Book/Magazine Covers (All) · Drawing · Illustration Art · Lee Elias · Look Here · Original art vs. printed page

Look Here: CHAMBER OF CHILLS #11 cover and original art by Lee Elias

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The element that distinguishes Lee Elias’s work here from your run-of-the-mill, damsel-in-distress comic-book cover is the half-naked guy on the ground grasping helplessly at the leg of the evil doer. More typically in fantasy art, it’s the girl who is on the ground, hanging onto the leg of the man, who is cast in the role of heroic protector. Elias’s canny subversion of that tired cliché reveals an artist who has not simply gone through the motions on a routine cover assignment but has thought his way through to a creative solution that gives the obligatory horror and cheesecake a playful tweak on the nose.

Book/Magazine Covers (All) · Heads Up! · Illustration Art · Look Here · Look There · Richard Corben

Look There, Read: Jan Strnad and Richard Corben on RAGEMOOR

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Westfield Comics Blog has an interview with longtime friends and legendary comics collaborators, Jan Strnad and Richard Corben, about their forthcoming four-issue Dark Horse mini-series, Ragemoor, which the publisher describes as follows:

Ragemoor! A living castle, nurtured on pagan blood, harborer to deadly monsters! A fortress possessed of its own will and ability to change itself, with the power to add and destroy rooms and to grow without the help of any human hand. Its owner is mad with jealously, its servants aren’t human, and its secret’s horrific!

Issue #1 of Ragemoor will be available in March. So men let your wallets flop out, and women open your purses, because a man or a woman without a copy of Ragemoor will be suffering with the worstest of curses!

In other words, HEADS UP!

“I’ve had a long career in comics, doing it the way I wanted, mostly. I’m grateful for what success I’ve had. I still love the possibility of comics, as a medium to tell the stories I want to, not just the ones that sell big. I still have some goals to achieve and skills to develop so I don’t intend to retire ever. I’m going to continue doing comics until I drop.”
— Richard Corben in conversation, Westfield Comics Blog, January 2012

BONUS COVER:

I’m a bit late with this one, but of course Corben fans will also want to pick up the Murky World one-shot, available in stores now from Dark Horse:

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Book/Magazine Covers (All) · Heads Up! · Illustration Art · Look Here · Mike Mignola

Heads Up: HELLBOY LIBRARY EDITION VOLUME 5

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Coming in July 2012 from Dark Horse:

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As usual, here’s the publisher’s description:

HELLBOY LIBRARY EDITION VOLUME 5 HC

Mike Mignola (W/Cover), Duncan Fegredo (A), and Dave Stewart (C)

On sale July 11
FC, 408 pages
$49.99
HC, 9″ x 12″

Hellboy has racked up multiple Eisner Awards, numerous spinoffs, a novel line, video games, cartoons, and two feature films. Hellboy Library Volume 5 collects two complete trade paperbacks, Darkness Calls and The Wild Hunt; the short story “The Mole”; and an extensive selection of previously unreleased sketches and designs.

* The oversized Hellboy hardcover series continues, collecting the beginning of the Mike Mignola and Duncan Fegredo saga!

* An extensive selection of new sketchbook material.

* A New York Times bestseller!

Even without artwork by Corben, the Dark Horse “library editions” of Hellboy are on my “must-have” list of comics publications. They’re GRRRRRREAT!

Book/Magazine Covers (All) · Heads Up! · Illustration Art · Look Here · Richard Corben

Heads Up: CREEPY PRESENTS RICHARD CORBEN

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Coming in July 2012 from Dark Horse:

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Here’s the publisher’s description:

CREEPY PRESENTS RICHARD CORBEN

Richard Corben (W/A/Cover), Donald F. McGregor (W), Greg Potter (W), Doug Moench (W), Bill DuBay (W), Steve Skeates (W), Rich Margopoulos (W), Jim Stenstrum (W), Gerry Boudreau (W), Budd Lewis (W), Bruce Jones (W), Roger McKenzie (W), Gerald Conway (W), Al Hewetson (W), Jack Butterworth (W), and Greg Potter (W)

On sale July 18
FC, 320 pages
$29.99
HC, 8 3/8″ x 10 7/8″

Over 300 pages of timeless terror from a master storyteller! Horror comics visionary and coloring pioneer Richard Corben has been a voice of creativity and change for over four decades. For the first time ever, Corben’s legendary Creepy and Eerie short stories and cover illustrations are being collected into one deluxe hardcover! With an informative foreword by artist and comic book colorist José Villarrubia — who also provides color restoration — this volume features Richard Corben’s original stories, Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, and collaborations with cast of comic-book writers.

* Essential stories and illustrations from Richard Corben!

* The first collection of all of Corben’s legendary Creepy and Eerie stories!

This is great news, but what we really want is the complete underground and self-published comics of Richard Corben! Giddy-up, Dark Horse!

Comics · Here, Read · Look Here · Robert Crumb

Connections: R. Crumb and Kevin C. Brown

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From Snoid Comics (1980), here’s “A Short History of America” by R. Crumb, along with Kevin C. Brown’s “An Autobiography” from Eclipse Magazine #7 (November 1982):

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Hey! The 15-panel poster version of “A Short History of America” is still available, new, from an online seller. It’s a lovely piece of work, no doubt, but I have to say, I actually prefer the 12-panel version, which didn’t attempt to predict the future but instead was simply a clear-eyed meditation on how America had changed from the arrival of the railway up until the late 1970s, when Crumb drew the strip.

Heads Up! · Look Here · Richard Corben

Heads Up: Corben Art Sale, 11 February 2012

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Corben comic art pages will go on sale Saturday 11 February 2012 at noon CST. Available art includes 10 pages from The Bodyssey, 11 pages from Rip in Time, 10 pages from Swamp Thing: Missing Links, and all 10 pages from “Tales of the Black Diamond, Part 5: Cartoon of Blood.” A preview of the sale with thumbnails of all of the pages has already been posted to the Corben website. The actual prices and payment links will be revealed on the sale day, and after that, it’s first come, first serve.

Click here to visit the “Sales” page at corbencomicart.com.

Act quickly on Saturday 11 February 2012, and you could be the proud owner of the original black-and-white art for pages like these:

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Good luck!