Gene Colan

Infobox Comics creator

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imagesize = 150
caption =
birthname =
birthdate = September 1, 1926 (age 81)
location = The Bronx, New York
deathdate =
deathplace =
nationality = American
area = Penciller, Inker
alias = Adam Austin


notable works = "Daredevil", "Tomb of Dracula", "Howard the Duck", "Detectives Inc."
awards = Eagle Award, 1977, 1979

Eugene "Gene" Colan (born September 1, 1926) is an American comic book artist.

Best known as one of Marvel Comics' most significant artists, whose signature titles include the superhero series, "Daredevil", the cult-hit satiric series "Howard the Duck", and "Tomb of Dracula", considered one of comics' classic horror series,Fact | date=July 2008 Colan was inducted into the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2005.

On May 11, 2008, Colan's family announced that Colan, who had been hospitalized for liver failure, had suffered a sharp deterioration in his health. [ [http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=16368 "Comic Book Resources", "Comic Book Legend Gene Colan Hospitalized for Liver Failure", by CBR News Team, Editor, May 11, 2008] ]

Biography

Early life and career

Born in The Bronx, New York City, New York, [http://www.twomorrows.com/alterego/articles/06colan.html Gene Colan interviewed by former Marvel editor-in-chief Roy Thomas, "Alter Ego". vol. 3, #6 (Autumn 2000)] ] Gene Colan began drawing at age three. "The first thing I ever drew was a lion. I must've absolutely copied it or something. But that's what my folks tell me. And from then on, I just drew everything in sight. My grandfather was my favorite subject". He attended George Washington High School in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan, and went on to study at the Art Students League of New York . His major art influences are Syd Shores, Coulton Waugh, and Milton Caniff.

He began working in comics in 1944, doing illustrations for publisher Fiction House's aviation-adventure series "Wings Comics". " [J] ust a summertime job before I went into the service", [ [http://www.adelaidecomicsandbooks.com/colan.html Gene Colan interview, Adelaide Comics and Books (2003)] ] it gave Colan his first published work, the one-page "Wing Tips" non-fiction filler "P-51B Mustang" (issue #42, Dec. 1944). [ [http://www.comics.org/details.lasso?id=4002 Grand Comics Database: "Wings Comics" #42, Dec. 1944] ] His first comics story was a seven-page "Clipper Kirk" feature in the following month's issue. [ [http://www.comics.org/details.lasso?id=4130 Grand Comics Database: "Wings Comics" #53 (Jan. 1945)] ]

After attempting to enlist in the U.S. Marine Corps during World War II but being pulled out by his father "because I was underage", Colan at "18 or 19" enlisted in the Army Air Corps. Originally scheduled for gunnery school in Boulder, Colorado, plans changed with the war's sudden end. After training at an Army camp near Biloxi, Mississippi, he joined the occupation forces in the Philippines There Colan rose to the rank of corporal, drew for the "Manila Times", and won an art contest.

Upon his return to civilian life in 1946, Colan went to work for Marvel Comics' 1940s precursor, Timely Comics. He recalled in 2000, "I was living with my parents. I worked very hard on a war story, about seven or eight pages long, and I did all the lettering myself, I inked it myself, I even had a wash effect over it. I did everything I could do, and I brought it over to Timely. What you had to do in those days was go to the candy store, pick up a comic book, and look in the back to see where it was published. Most of them were published in Manhattan, they would tell you the address, and you'd simply go down and make an appointment to go down and see the art director". Al Sulman, listed in Timely mastheads then as an "editorial associate",For example, in [http://comics.org/details.lasso?id=93176 "Patsy Walker" #11 (June 1947)] ] "gave me my break. I went up there, and he came out and met me in the waiting room, looked at my work, and said, 'Sit here for a minute'. And he brought the work in, and disappeared for about 10 minutes or so... then came back out and said, 'Come with me'. That's how I met [editor-in-chief] [Stan Lee|Stan [Lee] ] . [Whose official title, per same issue of "Patsy Walker" as above, was "consulting associate"] Just like that, and I had a job".

