Steranko: The Greatest Comic Book Artist of the Late Silver Age?

[rjpb]

OK, since most here would rather argue over an unarguable matter of personal taste, and just to be provocative, I'll put forth the notion that ROBERT CRUMB is the greatest comic book artist of the late Silver Age. He certainly influenced more subsequent comic creators than Steranko, and arguably anyone else from the late 60s (with the possible exception of Adams). His original art from that era commands the highest prices. He produced both classic covers and amazing interiors. His artistic style was derivative of and paid homage to classic cartoonists and comic artists like Basil Wolverton, yet was wildly innovative. His work had more cultural impact than any other comic book artist of the late '60s.

 

Comments? Criticisms? Rotten tomatoes?

 

 

 

Crumb is no doubt a great artist - and for my tastes superior to the mainstream artists of the late silver age - though I feel Crumb stylistically hit his peak in the 70s - which would be more of the "bronze" era. But I leave him out of this conversation as undergrounds pretty much exist outside the metallic eras we ascribe to mainstream comics. This does become less so as we move into the direct market era and the lines between undergrounds, independents,small press and alternative comics become blurred.

[delekkerste]

Interesting, but I think many Steranko or Adams covers would easily crack 100K if they came up. Hell, Neal's repro covers sell for 10K+.

 

I don't recall seeing Adams or Steranko on the cover of any major fine art magazines recently.

 

[tth2]

I have always found John Romita and John Buscema to be good, solid artists, but not in the same tier as the real innovators who took the graphic story form to new places. Ditko and Kirby may not have looked as "pretty," but they carried comics into new territory.

 

You can be a great "illustrator" and still be a lousy graphic storyteller. Indeed, many of today's so-called "hot" artists fall into this category. Great pin-up style pages, but they don't tell a story or invest their drawings with elments that define character or mood.

 

Conversely, you can be a mediocre to poor illustrator and still be a great storyteller. The immediate example that comes to mind is my favorite comics creator: Harvey Kurtzman. Harvey's sketchy, loose, cartoony style is not that well liked nor is it equisite illustration, but his ability to lay out comic book stories and create a visual vocabulary is unchallenged. When, in the case of Mad, you team Kurtzman's layouts with polished finishes by Jack Davis, Wally Wood, and Bill Elder, you get absolutely great comics.

 

Romita and Buscema both adopted the Jack Kirby way of telling comics stories, but added no new "vocabulary." Steranko started with Jack's style but contributed innovations in panel size, page layout, use of color, and other printing techniques that broke new ground.

 

It is true that art is subjective. You may like Buscema better than Steranko. But I think if we're talking about innovative and influential, the nod clearly goes to Steranko. The only other contender from that era is Neal Adams.

 

(Don't misunderstand here. I think Romita & Buscema ARE good storytellers, just not as good as Kirby, Ditko, Steranko, Kurtzman, Eisner, etc. because they were not innovators.)

Well said, Billy. Nice to see you posting outside of the DTM thread!

[tth2]

Personally...I think Steranko's a bit overrated. Don't get me wrong...he's a very competant artist. But I would much rather look at Smith's Conan or Severin's Dr Strange than a typical Steranko page. Steranko could come up with great set pieces but panel to panel story flow wasn't his strong point. And because of that I'd have to put him way down the ladder of greatest late Silver artist...

 

Jim

I love Barry Windsor Smith, but let's not forget that it took him a few issues of the Avengers, a few issues of DD, an issue of X-Men and (depending on who you talk with) 10-15 issues of Conan before he found THE Barry Smith that everyone now speaks of so adoringly.

 

After his very brief X-Men stint, Steranko's work was already fully mature and electrified collectors from the start.

[tth2]

I realize John Buscema is well-loved on these boards, but I think "journeyman" is the accurate appraisal of his work. Not intended as a slam at his memory, and I'd put someone like Gil Kane in the same category.

 

Did you learn nothing from the last time someone called Buscema a journeyman?

 

http://boards.collectors-society.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=750868&page=&fpart=1&vc=1

 

Sorry, looks like I owe some royalties to tth2

When I started reading this thread and saw it somehow turn into a comparison of Buscema and Steranko, I had a feeling it was deja vu all over again. Obviously, I agree completely with your assessment of Buscema, although less so with Gil Kane. I lump Gil Kane and Joe Kubert in sort of a second tier of artists, whose art was dynamic, innovative and very unique, but just seemed to be missing that tiny bit of aesthetic brilliance that vaulted them up to the first tier.

[tth2]

Thanks, I have a dictionary.

