Renji “Range” Murata (born October 2, 1968 in Osaka) is a Japanese artist and designer, known for his unique style combining Art Deco and Japanese anime elements. He is best known for his conceptual design work on anime series Last Exile and Blue Submarine No. 6.
He began his career in the early 1990s doing design work for video games. He still continues to do some work in this area today, having recently done the character designs for the PlayStation 2 game Spy Fiction.
He has published more than a dozen books of his work, some of the most notable being robot, rule, and futurhythm. He is also voted “Best Artist of the Year” 2006 in the Seiun Award.
With his trademark style doe eyed, petite female characters, often exhibiting subtle sexual innuendo, Murata-san’s illustrations can sometimes run dangerously into Lolicon territory. That said, there is no debate that the artwork is always done in excellent taste, and the design and technical artistry top notch.