Hired as "a staff penciler", Colan "started out at about $60 a week. ... Syd Shores was the art director [Gene Colan interview, "Alter Ego" #52 (March 2006), p. 66] Due to Colan's work going uncredited, in the manner of the times, comprehensive credits for this era are difficult if not impossible to ascertain.

After virtually all the Timely staff was let go in 1948 during an industry downturn, Colan began freelancing for National Comics, the future DC Comics. A stickler for accuracy, he meticulously researched his countless war stories for DC's "All-American Men at War", "Captain Storm", and "Our Army at War", as well as for Marvel's 1950s forerunner Atlas Comics, on the series "Battle", "Battle Action" "Battle Ground", "Battlefront", "G.I. Tales", "Marines in Battle", "Navy Combat" and "Navy Tales". Colan's earliest confirmed credit during this time is penciling and inking the six-page crime fiction story "Dream Of Doom", by an uncredited writer, in Atlas' "Lawbreakers Always Lose" #6 (Feb. 1949). [ [http://www.comics.org/details.lasso?id=211211 Grand Comics Database: "Lawbreakers Always Lose" #6 (Feb. 1949)] ]

He would rent 16 mm movies of "Hopalong Cassidy" Westerns in order to trace likenesses for the DC licensed series, which he drew from 1954 to 1957.

ilver Age

While freelancing for DC romance comics in the 1960s, and Colan did his first superhero work for Marvel under the pseudonym Adam Austin. [ [http://povonline.com/iaq/IAQ05.htm Evanier, Mark. "An Incessantly Asked Question #5," POVOnline (Apr. 14, 2008).] Retrieved July 28, 2008.] Taking to the form immediately, he introduced the "Sub-Mariner" feature in "Tales to Astonish", and succeeded Don Heck on "Iron Man" in "Tales of Suspense".

Shortly afterward, under his own name, Colan became one of the premier Silver Age Marvel artists, illustrating a host of such major characters as Captain America, Dr. Strange (both in the late-1960s and the mid-1970s series), and his signature character, Daredevil. Colan's long run on the series "Daredevil" encompassed all but three issues in an otherwise unbroken, 81-issue string from #20-100 (Sept. 1966 - June 1973), plus the initial "Daredevil Annual" (1967). He returned to draw ten issues sprinkled from 1974-79, and an eight-issue run in 1997.

Dracula and Batman

Colan also garnered praise in the 1970s for illustrating the complete, 70-issue run of the acclaimed horror title "Tomb of Dracula", as well as most issues of writer Steve Gerber's cult-hit, "Howard the Duck".

Back at DC in the 1980s, following a professional falling outFact|date=February 2007 with Marvel's then editor-in-chief, Jim Shooter, Colan brought his shadowy, moody textures to Batman, serving as the Dark Knight's primary artist from 1982-1986, penciling "Detective Comics" #528-538, 540-546 and 555-567, and "Batman" #340, 343-345, 348-351 and others. He was also the artist of "Wonder Woman" from #288-305 (Feb. 1982 - July 1983). Helping to create new characters as well, Colan collaborated in the '80s with "Tomb of Dracula" writer Marv Wolfman on the 14-issue run of "Night Force"; with Cary Bates on the 12-issue run of "Silverblade"; and with Greg Potter on the 12-issue run of "Jemm, Son of Saturn". As well, he drew the first six issues of Doug Moench's 1987 revival of "The Spectre".

Colan's style, characterized by fluid figure drawing and extensive use of shadow, was unusual among Silver Age comic artists, [Daniels, Les, "Marvel: Five Fabulous Decades of the World's Greatest Comics" (Harry N. Abrams, New York, 1991), p. 132. ISBN 0-8109-3821-9] and became more pronounced so as his career progressed. He usually worked as a penciller, with Klaus Janson and Tom Palmer as his most frequent inkers. Colan broke from the mass-market comic book penciller/inker/colorist assembly-line system by creating finished drawings in graphite and watercolor on such projects as the DC Comics miniseries "Nathaniel Dusk" (1984) and "Nathaniel Dusk II" (1985-86), and the feature "Ragamuffins" in the Eclipse Comics umbrella series "Eclipse" #3, 5, & 8 (1981-83). All these were written by frequent collaborator Don McGregor.

