Adachi Mitsuru
Mitsuru Adachi is one of the best and most famous manga artist in Japan. There's a saying there that "If a high school teacher don't know who Mitsuru Adachi is, he/she shouldn't be a high school teacher". He's works are mostly about the sweat, tears and loves of Japanese youth, and sports related most of the time. Often, his works strike cords of his readers, and anyone reading them will reflect back or look forward to their youth, laughing and crying with his characters (at least I did).
I'm constantly amazed by how simplistic and yet powerful his art style is. His drawings are deceivingly simple, yet the characters have perfectly drawn figures and proportions, and the backgrounds and props are photo-realistic.
Unfortunately, he is barely known in North America. Hopefully, we can see more of his work published here in the future.
