Mikiko Ponczeck (born February 2, 1984, in

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

) is a German- Japanese

comic book A comic book, comic-magazine, or simply comic is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panel (comics), panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are often accompanied by descriptive prose and wri ...

and

manga artist A manga artist, also known as a mangaka (), is a Cartoonist, comic artist who writes and/or illustrates manga. Most manga artists study at an art college or manga school or take on an apprenticeship with another artist before entering the indus ...

Early life

Due to her father's line of work, Mikiko has moved a lot in her childhood, which resulted in her growing up learning many languages and living in places such as

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

and

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

. She is fluent in German, English, Japanese and French.
In 1999 she moved to Germany, where she finished school.
Until August 2016 she lived in

Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in the state after Cologne and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants, seventh-largest city ...

, Germany. Currently she lives and works in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

Career

In August 2007, Mikiko published her first graphic novel ''Lost and Found'' at an indie publisher called The Wild Side. This, as well as her following artbook was released under her early online handle, Zombiesmile.
Mikiko was hired as a

graphic designer A graphic designer is a practitioner who follows the discipline of graphic design, either within companies or organizations or independently. They are professionals in design and visual communication, with their primary focus on transforming ...

at the Wild Side Publishing for a few years, where she was learned graphic design for packaging and lettering. She also translated English manga into German. At the release of her artbook ''BLUE'', she gave a detailed interview to the Koneko magazine (issue 33, July/August 2009).
In 2010 she was approached by the German branch of

Tokyopop Tokyopop (styled TOKYOPOP; formerly known as Mixx Entertainment) is an American distributor, licensor and publisher of anime, manga, manhwa and Western manga-style works. The German publishing division produces German translations of licens ...

, to participate in an

anthology In book publishing, an anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler; it may be a collection of plays, poems, short stories, songs, or related fiction/non-fiction excerpts by different authors. There are also thematic and g ...

project as an ''hommage to the Grimm's Manga'' series, which has been published in July 2011. With her contribution of ''

King Thrushbeard "King Thrushbeard" () or the haughty princess (German: ''die hochmütige Prinzessin'') is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm (KHM 52). It is of Aarne–Thompson type 900. Origin The tale was published by the Brothers Grimm i ...

'' her work is published alongside famous German comic artists such as Anike Hage ( Gothic Sports), Anna Hollmann, Inga Steinmetz, Nina Werner and Reyhan Yildirim. Early 2010, she was active as an online tutor for the Comicademy for their 'Scribble Club' course. In the same year she was hired as a

colorist In comics, a colorist is responsible for adding color to black-and-white line art. For most of the 20th century this was done using brushes and dyes which were then used as guides to produce the printing plates. Since the late 20th century it is ...

for ''Rombies'', a comic written by

Tom Taylor Tom Taylor (19 October 1817 – 12 July 1880) was an English dramatist, critic, biographer, public servant, and editor of Punch (magazine), ''Punch'' magazine. Taylor had a brief academic career, holding the professorship of English literatu ...

and illustrated by Skye Ogden, for Gestalt Publishing. Shortly after she also illustrated M.I.D.A.S. in collaboration with Taylor (writer) and Justin Randall (cover) which was finally released in 2016.
Throughout her freelancing years she has contributed various work for Subway (franchise), Animexx (German anime community), and Fireangels Publishing. In 2011, she participated in a charity-auction organised by the German branch of

to raise money for the

2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami On 11 March 2011, at 14:46:24 Japan Standard Time, JST (05:46:24 UTC), a 9.0–9.1 Submarine earthquake, undersea megathrust earthquake occurred in the Pacific Ocean, east of the Oshika Peninsula of the Tōhoku region. It lasted approx ...

victims. At the end of the year, she was featured in an episode of Aufgezeichnet.tv, reviewing manga and graphic novels for the first time, and is now working as a presenter and reviewer on a regular basis for their online channel. In July 2012, her profile on

deviantArt DeviantArt (formerly styled as deviantART and thus abbreviated as dA) is an American online community that features artwork, videography, photography, and literature, launched on August 7, 2000, by Mathew Stephens, Scott Jarkoff and Angelo Sotir ...

reached one million pageviews. ''Grimms Manga Sonderband'' won the ''AnimaniA Award'' for Best National Manga in the same month, while her debut ''Lost And Found'' came in second. Starting in February 2013, she hosted an online

livestream Livestreaming, live-streaming, or live streaming is the streaming media, streaming of video or Digital audio, audio in real-time communication, real time or near real time. While often referred to simply as ''streaming'', the real-time nature ...

show called ''J-MAG'', which airs biweekly on

MyVideo MyVideo was a German video hosting service website, provided by Magic Internet based in Bucharest, Romania and later in Berlin. It was available in German (myvideo.de, myvideo.ch, and myvideo.at) until April 2016. According to Alexa Internet, t ...

