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Bob Kane's paintings - where are they?

Started by tilleycs,

36 posts in this topic

Stromm

Stromm

Posted
Posted
who knows what to think of it

but it may not actually be a real design sheet as Bob Kane stated he created Batman in 1939, yet this piece is dated 1934. It may be a piece he did later, or maybe not a Kane piece.

 

It could also fit into another category - the one where Bob was continually "pre-dating" stuff he drew. For instance there are numerous oversized drawing of batman that we know were drawn by Kane in the 60s-70s period that have things like "Batman 1939" signed onto them, indicating to many that the pieces would have been drawn in 1939 - which falsely indicates to fans in incorrect date of creation for those pieces.

 

If you ever met Bob, you would know he had an ego the size of the Empire State Building and at times he would make "revisionist" statements to boost his stature (for what reasons I'll never know seeing as he had everything to be proud of concerning Batman)

 

another thing is that Kane's seminal drawings of Batman did not look like the Batman we know and the image above looks like he finished his design. But it is known that his Uncle at DC (I can't remember which one was his uncle dammit - Jack Adler maybe?) had mentioned numerous changes, resulting in the 1939 Batman look.

 

I suggest that Jim Steranko might be able to better judge what that piece is above & to better detail the creation of Batman and that his "History of Comics vol 1+2" would be helpful as it has a top-quality description of Batman's creation

 

Thanks for your input, everything you wrote about BK, I have heard or read before. I'll have to check out the Steranko book.

Also, you can see a picture of this in Wizard #135, on page 86, at the bottom, in an article about Bob Kane and Batman.

 

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Speedy-D

Speedy-D

Posted
Posted

It was strongly suggested in the book "Men of Tomorrow," by Gerard Jones, that Kane paid a woman (name escapes me right now) to do the "fine art" paintings for him. Also that he never paid her!

 

As for whether Finger & Robinson's lack of credits for Batman work is fair, I'd say it's not fair, but it's also not uncommon. I work for an agency that makes Web sites, and anything I create is their property. I just get a paycheck. If I should one day invent the next big thing online, while doing a job for one of our clients, it'll be the property of my employer. I don't think there's much threat of my doing that though!

 

When this results in something as monumental as Batman, it must be very painful.

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comicartcom

comicartcom

Posted
Posted

Buyatari.. I do not think it's fake Kane art. It looks like Kane art to me. I dispute what it appears to be however & I wouldn't doubt that it's something that Bob did at a much later date than 1934.. maybe even in the 1960s to support some "revisionist" story he may have been telling or to boost his ego ("oh yeah I created Batman when Shakespeare was alive before Arthur Conan Doyle ever created Sherlock Holmes.. here's the proof")

 

people are strange. here is a true story:

 

about 20 years ago, I was contacted by a golden/silver age artist of one of the top 5 comic characters. He had artwork.

 

So I go to his house & I buy about 20 pages of art - none of which was his stuff and all by top artists he worked with - and I buy 2 GA covers by him. I also spoke to him about making recreations and selling them, but only exclusively. We agreed to a deal and when I came back to town for a convention, I went over again and he had 2 full color recreations of the same 2 comic covers I had bought from him earlier. Great, now I can start selling his recreations.

 

Well, a few weeks later, someone calls me trying to sell recreations by the guy. Naturally miffed, I called him up & after we spoke, he withdrew from the other guy (as he should have).

 

In the meantime, I had started scrutinizing the 2 GA covers he sold me because I had looked at one of the comics at a convention to match with them & I noticed a difference in one. So I took 35mm shots, got slides produced, put the 2 GA covers on the wall and projected the comic images over them. I was pretty angry when I realized that the 2 covers were recreations!! The lines did not properly match, some minor things were missing or even there was a line that wasn't supposed to be there.

 

I called him up and was pretty mad, but I kept my cool as I told him what I had found and finally after quite a bit of prodding, he admitted that the 2 were recreations. I didn't pay alot for them, so I just put them out as recreations and sold them and of course, I was done with him because I'm not going to trust him anymore.

 

so here we have an artist, and even though we could have sold lots of his recreations, for whatever reason his ego made him try this scam on me. It was actually quite surprising as he was clearly a very intelligent and very likable guy, he was a very well known artist and having done one of the top characters could have made lots of money.

 

You never know what some of these guys are thinking, so when I see stuff like this from a guy we all know as an egotist (Kane) and think of the things I know.. I just wonder what the ferq is going on

 

by the way. I have left the artist in my story un-named because I do not choose to tarnish his name publicly. A small few people (also un-named) do know of what I write about.

