Comments on: Friday In The Gallery (Updated on Saturday!)

By: Marc Witz

Marc Witz — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 13:29:51 +0000

I think commercial art does something so much fine art does not — captures an era, captures the soul. taps into our collective unconscious. The artists dig into their soul and tap something few civilians can. I love commercial art.

Yeah, I knew about Jones, I think I was told it was emphysema, fortunately Maria finished filming the documentary on her.

By: Steve Fahnestalk

Steve Fahnestalk — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 22:43:57 +0000

Thanks for that information, Marc. I still have many of those Matt Helm paperbacks. Too bad they’ve never really made a proper Matt Helm movie. (The Dean Martin ones were sort of fun, but not at all good.)
Jeffrey Catherine Jones died recently, as you probably already know. Too bad. I was just getting to know her after years of admiring her art.
The commercial art shown on these pages is something I’ve always admired. Many people dismiss commercial art, but to do a proper job takes talent. I make no distinction between “fine” art and commercial art; IMO, an artist is an artist is an artist. Their art either speaks to you or doesn’t.

By: Marc Witz

Marc Witz — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 18:43:27 +0000

Odd I came back today to tell you who did the Matt Helm covers and cannot find my original post…so:

The Bantam Books, James Bond reissues were painted by Frank McCarthy. The Avengers Battle the Earth Wrecker cover WAS Bob McGinniss.

I worked at Bantam for 10 years and wound up freelancing for the art department.

The Matt Helm covers were by the late John R. McDermott .

By: Andrea

Andrea — Tue, 10 May 2011 22:13:13 +0000

Thank you for collecting all these nifty images into one place. As an illustrator, these collections can be very interesting

By: Steve Fahnestalk

Steve Fahnestalk — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 16:39:45 +0000

Sorry, I typed “not Jeffrey” when I meant to type “NOW Jeffrey Catherine Jones”!

By: Steve Fahnestalk

Steve Fahnestalk — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 16:38:58 +0000

If you’re interested, Jeff Jones is not Jeffrey Catherine Jones, and her Facebook page is easily found. She’s still doing wonderful art, though most of what she posts is older stuff.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 10:56:07 +0000

Its the forbiddeness of it all thats missing

By: Steve Fahnestalk

Steve Fahnestalk — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 15:20:26 +0000

Actually, the “Back to the Stone Age” cover IS by Frazetta. If you look closely at the picture, you can just see the stylized “F” of his signature. That in no way is a Corben cover. Corben couldn’t draw people; his colors, though were unmistakable, especially in the Heavy Metal stories, like Den. (His people were always exaggerated in some dimension or other, though whether that is deliberate I don’t know.)

By: Marc

Marc — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 07:54:39 +0000

I enjoyed this so much while listening to Coast To Coast. I first saw Mr. James Bama’s work in the sixties, I was and am still obsessed with the Aurora model box painting of Bela Lugosi. Cheers and thanks for this, and the Illustrations are just Fantastic I will be back many times to read more.

By: plok

plok — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 07:57:43 +0000

Thank you for posting that “Shores Of Tomorrow” cover, Greg…I’d actually like to do a post on it myself, any way I could borrow the image off you somehow?

By: Thomas

Thomas — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 00:51:56 +0000

The Colonel Sun is by Frank McCarthy.

Great Page. Thanks for putting this up!

By: Marko Warkaske

Marko Warkaske — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 12:33:57 +0000

That “Wizard of Oz” cover is by Roy G. Krenkel not Frazetta…They were real good friends and often worked together on book covers (in fact, as I have read, Krenkel helped Frazetta get his job with Ace books on the Edgar Rice Burroughs covers in the 1960′s).

By: Steve Fahnestalk

Steve Fahnestalk — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 06:47:34 +0000

Many of the Ace doubles were done by people like the late great Jack Gaughan, the also late & great Kelly Freas, Ed Emshwiller (did anyone else pore over those doubles millimeter by millimeter back in the early ’60s, looking for “emsh” hidden somewhere in the image?), John Berkey, Alex Schomburg and I can’t EVEN remember all the artists I haven’t thought of for years. Those were the days… Jeff Jones did a few as well (obviously, the later Aces).

By: Steve E

Steve E — Sat, 17 May 2008 22:52:17 +0000

Great article – brought back many old memories. As a kid in the early ’60s I had a paper route after school, and I used the money I made to buy used paperbacks, mostly science fiction. Some really cheap ones were called “Ace Doubles”, because they were actually two novels, with two covers and no backs! The illustrations were always eye-grabbing, but I never knew who did any of them for Ace. Frazetta could always be recognized, but they must have had a stable of guys to go to.
Keep the faith!

By: Manticore

Manticore — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 07:50:08 +0000

True, “almost direct quotation” was an excessive description. But AVENGERS 28 was clearly the start-up point for this cover.

By: MarkAndrew

MarkAndrew — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 07:34:30 +0000

Good spotting, and almost certainly an homage to Avengers 28.

But the poses for every character but Hawkeye are different: In Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch’s case, very different.

By: Manticore

Manticore — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 07:24:46 +0000

Of course, if the poses on that AVENGERS cover are “awkward”, it’s simply because they are a direct quotation of an old AVENGERS cover by Jack Kirby, issue #28.

By: Dave Melges

Dave Melges — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 19:42:36 +0000

Wow, what a great article…this is something I know close to ZERO about, but I found it absolutely fascinating. More so because I have not one lick of eye hand art talent, but actually make my living as a graphic artist/photographer…which means I know good when I see it but can appreciate it like nobody’s business because I can’t begin to approach doing it!

I’m 44 so I’m in the age zone….where so many of my fav books growing up had illustrated covers…great trip back, thank you
dave

By: Fred Nakhle

Fred Nakhle — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 12:51:45 +0000

If you are the guy that drew comics at school,Ihave one STRANGE comic you did

By: Rich Drees

Rich Drees — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 23:24:34 +0000

Just stumbled across the article and I had to add that if you think Steranko’s SHADOW covers were something, you should see the original paintings. A college friend worked for Steranko in the mid-80s and had the privelage to see the originals and he said that the colors are even more amazing than how they look on the paperbacks.