final Fantasy saga Simple pixel art becomes a fantastic, sensational world. The characters, with particular and often exotic clothes, gradually become those fascinating creatures of Amano, with an extremely refined taste. We are faced with a unique fantasy of its kind, with dreamy atmospheres and figures that no longer seem mere human beings.


The stories of the Japanese tradition, like that you are Samurai, are not mythology. It is a real past. In the world, Japanese history is perhaps viewed in an anthological way, but for a person from Japan it is simply part of their own history. So I wondered, what could be fantasy? Western mythologies, Greek and Egyptian, took ancient cities as starting ideas to create my worlds.

Yoshitaka Amano illustrates his creative process

When the master Amano faces a commission, he has an essential task: to give the characters the first shape, to then present his illustrations to the chatacter designers , whether it's from an anime or a video game. The creative process of the master, therefore, is at the basis of what becomes, then, the final product. The artist explains this process, which is not entirely obvious.

I have always enjoyed creating new characters. My job has always been to draw them on paper. Among the various sectors, I pass my illustrations to those who then make the final product. I know there have been a lot of changes in new technologies, but it doesn't affect me personally. My job is to create illustrations on paper. What comes next is not part of my role. As far as possible, I always hope that your work is done in the best possible way.

Other works by Yoshitaka Amano

In his long career, Amano often faces the Western world. The Sandman is the comic by Neil Gaiman, now on everyone's lips since the TV series of the same name landed on Netflix. In 1999, the maestro collaborated with the British author and cartoonist on the birth of The Sandman: The Dream Hunters. Amano talks about their first meeting and the birth of an epic collaboration.

I had a solo show in New York. DC asked me for a collaboration, and at first I made illustrations for The Sandman. After the poster, Gaiman saw it and liked it. So he asked me to work with him on a story for The Sandman. He submitted the texts to me and I made the illustrations.



Don Giovanni About Netflix, Amano's signature returns in one of the latest news of the platform: Exception, 3D anime that sees a strong combination of art and music, that of the composer Ryuichi Sakamoto. During his career, he made many famous posters of musical works, including Mozart's Don Giovanni.

Opera is not very popular in Japan, but I like it. I made many posters for some works, like Don Giovanni. For me, music is also pure art, that's why I listen to it.

The interesting conference at Lucca Comics and Games 2022 closes with Yoshitaka Amano's promise of new projects to be discovered.

Buy the limited edition Illustrated Biography of Yoshitaka Amano on Amazon