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Manga Mag Artist Keizo Tsukamoto Earns Guinness Record
posted on by Egan Loo
Keizo Tsukamoto, the cover illustrator for Houbunsha's Weekly Manga Times magazine since 1970, has received recognition from Guinness World Records for having the world's longest continuous career illustrating one magazine. Tsukamoto drew his first Weekly Manga Times cover when he was 23 years old in April of 1970. 38 years later, he is still drawing the cover art and has not missed a single weekly issue. As of last month, that adds up to 1,937 cover illustrations.
Tsukamoto is most famous for creating smiling female faces for the magazine, but he still covers a variety of subjects and media in his other pieces. He also created his own manga mascot: a rabbit named Pyonko.
It takes Tsukamoto three days to draw a typical cover illustration. He starts by drafting a piece with pencils and then finishes it with airbrushes; he still does not use any computers.
Tsukamoto has been at the magazine so long that he has gone through six editor-in-chiefs. Even his oldest son and daughter are in their 30s. He told The Yomiuri Shimbun paper that he is now aiming for 50 years.
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