 

I did intend to call Buscema and Kane experienced, capable, reliable workmen, and my reading of Websters supports that take on "journeyman." (I tend to think of it as interchangable with "craftsman.") I feel the same way about someone like Curt Swan or Irv Novick. And I like lots of stuff by these guys, no doubt. "Solid" but not brilliant. I'd reserve "brilliant" for guys like Adams, Eisner, Kurtzman, Wally Wood in his better days, and yes Steranko.

 

But since the initial feedback on this thread, I did go back and see that the related word "journeywork" can be used in place of "hackwork," and that was certainly not my intent regarding any of the above folks' work.

Once again, totally in agreement with Zonker regarding the definition of "journeyman" and categorizing John Buscema as such. Buscema, Swan, Cardy, Romita, John and Marie Severin (both of whose work I love and is extremely underrated) are all what I would categorize as good, solid commercial artists. Pleases everyone, but electrifies no one, changed nothing. I would call them third-tier artists, which is not meant as a slight. It simply means they're below the second-tier I described in my earlier post which contains Kubert and Kane, among others, who had an element of innovation in their work, and above less-skilled craftsmen such as Sal Buscema, Don Heck, Herb Trimpe, etc., who would go into a 4th or 5th tier, depending on your tastes.

[Luxxcorp-migration]

Adams > Steranko

Steranko probably did drugs.

MediaScene magazine and his History of Comics may have taken up a lot of his time that he could have devoted to his art.

His greatest contribution to comics was the introduction of psychedelic/surreal art.

Steranko's Nick Fury #6 looks like Williamson could have drawn it.

http://www.awe4one.com/pics/fury.jpg

[Zonker]

Thanks!

 

As a further olive branch to the Buscema admirers, I'll say that neither JB nor Gil Kane were generally well-served by their usual inkers (I also prefer Gil Kane inking his own stuff) and remind everybody one of the examples I picked out in my 'Overlooked Readers Thread' some time ago in the Bronze forum was Conan 39, a rare example of Buscema inking his own pencils on that particular strip. I think its pretty sweet:

 

[Moondog]

Marty Nodell once told me a story of when he worked for Atlas for a short period of time before the Atlas implosion in '56/'57 or thereabouts.

 

He, along with a few others, were asked to help finish a book for someone who was sick. He recalled that "this young kid, John Buscema, was amazing us all by inking pages directly - with no pencils to follow. We were in awe of his talent."

 

I accept Zonker's olive branch, but really to consider Buscema and Kane in the same group of artists such as Trimpe, Heck, etc., is just too off base for serious consideration. Don't ask fans who the greats are - ask the pros. Believe me they know.

 

Also, I believe Steranko is on record of saying he has never taken any drug of any kind...maybe not even alcohol?

[Silver Surfer]

Marty Nodell once told me a story of when he worked for Atlas for a short period of time before the Atlas implosion in '56/'57 or thereabouts.

 

He, along with a few others, were asked to help finish a book for someone who was sick. He recalled that "this young kid, John Buscema, was amazing us all by inking pages directly - with no pencils to follow. We were in awe of his talent."

 

I accept Zonker's olive branch, but really to consider Buscema and Kane in the same group of artists such as Trimpe, Heck, etc., is just too off base for serious consideration. Don't ask fans who the greats are - ask the pros. Believe me they know.

 

Also, I believe Steranko is on record of saying he has never taken any drug of any kind...maybe not even alcohol?

 

"Don't ask fans who the greats are - ask the pros. Believe me they know." This is the key quote here. I can't believe so me of the comments here, like his is a 3rd tier artist that didn't wow anyone? Buscema did nothing but wow us with his cover art let alone the rest of the material. The problem I think is that he cranked them out on such a regular basis that people took them for granted. Just think for a moment of all those greta Avengers, Silver Surfer Thor and Sub-Mariner covers. We are talking about classics here. In 1968 Marvel was at its peak selling 50,000,000 copies that year and Buscema was leading the charge. Quotes:

 

Stan Lee " he draws like a classical artist, like Michelangelo". Not bad for a "journeyman". For the record I'll take Romita over Kane, Steranko.

[october]

Interesting, but I think many Steranko or Adams covers would easily crack 100K if they came up. Hell, Neal's repro covers sell for 10K+.

 

I don't recall seeing Adams or Steranko on the cover of any major fine art magazines recently.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Maybe, but even Crumb has not done the art for a allegy medication commercial, which I think we all can agree is the apogee of any great artists career.

 

http://www.nealadams.com/page11.html

[Calamerica]

Wow! Great Thread!