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Koko

Koko

Posted
Posted

Listers,

Greg Theakston here. I ghosted Kane's last eight paintings. Maybe ghosted isn't the right term, as he presented me with full pencils which I corrected then painted. All Batman pieces, done on double-weight illustration board in acrylics, and I even signed for Kane. Bob allowed me to transfer the drawings to fresh board and I got to keep the pencils!

I have no idea where the paintings got to.

Regards,

Greg Theakston

Pure Imagination.info

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buyatari

buyatari

Posted
Posted
Buyatari.. I do not think it's fake Kane art. It looks like Kane art to me. I dispute what it appears to be however & I wouldn't doubt that it's something that Bob did at a much later date than 1934.. maybe even in the 1960s to support some "revisionist" story he may have been telling or to boost his ego ("oh yeah I created Batman when Shakespeare was alive before Arthur Conan Doyle ever created Sherlock Holmes.. here's the proof")

 

people are strange. here is a true story:

 

about 20 years ago, I was contacted by a golden/silver age artist of one of the top 5 comic characters. He had artwork.

 

So I go to his house & I buy about 20 pages of art - none of which was his stuff and all by top artists he worked with - and I buy 2 GA covers by him. I also spoke to him about making recreations and selling them, but only exclusively. We agreed to a deal and when I came back to town for a convention, I went over again and he had 2 full color recreations of the same 2 comic covers I had bought from him earlier. Great, now I can start selling his recreations.

 

Well, a few weeks later, someone calls me trying to sell recreations by the guy. Naturally miffed, I called him up & after we spoke, he withdrew from the other guy (as he should have).

 

In the meantime, I had started scrutinizing the 2 GA covers he sold me because I had looked at one of the comics at a convention to match with them & I noticed a difference in one. So I took 35mm shots, got slides produced, put the 2 GA covers on the wall and projected the comic images over them. I was pretty angry when I realized that the 2 covers were recreations!! The lines did not properly match, some minor things were missing or even there was a line that wasn't supposed to be there.

 

I called him up and was pretty mad, but I kept my cool as I told him what I had found and finally after quite a bit of prodding, he admitted that the 2 were recreations. I didn't pay alot for them, so I just put them out as recreations and sold them and of course, I was done with him because I'm not going to trust him anymore.

 

so here we have an artist, and even though we could have sold lots of his recreations, for whatever reason his ego made him try this scam on me. It was actually quite surprising as he was clearly a very intelligent and very likable guy, he was a very well known artist and having done one of the top characters could have made lots of money.

 

You never know what some of these guys are thinking, so when I see stuff like this from a guy we all know as an egotist (Kane) and think of the things I know.. I just wonder what the ferq is going on

 

by the way. I have left the artist in my story un-named because I do not choose to tarnish his name publicly - even though he is no longer with us. A small few people (also un-named) do know of what I write about.

 

I said it looks like a poorly done fake and it does.

 

Perhaps it is a poorly done fake by Bob Kane ?

 

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tilleycs

tilleycs

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Listers,

Greg Theakston here. I ghosted Kane's last eight paintings. Maybe ghosted isn't the right term, as he presented me with full pencils which I corrected then painted. All Batman pieces, done on double-weight illustration board in acrylics, and I even signed for Kane. Bob allowed me to transfer the drawings to fresh board and I got to keep the pencils!

I have no idea where the paintings got to.

Regards,

Greg Theakston

Pure Imagination.info

 

Wow, thanks for sharing that. I had no idea how many cans I'd inadvertently opened up when I posted this topic! I was just curious if anyone had any info. Wow, pull a loose thread and sometimes the whole sweater unravels.

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comicartcom

comicartcom

Posted
Posted

I vaguely remember Greg telling me about this at that time when I was at his appartment years ago.. It just adds to the fact that Kane was an egotist who liked to take credit for lots of things he didn't do.

 

Why people do that is a mystery because as I said earlier in this thread, Kane's reputation as a legendary creator of Batman was all the guy would ever need. I guess he had something inside him that made him feel slighted, and the only way to boost his feelings were to "verbally improve upon his life". Too bad, it's just a tarnish.

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shiverbones

shiverbones

Posted
Posted
What do you think of this comicartcon?

 

bobkane1.jpg

 

EAGLE-MAN, eh?

 

Wonder why he never took off?

 

Never took off . . .

 

hm

 

:)

 

:grin:

 

lol

 

the fakest of fakes I have ever seen. The Edges are painted with Burnt Sienna paint, just ludicrous. Also the actual deckled edge of the paper is light years beyond what Kane would have used for such a piece. That sort of paper is reserved for well thought out works, not idea pieces.

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