Every artist has his or her influences. There are usually so many that it’s very hard to narrow them down. I have numerous ones myself but I’ve never really tried to list them. That is, until know. Some of these artist’s only influence on me is their inspirational struggles. Others I’ve outright ripped off a little bit. I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Any artist is a virtual casserole of his influences, put into a blender, eaten and then thrown up only to be ingested once again, much like our friend the common house fly. I’ll keep this list to my top ten.
In a bold attempt to write more than one sentence about each person and to populate my blog with some content I’m going to drag this out a bit. Every week I’ll post a new one counting down from 10 until we get to my #1 all time favorite artist, which even as I type this I’m not sure who that is. Let’s get started. Here is number #10.
#10 – Brian Stelfreeze
I grew up on comics. Reading them led to my love of drawing. There is one comic artist who influenced me not as much by his fantastic art but more because of the type of person and teacher he is. That would be the incredibly talented Brian Stelfreeze. I’ve been attending the Heroes comic book convention as a fan or artist for almost 15 years now and every single year I’d hang out at Brian’s table because he was dropping some serious art knowledge atomic bombs. In fact, in hindsight I wish I’d just taken all that money for art school and hired Brian as a mentor and tutor. He’s an artist who has a rare ability to be an even better teacher and that’s saying a mouthful as his art is quite awesome. You can see him at almost any show with clipboard in hand showing struggling artist (and sometime professionals) the keys to making good comics.
He isn’t one to placate an artists either. He once looked though a comic I’d self published to give me some feedback. As he tuned the pages he’d commit on my strengths here or what I’d done good there, but then he’d stop dead on a page, tap the page and ask me why I had to go and %$^ it all up and do this. You’re killing me, he’d say. You’ve got all this beautiful rendering but you didn’t follow this basic rule. The other cool thing about Brian is that when he gives you some knowledge you better pull up a chair. I’ve never had a critique from the guys that was less than 20 minutes and I’ve had some that went over an hour.
Almost every time I draw or paint at some point during the process I’ll hear Brian’s voice in my head reminding me of one of the hundreds of art lessons or techniques he’s taught me over the years.
Honorable Mention: Lee Weeks and JRJR
Lee Weeks (and his run on the Incredible Hulk) and John Romita, JR. (and his run on Spider-man) should also get an honorable mention. The thing that links these two guys together in my eyes is their ability to ride a fine line between telling a story and being an illustrator. I grew up in the middle of the Image comics revolution during a time when comic art was 90% sizzle and 10% steak, with tons of random cross hatching covering up some misguided fundamentals. JRJR and Weeks are the perfect combination of steak and sizzle.
Incidentally, that Batman image above is the cover to my favorite Batman comic of all time. The story is about the Joker who is in jail in Arkum Asylum. He knows there a kidnapped little girl is being held. If Batman can’t get the Joker to talk the little girl will die. Great story and wonderful art.
