Research Artist #11: CLAMP

CLAMP is actually a team of four women in Japan who create manga. Ageha Okawa writes most of the stories, and the other three, Mokona, Satsuki Igarashi, and Tsubaki Nekoi, shift roles for each project. They've tackled many different genres and different audience levels with overwhelming success. I prefer their earlier works, Cardcaptor Sakura and Magic Knight Rayearth, projects in which Mokona was the main artist. I really love the long, flowing, sweeping lines she used for those projects. The hair and outfits were intricate and absolutely beautiful. The colors in colored pictures were stunning, too (and they still are). While I don't find their recent manga as appealing, I can't deny the influence they've had on me. CLAMP is one of the factors that got me into manga/anime in the first place.
This is art from CCS and MKR:

And this is some of their more recent stuff:

Don't get me wrong, I think the art is still great! I just don't like their current stories.