, a German video portal similar to

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

. The show revolves around

Anime is a Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, , in Japan and in Ja ...

Manga are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long history in earlier Japanese art. The term is used in Japan to refer to both comics ...

, Japanese culture and popculture. In 2015 she worked for

Nintendo is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles. The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...

, providing cover artwork for the EU release of Fossil Fighters: Frontier and Teddy Together in 2016. 2016 in may, she was invited to the German educational children's show

Tigerenten Club Tigerenten Club is a German children's television programme. The programme involves a mix of games, quizzes, cartoons and outside reports from the presenters and children, with the aim to educate and entertain. It is produced by SWR in co-operatio ...

along with popsinger

Jamie-Lee Kriewitz Jamie-Lee Kriewitz (; born 18 March 1998), better known as Jamie-Lee, is a German pop singer. Born and raised in Bennigsen, Hanover, she performed as a member of the children choir Joyful Noise before auditioning for the The Voice of Germany (sea ...

for a guest appearance, soon after she won the prestigious German

Max & Moritz Prize The Max und Moritz Award (German language, German:Max und Moritz-Preis), also known as the Max & Moritz Prize , is a prize for comic books, comic strips, and other similar materials. It has been awarded at each of the biennial International Comi ...

for her comic Crash'n'Burn. 2018 Mikiko's short story 'Crimson' appeared in the anthology Traces of the Great War alongside

Bryan Talbot Bryan Talbot (born 24 February 1952) is a British comics artist and writer, best known as the creator of '' The Adventures of Luther Arkwright'' and its sequels '' Heart of Empire'' and '' The Legend of Luther Arkwright'', as well as the ''Gra ...

, Mary Talbot,

Ian Rankin Sir Ian James Rankin (born 28 April 1960) is a Scottish crime writer and philanthropist, best known for his Inspector Rebus novels. Early life Rankin was born in Cardenden, Fife. His father, James, owned a grocery shop, and his mother, Isobel ...

Dave McKean David McKean (born 29 December 1963) is an England, English artist. His work incorporates drawing, painting, photography, collage, found objects, digital art, and sculpture. McKean has illustrated works by authors such as S. F. Said, S.F. Said, ...

Charlie Adlard Charles Adlard (born 4 August 1966) is a British comic book artist known for his work on books such as '' The Walking Dead'' and '' Savage''. Career Adlard began his work in the UK on ''White Death'' with Robbie Morrison and '' 2000 AD'' serie ...

Juan Díaz Canales Juan Díaz Canales is a Spanish comics artist and an animation, animated film director, known as the co-creator of ''Blacksad''. Biography At an early age, Juan Díaz Canales became interested in comics and their creation, which progressed and b ...

, Victoria Lomasko and more international artists. This project was released in October in both the UK and France, for the centenary of the First World War to remember the impact it has had across cultures and borders to this day. In the same year she began working for

Adobe Adobe (from arabic: الطوب Attub ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for mudbrick. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is use ...

on social media as a promoter and regularly appears on stage at comic shows such as

MCM London The MCM Comic Con London (formerly known as the London Movies, Comics, and Media Expo, London MCM Expo, and MCM London Comic Con) is a speculative fiction fan convention held at ExCel London twice yearly since 2002, usually on the last weeken ...

and

Leipzig book fair The Leipzig Book Fair () is the second largest book fair in Germany after the Frankfurt Book Fair. The fair takes place annually over four days at the Leipzig Trade Fairground in the northern part of Leipzig, Saxony. It is the first large trad ...

Work

* ''Lost and Found'', 2007 August / ''The Wild Side'' / * ''Manga-Mixx 5'', 2008 / ''Animexx'' (Coverillustration) * ''BLUE (Artbook)'', 2009 September / ''The Wild Side'' / * ''Grimms Manga Sonderband'', 2011 July / ''Tokyopop'' / * ''Rombies'', 2011 / ''Gestalt Publishing'' * ''Lost and Found'', 2011 September/ ''Tokyopop'' / * ''BLUE (Artbook)'', 2011 Oktober/ ''Tokyopop'' / * ''Grimms Manga Sonderband - Perfect Edition'', 2013 January / ''Tokyopop'' / * ''Crash 'n' Burn'', 2 volumes, 2014 / ''Tokyopop'' / / * ''Scars'', 2015 November/ ''Pyramond'' / *''miki's mini comics,'' May 2017/ ''Pyramond''/ *''Traces of the Great War,'' November 2018/ ''Image Comics/''

References

Mikiko's websiteMikiko's webcomicsMikiko on deviantART

Tokyopop Germany

Max & Moritz Prize page

External links

Aufgezeichnet.tv

J-MAG on MyVideo
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ponczeck, Mikiko Claire 1984 births Living people German comics artists German female comics artists