In 2012 I was on a music tour of Japan. Itoh Benimaruh was a friend of the musician I was working with and he came out to our Tokyo shows. He was the nicest
guy and very fun to hang with. He gave me a copy of a book called Pikachu meets the press after learning I liked Pokemon. It’s a collection of comic strips that were released in US newspapers that he did the illustrations for.
He illustrated 6 cards for the tcg, my favorite being his Coro mewtwo that was reprinted as an English Black Star promo. He did 3D development for a lot of early Pokemon games. He also did early work illustrating Star Fox and Super Metroid for Nintendo Power.
These memories mean a lot to me so it’s fun to get to share them. Japan ranks at the very top of my favorite places I’ve been fortunate enough to visit.
Here’s some pictures of the comic book he signed and post cards of his work.
