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80 Artists & Writers Contribute to Katsuhiro Otomo Tribute Book

Katsuhiro Ōtomo's Akira manga and film has influenced generation after generation of creative professionals around the world. Fans have created CG and live-action fan trailers and scientists even named a galaxy after his work.

Next year, 80 of Otomo's contemporaries will honor him with a tribute book. Tribute to Otomo will be available simultaneously in France and Japan and contain writing and artwork by Hiroyuki Asada (Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee), Hisashi Eguchi (Perfect Blue), Daisuke Igarashi (Children of the Sea), Atsushi Kamijou (To-Y), Masakazu Katsura (Video Girl Ai, I"S), Masashi Kishimoto (Naruto), Taiyo Matsumoto (Ping Pong), Minetarō Mochizuki (Dragon Head), Range Murata (Last Exile), Tsutomu Nihei (Knights of Sidonia), Yoshiyuki Sadamoto (Neon Genesis Evangelion), Masamune Shirow (Ghost in the Shell), Shōu Tajima (MPD-Psycho), Fumiko Takano (Kiiroi Hon), Takayuki Takeya (mechanical designer), Jiro Taniguchi (Kodoku no Gourmet), Katsuya Terada (Blood: The Last Vampire), Naoki Urasawa (Master Keaton, Monster), Sensha Yoshida (Utsurun Desu), Stan Sakai, Tomer and Asaf Hanuka, Sara Pichelli, and Aleksi Briclot.

French comic writer and novelist Benoît Peeters will pen the book's introduction. Kodansha Comics has licensed the hardcover, 168-page book and will publish it in North America in March 2017.

The volume was originally offered at France's Angoulême International Comics Festival, where Otomo won the Grand Prix award for lifetime achievement in 2015, becoming the first Japanese artist and one of only five non-French creators to take the festival's top prize. The award includes an invitation to serve as the president of the following year's festival. The other nominees for the award were Alan Moore (Watchmen, V for Vendetta) and Belgian comic artist Hermann (Jeremiah).

Source: Comic Natalie