The Art Of Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind Artbook (Hardcover) Review

-Written by: Andrew

I have had the pleasure of looking through “The Art of Nausicaa of The Valley of The Wind Artbook” which is full of frames, sketches, and concepts from both the manga and movie of Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind by Hayao Miyazaki.

This book has three main sections. The first and biggest section is the artwork section. The second section is about the animation techniques used in creating the movie. As someone who went to college for animation, this was a very fascinating section to read through. The third section is the backstory of the creation of Nausicaa. I actually really like how they set this up. If you are looking at this purely for the art you can just flip through most of this book with little interruption. If you want to learn more about the story and movie you can look near the back and get all that information.

As I hinted at, most of the pages in this book are pure art, whether it is a single big picture or many smaller works. You won't hit too many words until you get to the second section. The only words that really show up before then are on "chapter" pages and to describe an odd picture here and there. Many of the sketches and artwork in the book are in beautiful watercolor. If it doesn't fall into this category, the artwork will likely be line art or a cell/frame from the movie.

This is an absolutely beautiful book with breathtaking artwork. I always enjoy seeing the building blocks of stories and seeing what could have been, and this artbook does just that. If you love Nausicaa or you just want to look at amazing artwork, I think that you should treat yourself and pick up this artbook!