 

So much to catch up on but this one is truly worth the time and effort!

 

Key points that caught me here:

 

1) Steranko's short period of time to entertain us;

 

2) "Innovative & Influential"; using these descriptors to compare various Artists;

 

3) Well-loved and respected artists on this Forum

 

4) Panel-to-panel, flowing storylines, covers, splash pages, other interior artworks

 

5) 2nd, 3rd, 4th, & even 5th tier artists?

 

My take if I may:

 

I was about 13 - 14 years old when I bought those CAP issues - I remember passing them on to my neighborhood friends and there was some discussion re: this new style of art. No one knew or ever read anything about this "Steranko". But we all liked what we saw. We traded comics like most kids did in those days and I told one friend that I did not want the SHIELD copies as I did not follow that and did not want to give it a chance - I had enough( those days). My brother told me that the "traded" copies were in the living room and I thought that the kid made a mistake when I first glanced at them these could not possibly be the comics he intended to trade me for - the covers alone just blew the doors off and I was hooked on Steranko. But he did not seem to have many Issues following and he just dropped off the map.

 

Mr. Steranko WAS influential for that time and WAS an Innovator for the style of art he entertained us with. Like-other-artists-don't-get-me-started folks don't need to get testy here - even you can agree that Steranko had what it took with his OWN style of art to get our attention.

 

Maybe Steranko was not the best panel-to-panel, flow of story, other interior background art, but his covers are one of the best ever produced by any Comic Book artist. Of course I loved the Silver Surfer # 4 cover w/ Thor( John Buscema) and that particular cover always gets in the top 25 in the other Websites I can look up for you, but nevertheless Steranko's SHIELD covers IMO saved that series for that time.

 

2nd, 3rd, 4th & 5th tier artists? I can't go there - any artist that had the envious but utmost skill-requiring duties before him/her could not be disrespected to be relegated to a "totem pole" type of rankings - I understand that this is human nature to compare and rank things, such as football QB's, who is the better QB, and the truth is that any NFL QB that is selected to play on any NFL team is capable of winning a game that they are in charge of. Comic Books had "team players" too - the inkers, letterers, and others. I also remember some kids that did not like Trimpe, and a few did not like Marie Severin only because she was a woman, but to have these artists ranked like this? It is a free world and that is fine, but my take is that they ALL were far talented for art than most people on this planet and I respect that talent in a revering manner. Marie Severin drew a mean Silver Surfer when she was doing the HULK portion of Tales to Astonish. A man once told me that Jack Kirby did the cover of TTA # 93 for her but this was never confirmed.

 

Something that I did not see here on this Thread was how Steranko penciled his Dynamic "Battle Scenes" - which are the staple of Superhero Comic Books. I thought he was just as good as the rest, but I must agree with a few that J. Buscema was a tad better. The SS # 4 Thor cover shows an impending collision with two very powerful combatants and there is uncertainty of the outcome - thus the allure of buying the comic and reading it. Drawing females? Buscema again gets the nod - look at that Blonde Silver Surfer saves in SS # 2 - a stunning beauty!

 

Another thing to consider is the actual assignments and other parameters - Buscema had many titles to do on deadline and Steranko had only a few. Steranko may have had been given the luxury of 2 pages per day whereas Kirby/Buscema/Colan had 4 - 7 or more pages to churn out daily. This would give Steranko a decided edge in final product. I am sure Stan Lee knew what kind of art he was getting as I am sure each artist hired had to submit portfolios and samples of works, thus Mr. Lee could have granted such leeway for Steranko.

 

I read in more than one place that Kirby's output was tops followed closely by Buscema. Buscema was out of work for a while and comics got him back to work. This had a profound effect on him and he also did the B&W Conan and Savage Sword titles. I don't know much about Steranko thus I can't really integrate this part of my take here while comparing him against others.

 

Bottom Line: Steranko WAS great and if he has fans that put him on the top of their ranking/chain, etc - so be it. Just remember that QB's Jeff Hostetler, Trent Dilfer and Earl Morrall all were the winning QB's in Super Bowl games - not too many NFL fans had them on their Fantasy Football lists!

 

CAL

[awe4one]

Just remember that QB's Jeff Hostetler, Trent Dilfer and Earl Morrall all were the winning QB's in Super Bowl games - not too many NFL fans had them on their Fantasy Football lists!

 

Super Bowl QBs historically are average fantasy players in the years they win the big game...

