Jo Chen
Quick Facts
Biography
Jo Chen (Chinese: 咎井淳; pinyin: Jiù Jǐngchún; born July 4, 1976) is a comic book artist and writer best known for her highly detailed painted comic book covers. She is also known by the pen name, TogaQ, and is known as Jun Togai ("Togai Jun" 咎井淳) in the Japanese comic industry.
Early life
Chen was born in Taipei, Taiwan and emigrated to the United States in late 1994.
Career
Working professionally in the Asian comic book industry since age fourteen, she began her career in the U.S. comic book industry with her art work for the Racer X mini-series, part of the Speed Racer series published by Wildstorm/D.C. Comics in 2000.
She established herself producing interiors and covers for titles including Darkminds: Macropolis, Battle of the Planets, Robotech, Fight For Tomorrow, Taskmaster, The Demon, Thor, and (Batman &) Robin. Currently she is most well known to American comic readers as the cover artist of Runaways, and Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 and the current Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Nine comics published by Dark Horse Comics. She will also participate on the Whedon-Dark Horse Angel book.
In other media, Chen has also produced packaging artwork for Microsoft's popular Xbox Fable, Fable: The Lost Chapters, Fable II and Fable III RPGs, and done covers for PlayStation Magazine (a Final Fantasy cover for the January 2002 issue and a Tomb Raider cover for the February 2003 issue).
Under the pseudonym, TogaQ, she and author, Kichiku Neko (aka, Narcissus) created the yaoi doujinshi-turned manga series, In These Words. The title was eventually picked up by Japanese publisher, Libre Publishing and serialized in the boys' love comic anthology, Be x Boy Gold.
She is the younger sister of artist Christina Chen and lives with her family outside of Washington, D.C.