Fruits Basket Illustrations

Posted by Zeb in Artbook Reviews on Jun 30th, 2004 | 0 comments
Title Fruits Basket Illustrations
Artist Natsuki Takaya
Published: 21/04/2004
Publisher: Hakusensha
Content 100 pages in total (101 if you include a see through piece of paper); 88 pages of full colour illustrations; 4 title pages with colour illustrations; 6 pages of colour thumbnails with notes; 2 page afterward by artist and publishing information; Softcover.
Extras None
Cover Price ¥1600
ISBN 4-592-73220-0
Rate Excellent
Purchase 03/05/2004 | JPQUEEN.COM | US$23.90
Comments Fruits Basket is a series you’d love to hate… for a long time I refused to admit to liking it, even though I watched the entire series in one sitting. I spent a long time searching for an artbook to this series, and finally got my hands on the ‘Fruits Basket Character Book’ which was published in 2001.
Can we talk about gut wrenching dissapointment? Pure disgust? Over 100 pages of junk, about 20 pages of colour with mediocre art at best… but the rest was, IMHO, junk. Of the two artbooks I have ever sold, that book was the one I never regretted selling, even to this day.

I despaired of ever finding a great artbook for this series, until I saw an ad for it on a Japanese website in March this year. Rejoice rejoice! and on finally receiving this book, I was pleased beyond belief. This book was worth the wait!

Page after page of pretty ‘Fruits Basket’ artwork to look at… all my favourite characters in different moods and poses. The index page gives you a rundown of the illustrations in order of the year they were created (from 1998 to 2002) which is nice to know… although Takaya’s drawing style hasn’t changed much during that period, instead, it has become more refined.
What interests me the most about her work, is how she incorporates “real life” elements/textures into her work. Some of the backgrounds look more like scans of Japanese origami paper, similar textures are used to make up the cloth of coats and dresses… or kanji characters on these clothings. While the use of this technique isn’t new amongst manga-ka, Takaya is one of the few that I think has done it well.

The book itself is neatly presented; the lettering on the cover is actually silver, and the paper used to create the cover has a lovely soft matt feel (imho appropriate to the theme of this book in a way.) The illustrations are vibrant, and printed on semi-matt thick paper. There is very little waste of space, and the only gripe I could have is that some of the images could have done with having an entire page dedicated to themselves.

Other than that, the price is great for what you get. If you’re a fan of the series, buy this book! You’re not going to find anything better :)
Fruits Basket Illustrations



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