Independent-comics work includes the Eclipse graphic novel "" (1985), written by McGregor and reprinted in sepia tone as an Eclipse miniseries in 1987, and the miniseries "Predator: Hell & Hot Water" for Dark Horse Comics. He contributed to Archie Comics in the late 1980s and early 1990s, drawing and occasionally writing a number of stories. His work there included penciling the lighthearted science-fiction series "Jughead's Time Police" #1-6 (July 1990 - May 1991), and the 1990 one-shot "To Riverdale and Back Again", an adaptation of the NBC TV movie about the Archie characters 20 years later, airing May 6, 1990; Stan Goldberg and Mike Esposito drew the parts featuring the characters in flashback as teens, while Colan drew adult characters, in a less cartoony style.

Back at Marvel, he collaborated again with Marv Wolfman on a "Tomb of Dracula" prestige series and with Don McGregor on a Black Panther serial in the Marvel Comics Presents anthology.

Later life and career

In the 2000s, Colan returned to vampires by drawing a pair of stories for Dark Horse Comics' "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" series.

Colan and second-wife [" [M] y first wife and I would go out on dates with" fellow Timely Comics artist Rudy LaPick and his girlfriend: "Alter Ego", Ibid., p. 70] Adrienne moved from New York City to Vermont late in life. At various points he has taught at Manhattan's School of Visual Arts and Fashion Institute of Technology, and had showings at the Bess Cutler Gallery in New York City and at the Elm Street Arts Gallery in Manchester, Vermont.

He penciled the final pages of "Blade" vol. 3, #12 (Oct. 2007), the final issue of that series, drawing a flashback scene in which the character dresses in his original outfit from the 1970s series "Tomb of Dracula". That same month, for the anniversary issue "Daredevil" vol. 2, #100 (Oct. 2007), Colan penciled pages 18-20 of the 36-page story "Without Fear, Part One"; the issue additionally reprinted the Colan-drawn "Daredevil" #90-91 (Aug.-Sept. 1972).

Awards and honors

Colan was nominated for the Shazam Award for Best Penciller (Dramatic Division) in 1974. He received the 1977 and 1979 Eagle Award for Favorite Comic Book (Humor), for "Howard the Duck", and was nominated foe five Eagle Awards in 1978.

In 2005, Colan was inducted into the comics industry's Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame.

Critical assessment

Comics historians and critics have writtenFact|date=April 2008 that the shadowy depth of Colan's art makes it particularly well-suited for black-and-white reproduction, as in his stories for the Warren Publishing magazines "Eerie" and "Blazing Combat" in the 1960s and Marvel's "Dracula Lives!", "Hulk", "The Savage Sword of Conan", and "Savage Tales" magazines in the 1970s. This is also evident in the black-and-white, trade paperback collections of his acclaimed 1970s horror series "Tomb of Dracula".

Audio

* [http://www.aroundcomics.com/?p=62 Around Comics Podcast Interview (December 2006)]
* [http://www.comicgeekspeak.com/episodes/comic_geek_speak-110.php Comic Geek Speak Podcast Interview (December 2005)]

Footnotes

References

* [http://www.genecolan.com/ Gene Colan official site]
*Field, Tom, "Secrets in the Shadows: The Art & Life of Gene Colan" (TwoMorrows Publishing, 2005) ISBN 1-893905-45-4
* [http://www.twomorrows.com/comicbookartist/articles/13colan.html "Comic Book Artist" #13 (May 2001): Gene Colan interview]
* [http://www.slayerlit.us/interviews/interview8.htm SlayerLit (date n.a.; circa 2007): Gene Colan interview]
* [http://www.maelmill-insi.de/UHBMCC/ The Unofficial Handbook of Marvel Comics Creators]
* [http://www.atlastales.com Atlas Tales]
* [http://www.comics.org The Grand Comic-Book Database]