Hajime Sorayama was born the eldest son of a carpenter in 1947 in Ehime Prefecture, Japan. At school, he scored low in physical education and music, but received top grades in art. When he was in high school, he did pen-and-ink drawings of airplanes and ships. Sorayama entered Shikoku Gakuin university in 1965. After the publication of PINK JOURNAL in 1967, he left the school and entered the Chuo Art School. Graduating in 1969, he was hired at an advertising firm as a comprehensive illustrator. He began working independently as a free-lance illustrator in 1972. Sorayama drew his first robot in 1978. His books and videos include SEXY ROBOTS (Genko-Sha, 1983), PINUP (Graphic-Sha, 1985), ILLUSTRATION VIDEO (Fuji Television, 1985), VENUS ODYSSEY (Tokuma Communications, 1985), POSTER BOOK SEXY ROBOT (Taco, Berlin, 1989), HAJIME SORAYAMA (Taco, 1989), and HYPER ILLUSTRATIONS (Bijutsu Shuppan-Sha, 1989), THE GYNOIDS (Treville 1993) NAGA (Sakuhin-sha 1997), TORTURE (Sakuhin-sha 1998.)

(Excerpted from "Hyper Illustrations II")