Takao Saito

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This article is about the Japanese mangaka. For the Japanese cinematographer, see Takao Saito (cinematographer). For the Japanese opposition politician from the World War II era, see Saitō Takao.

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Takao Saitō (斎藤隆夫, さいとう・たかを, Takao Saitō^? born November 3, 1936) is a Japanese manga artist. He is best-known for creating the very successful series Golgo 13. He is married to fellow artist Setsuko Yamada (セツコ・山田, Setsuko Yamada^?).

1 Life
2 Selected works
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Life

Takao Saito was born on November 3, 1936 in Osaka as the son of a barber. During his school days in Osaka he was the best in his class in drawing and fighting, and also considered becoming a boxer. After graduation from Junior High School in Osaka, he decided to become a manga artist, influenced by movies like King Kong and War of the Worlds.

He debuted with his first manga Baron Air (空気男爵) in 1955. In 1958 he moved to Tokyo, where he started a comic story atelier (劇画工房) together with 7 other artists (Masahiko Matsumoto, Aki Masa Sato, Fumi Ishikawa Yasu, Masaru Sakurai, Susumu Mon, Tsu Motomi, Qi Mahi). Since April 1960, he has run Saito Production, a company with currently 19 employees. In 1971 he also started to give courses in drawing manga.

In 1976, he won the 21th Shogakukan Manga Award for seinen/general manga for Golgo 13.^[1]