Kazuo Umezu, Prolific Manga Creator of Scare & Quite a pair of Genres, Dies at 88

Prolific peril manga creator Kazuo Umezu died final week on October 28. He change into 88. His family and shut mates held a private funeral.

Umezu’s art company UMEZZ issued a statement concerning his death, announcing “Umezu wanted to spread his work throughout the world, to be read by all forever. He believed in the intrinsic artistic value of his work. May that aspiration rest forever in the hearts of all.”

Shogakukan and Shogakukan-Shueisha Productions moreover issued a joint statement, announcing “Umezu leaves behind legendary works in not just horror, comedy, and science fiction manga, but also in film and in the recent 101 acrylic paintings of “Kazuo Umezz: The Great Artwork Exhibition,” with his expressive techniques transcending the boundaries of manga.”

Umezu change into born in Wakayama City in 1936, but change into raised in Nara Prefecture. He started drawing his have manga in fourth grade. He made his professional manga debut as an 18-three hundred and sixty five days-mature third-three hundred and sixty five days high college scholar with the Bessekai and Mori no Kyōdai books, printed below Tomo Books. While most attention-grabbing known for his peril and supernatural manga, Umezu moreover drew comedy manga equivalent to Makoto-chan, and moreover printed peril manga in shojo magazines, equivalent to Reptilia, which ran in Kodansha‘s Shōjo Friend magazine.

Viz printed Umezu’s The Drifting School room manga in 2006 to 2008, and released the manga digitally in 2013, with a brand new deluxe hardcover free up in 2019-2020. His varied manga encompass Cat-Eyed Boy and Orochi, amongst others. Umezu at the start retired from drawing manga in 1995 after finishing the 14-Sai manga. He later made his directorial debut in an autobiographical film titled Mom, which opened in Japan in September 2014.

Umezu’s science fiction manga My Determine Is Shingo ran in Shogakukan‘s Weekly Immense Comic Spirits in the Nineteen Eighties. His most latest work is Zoku Shingo: Chiisana Robot Shingo Bijutsukan (Sequel Shingo: Tiny Robot Shingo Artwork Museum), a sequel to My Determine Is Shingo, consisting of a sequence of 101 acrylic artwork. The work, four years in the making, debuted in January 2022 at an art exhibition featuring Umezu’s work titled “Kazuo Umezz The Great Art Exhibition.” The exhibition change into held at Tokyo City Watch from January to March 2022, and change into be held at Osaka’s Abeno Harukas Artwork Museum in September to November 2022. The Asahi Shimbun paper’s Twenty seventh Annual Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize awards honored Umezu with a special prize for the work in 2023.

Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs awarded Umezu with its Commissioner for Cultural Affairs award in March 2019, which honors “individuals who have made distinguished accomplishment in artistic and cultural activities.”

Supply: Comic Natalie