Jiro Taniguchi
was a Japanese manga writer/artist. His works belong to the gekiga, or "dramatic pictures", genre of manga. In France he was knighted a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2011. Career Taniguchi began his career as an assistant of manga artist Kyuuta Ishikawa. He made his manga debut in 1970 with Kareta Heya (A Desiccated Summer), published in the magazine Young Comic. From 1978 to 1986, he created several hard-boiled comics with the scenarist Natsuo Sekigawa, such as City Without Defense, The Wind of the West is White and Lindo 3. From 1987 to 1996, Taniguchi and Natsuo Sekigawa produced the 5-volume series Botchan no Jidai. In the 1990s, he came up with several albums, among which were , {{nihongo|Chichi no Koyomi|父の暦}}, and . From 1980 to 1983, he collaborated with Garon Tsuchiya for the manga , and . He illustrated Baku Yumemakura’s works, Garouden from 1989 to 1990 and Kamigami no itadaki (The Summit of the Gods) from 2000 to 2003. He later received awards at the Angoulême International Comics Festival in 2002 and 2005. For Kamigami no itadaki, he hiked to Kathmandu, Nepal for research. In 1997, he created the Ikaru (Icarus) series with