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Post by berkley on Mar 23, 2023 22:32:45 GMT -5
One of mine is Jim Starlin: I really don't like his art much from sometime around the 1980s onwards but I love his 1970s stuff. For all I know his later work might be more technically accomplished but I just don't like the look of it.
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Post by adamwarlock2099 on Mar 24, 2023 4:37:27 GMT -5
But comics are a product. Marvel and DC produce them for a profit. Is X celebrity’s cologne art? Is X instagram user’s new clothes line art? The commonality of it all is profit.
Now are the people involved in said end product in it for the profit only? Possibly not. But they’re still getting a paycheck for their labors. How many of us would still do our mundane jobs with no pay?
Lots of people here don’t like a lot of high profile artists throughout time but their comics sold like pot at a Willie Nelson concert. In the end what sells is what sells. And I’d imagine any artist whose art has changed throughout times for a selling point, his opinion of it artistically matters little if that paycheck for his popularity puts food on his family’s table.
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Post by kirby101 on Mar 24, 2023 6:58:28 GMT -5
I don't agree. Artists' styles evolve. There are many reasons for this. And yes, staying commercially viable is one. But also a changing aesthetic, the influence of other art and artists, a change in tools, a more streamlined way to work, etc. As a commercial artist, I can tell you, the results do matter, even if it is "for pay. And BTW ALL artist work for pay. Whether the art is being published or selling in a gallery. Listen to almost any interview with a comic artist and you hear how much they cared about the art. Even John Buscema, who did not care about comics, cared deeply about the art he produced.
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Post by tonebone on Mar 24, 2023 8:30:48 GMT -5
He was wrong. We hated it. He wasn't wrong. He loved it. He didn't care what you thought. I loved it too. I first found him in Star Wars, as a kid, and loved the look of his work. A lot of Star Wars was people sitting in spaceships... his "always in motion" angular style really added some life, I thought.
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Post by impulse on Mar 24, 2023 8:50:30 GMT -5
If you go high up enough, from a certain perspective everyone is selling themselves for money, and the lucky ones find a ratio of earnings and internal satisfaction, whether that is artistic authenticity or something else, that they are happy with.
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Post by Cei-U! on Mar 24, 2023 9:30:59 GMT -5
Yes, comic books are a product but considering how abysmally the industry paid compared to other kinds of commercial art (at least until the mid-80s), virtually nobody drawing them was in it strictly for the money. They had to love the medium or else why bother?
Cei-U! I summon the simple truth!
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Post by MDG on Mar 24, 2023 10:50:01 GMT -5
Yes, comic books are a product but considering how abysmally the industry paid compared to other kinds of commercial art (at least until the mid-80s), virtually nobody drawing them was in it strictly for the money. They had to love the medium or else why bother? Cei-U! I summon the simple truth! Yeah, and there's always been that balance of the artists who could work on a "production schedule" that allowed them to make a living wage and still do good work, or great work, or work they could be proud of. And a lot of acclaimed artists couldn;t do it, or couldn't do it for long.
And because of scheduling problems on their end or the publisher's, they might sometimes have to make shortcuts, whether that's fudging anatomy, leaving out backgrounds, or calling in Sal Trapani to ghost part of it.
I went to a lecture by Gene Yang (Superman Smashes the Klan) yesterday and in answer to a question from one of the students, he went into detail on the difference of making a living according to what he called "the superhero model"--basically a page rate and regular checks--and the graphic novel model, which is closer to traditional publishing (where you sign a contract and get an advance followed by other payments according to the contract).
That's why it's hard to compare all cartoonists and how they choose to produce what they produce.
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Post by mikelmidnight on Mar 24, 2023 11:17:52 GMT -5
One of mine is Jim Starlin: I really don't like his art much from sometime around the 1980s onwards but I love his 1970s stuff. For all I know his later work might be more technically accomplished but I just don't like the look of it. Unfortunately, I agree with you re: Starlin. I don't think anyone has mentioned ROBERT CRUMB here. His art in the 60s was very loose and cartoony, but as he's gotten older his drawings have become more realistic and obsessively detailed. He's completely reversed the standard pattern.
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Post by adamwarlock2099 on Mar 25, 2023 9:16:35 GMT -5
Yes, comic books are a product but considering how abysmally the industry paid compared to other kinds of commercial art (at least until the mid-80s), virtually nobody drawing them was in it strictly for the money. They had to love the medium or else why bother? Cei-U! I summon the simple truth! I can agree to that. I take pride in how I do my job. No one outside my supervisor or coworkers will ever know. But its important to myself to be proud of my own work than it is other’s opinion.
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Post by Calidore on Mar 25, 2023 12:54:51 GMT -5
Surprised nobody has yet mentioned Bill Sienkiewicz, who seemingly discovered that plugging his pencil into an electrical socket and drawing while being zapped* did interesting things to his art.
* Possibly not how it actually happened. Don't try this at home.
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Post by MDG on Mar 25, 2023 13:14:26 GMT -5
Surprised nobody has yet mentioned Bill Sienkiewicz, who seemingly discovered that plugging his pencil into an electrical socket and drawing while being zapped* did interesting things to his art. * Possibly not how it actually happened. Don't try this at home. I think Sienkiewicz is an extraordinary talent, but I'll agree that some of what he does doesn't really work for comics.
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Post by kirby101 on Mar 25, 2023 14:11:43 GMT -5
He's moved beyond comics.
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Post by Calidore on Mar 25, 2023 19:16:41 GMT -5
Surprised nobody has yet mentioned Bill Sienkiewicz, who seemingly discovered that plugging his pencil into an electrical socket and drawing while being zapped* did interesting things to his art. * Possibly not how it actually happened. Don't try this at home. I think Sienkiewicz is an extraordinary talent, but I'll agree that some of what he does doesn't really work for comics. Oh, that's not what I was saying at all. That is, extraordinary talent, yes, but I think he works fine for comics. I should add the caveat that I haven't seen much if any of his comics work since the '90s.
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Post by adamwarlock2099 on Mar 26, 2023 13:00:51 GMT -5
One of the few things his art has worked with for me. And thats because of my familiarity with game this comic is from. Otherwise i find his art incomprehensible.
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Post by tonebone on Mar 26, 2023 18:05:33 GMT -5
He wasn't wrong. He loved it. He didn't care what you thought. I loved it too. I first found him in Star Wars, as a kid, and loved the look of his work. A lot of Star Wars was people sitting in spaceships... his "always in motion" angular style really added some life, I thought. Here I go, replying to my own post... I was reading the Alex Toth book "Setting the Standard" featuring a ton of Toth's work in the 50's, and I started noticing that every once in a while, he would draw a profile of a character that would look very Infantino-influenced... sometimes looking like very late Infantino, in fact. I guess it could be Toth influencing him, tho...
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