Personal Information
Born in Osaka in 1948, Naohisa Inoue graduated from the Kanazawa College of Art in 1971. Between 1973 and 1992, he worked as a graphic designer and a high school fine art teacher before becoming a freelance artist in 1993. He currently serves as a Professor of Art and Design at Seian University. In 1994, Inoue held his first exhibition in the Tokyo area at the Pinpoint Gallery in Minami Aoyama, showcasing paintings from The Natural History of Iblard. At the time a devoted admirer of Hayao Miyazaki's films, Inoue invited the director to the event without expecting him to attend. Miyazaki not only appeared but was so impressed that he purchased a piece titled Upward Draft, which now hangs in the Studio Ghibli staff cafeteria. Furthermore, Miyazaki invited Inoue to join the art team for Whisper of the Heart, a production directed by Yoshifumi Kondou. Several of Inoue's Iblard paintings were incorporated into the film's CGI fantasy sequence, which depicts scenes from Shizuku's first novel, The Story Baron Gave Me. Additionally, Inoue provided the voice for one of the musician characters in the film, specifically the one who compliments Shizuku's "nice vocal" following their impromptu performance of Country Roads.
