Bundles of insane characters are stacked to the edges of every frame in Takayo Akiyama’s wonderfully chaotic comics. Even without the equally surreal stories, you could spend hours pouring over the uniquely weird characters, wondering what’s going on. But, there are stories, with reoccurring themes of drinking and mayhem.
Apart from the imaginative settings and people/monsters, the drawings also drew us in. There’s so much to absorb and get your head around. Best of all, it pretty much all makes you giggle. Takayo talks about all these things and the materials used.
I’m a Japanese illustrator/cartoonist based in London since 2002. My comics are often located in imaginary worlds with a twist of London pub culture.
My characters, the siamese twins are playing piano at a pub and Y-front mouse ( ex-pop star, now he’s an alcoholic mouse) is living in the cellor. I like drawing sort of rude, drunk but charming characters. I often use my experience for the stories.
I use kent board or watercolour paper. Use pencil for rough sketching then ink it with Rotring Isographs. I like 0.35 and 0.5. I guess it’s very straight forward. I use a light box to colour in. Then, I scan those then clean up in Photoshop
© Takayo Akiyama, 2013