 

Jim

[Calamerica]

What I meant by the Super Bowl QB's post above was that everyone would not have given the then-newcomer Steranko much of a chance against the proven Kirby, Buscema and others, but the truth is that Steranko could hold his own and did so very well.

 

This is a great Thread and the discussion of artists brings out many others' likes and dislikes of art - and not too much slamming of others. A very civil Thread!

 

CAL

[tth2]

Another thing to consider is the actual assignments and other parameters - Buscema had many titles to do on deadline and Steranko had only a few. Steranko may have had been given the luxury of 2 pages per day whereas Kirby/Buscema/Colan had 4 - 7 or more pages to churn out daily. This would give Steranko a decided edge in final product. I am sure Stan Lee knew what kind of art he was getting as I am sure each artist hired had to submit portfolios and samples of works, thus Mr. Lee could have granted such leeway for Steranko.

I think time is a relatively unimportant factor here. Buscema's middle of the road style lends itself to high volume production. But regardless, he could sit there with the same comic for 1 year, but the spark of genius would still be missing. This is not a criticism of Buscema, simply recognition that life is unfair in its allocation of genius. Salieri could have had all of eternity to write a symphony, but he still would never have produced anything as good as Mozart could produce in a day. Many good physicists with degrees from the finest schools could work on equations all their life and not produce anything remotely comparable to breakthroughs that Einstein had achieved in his early 20s.

[BillyBatson4360]

I thought this thread was dealng with mainstream comics in the late sixties. If we include ALL comics work, then, yes, I would have to admit the R. Crumb wins going away. The term "genius" is often tossed around rather casually in our culture. Crumb, in my opinion, is a genius. He's produced a large body of very impressive work and he's had a solid impact on popular culture.

 

To give Kane his props, he was one of the pioneers in the graphic novel field with the "His Name Is Savage" and "Blackmark" projects. He was the definitive Silver Age artist on Green Lantern and the Atom. He was great on Captain Marvel and second only to Kirby on Captain America (not counting Steranko's brief run). I also prefer Kane to Romita on Spider-Man. (Sorry, Romita fans, I have never considered him anything but an average artist.)

 

But obviously, Kane had been in comics well before the late Silver Age. Frankly, so had Romita & Buscema so they wouldn't qualify in this discussion either. I thought the intention was to discuss artists who started their careers in the late 60's.

[tth2]

I thought this thread was dealng with mainstream comics in the late sixties. If we include ALL comics work, then, yes, I would have to admit the R. Crumb wins going away. The term "genius" is often tossed around rather casually in our culture. Crumb, in my opinion, is a genius. He's produced a large body of very impressive work and he's had a solid impact on popular culture.

We need to separate what we`re lauding people for: art, story, or both. I think this is primarily an art thread (about Steranko, believe it or not ). I`ve never read any of Crumb`s work because I find his art style so horrific that I just could never get interested enough to check out his writing.

[Sal]

Adams > Steranko

Steranko probably did drugs.

MediaScene magazine and his History of Comics may have taken up a lot of his time that he could have devoted to his art.

His greatest contribution to comics was the introduction of psychedelic/surreal art.

Steranko's Nick Fury #6 looks like Williamson could have drawn it.

http://www.awe4one.com/pics/fury.jpg

 

actually, i was thinking that Steranko was doing a pretty good Wally Wood with that cover

[toro]

My 2 cents, for what it is worth. I loved Neal Adams work, he could do both Marvel and DC characters and both keep the house style yet give them his own unique vision. I look at some of the work of todays artists and feel that they are all the [#@$%!!!] sons of Neal.

[BillyBatson4360]

"I`ve never read any of Crumb`s work because I find his art style so horrific that I just could never get interested enough to check out his writing."

 

Wow! I find that amazing. I think Crumb has one of the most accessible styles in all of comics. To me, it just looks so inviting and easy to read.

 

Obviously, Crumb is working in a different field of comic art - the "big foot" or "funny" part of funny books. His most obvious influence is Basil Wolverton. Now, I love Wolverton (I highly recommended Theakston's "Wolverton Reader") If you don't care for Wolverton, you probably won't dig Crumb, either.

 

Crumb evoked an era of comics that had already vanished by the time Zap Comix hit the stands. He grafted this earlier 1930's-40's "retro" style of art with the counterculture movement of the late 60's and single-handedly birthed an industry that flourished for years.

 

As for the art/writing thing. I have always felt that most of the real "utmost" greats in the comic book world were the double threats: Kurtzman, Eisner, Barks, Crumb, etc. Even Kirby & Ditko have writing skills - but not dialogging skills, if that makes sense.