Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Illustrators and a Word on Shel

Marooned Pirate
Howard Pyle
Written 22 December, 2010

Illustrators

I don't know why I got into the recent dissertations on illustrators. I know it was triggered by my learning of the death of John Callahan, but the rest? I suppose it's because for most of us, visual artists affect us. I just wanted to share.

I always thought of myself primarily as a written word person. When, at age six or seven, I read comic books, I paid more attention to the words than to the pictures. Or so I thought. I belatedly came to realize just how important the visuals were.

There are so many artists who have affected me. All the painters-- from Da Vinci and Michelangelo and Botticelli, to Monet and Manet and Degas and Gaugin, to Goya and Picasso and Dali, to the Wyeths and Charles Russell and J.M.W. Turner. So many names to drop, so little time!

And then the illustrators! Aubrey Beardsley and Maxfield Parrish and Howard Pyle; Frank Frazetta and Nick Adams and Carl Barks; Harvey Kurtzman and John Buscema and Bernie Wrightson; R. Crumb and Gilbert Shelton and Bill Griffith. And of course, Charles Addams, Gahan Wilson, and Charles Rodrigues.

And perhaps my all-time favorite, Shel Silverstein. I'll resist writing a post about this good-humored jack-of-all-arts (at least for now), but I will point you here for a read Shel would have loved.


2 comments:

Melissa Yeuxdoux said...

Don't forget Jim Steranko; his work on Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD was sheer genius.

Cheyenne Palisades said...

I have some of those old Agent of Shield issues, Melissa. They're getting pretty valuable. I'll take a look at Steranko's art.

There are so many great illustrators, aren't there?

One I'm not impressed with is Todd. He has one last name now. I have every issues of Amazing Spider-Man and Spectacular Spider-Man from the early 70s through the early 90s, and X-Men, too. When all the other artists took their lead from Todd McFarlane and started drawing heroes as wide was houses, I just stopped bothering with Marvel and DC titles. Sad.