What are the Fullmetal Alchemist art books?
Because Hiromu Arakawa wrote and drew the manga herself, Fullmetal Alchemist's art books are single artist volumes rather than production compilations. In Japan, Square Enix issued illustration collections gathering her color work: tankobon covers, magazine color pages, poster art and promotional illustrations, printed at large size on heavy stock. These Japanese books are the source volumes from which the English art books were built.
The first English entry, The Art of Fullmetal Alchemist, arrived from Viz in 2005 while both the manga and the first anime were mid run. It collects Arakawa's early color illustrations with her own commentary, character design sketches and a look at her working methods, and for years it was the only Arakawa art book most Western fans could buy. Early printings are softcover and modestly sized by art book standards.
The definitive English volume is The Complete Art of Fullmetal Alchemist (2018), a large hardcover that gathers the full span of Arakawa's series illustration, including the kanzenban portrait covers, later color pages and celebratory reunion art drawn after the manga ended. It functions as the visual companion to the Fullmetal Edition hardcovers released the same year and is the book most collectors mean when they say the art book without qualification.
Separate from Arakawa's volumes, both anime generated their own art and setting books in Japan: model sheets, background art and Yoshiyuki Ito's or Hiroki Kanno's design work for the 2003 series and Brotherhood respectively. Those books credit the Bones staffs and cover the anime as productions. Shoppers should check the artist credit on any listing, since sellers routinely shelve anime production books and Arakawa illustration books under one search phrase.
Condition notes for buyers: the Japanese collections often shipped with obi strips and poster inserts that secondhand copies may lack, and the big English hardcover's matte jacket scuffs visibly, so a clean jacket is the premium. All of them reward the series' central collecting truth, that one artist's hand runs from the first chapter to the last illustration.
