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The Marvel Magazine Thread
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111 posts in this topic

On 7/6/2018 at 3:11 AM, N e r V said:

 

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By April 1973 Monster Madness was releasing its last issue (#3) but Dracula Lives was just getting started with issue #2 out and Marvel was going to reach back into their past to bring back a character for a new horror series. More on him later. First Dracula Lives had a cover by one Jordi Penalva which itself is interesting since his work was pretty limited here in the US but also because it’s the first to set the tone for most of the Dracula Lives covers which had the count and the damsel in distress theme over and over again. This issue also brings up the point of why Stalin never tried to get rid of Dracula. The communist vs the count could have been a grand epic for some writer or maybe it’s just a boring story of how the USSR just ignored the count and let him be. 

I was collecting comics by now but missed this issue and wouldn’t pick up my first copy until issue #3. Perhaps more interesting than Dracula Lives this month is what was happening in the counts own color comic. My first issue of Tomb of Dracula happened to be issue #10 which introduced a new character named Blade.

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From Dan Dare:

 

Jordi Penalva
Penalva's original art for one of the interior plates in the 1960 Kit Carson Annual.

Jordi Bosch Peñalver, (better known as Jordi Penalva) was born in Barcelona (Catelonia) in 1927. He studied at the Escuela Superior de Bellas Artes in Barcelona under Ernest Santasusagna. The young Jordi had the ambition of becoming a serious artist and many of the pieces that he did in the 1940's can still be found at modest prices.

He began working as an illustrator in the late forties for the publishers Janés and Juventud, where he illustrated covers for paperback reprints of Zane Grey and PC Wren. 

In 1952 he moved briefly to Brazil before returing to his native Spain. It is probable that he was commissioned via one of the art agencies that flourished at the time: either the Anglo-Spanish Bardon or the Belgian A.L.I. His work however speaks for itself. 

I have found no reference to his ever working on a comic strip per se, and like Alessandro Biffignandiand others, the bulk of his output seems to have been covers.

He started working on Fleetway's Cowboy Picture Library series in the late 50's and contributed two colour plates for the 1960 Kit Carson Annual, published in September 1959. This was a sure sign of Fleetway's faith in Penalva as the colour plates in these annuals were always done by their quality artists such as Derek Eyles and Septimus Scott. 

Times and tastes were changing by the early sixties: westerns were making way for the new war comics and it was in this genre that Penalva is best known in the UK. When Cowboy Picture Library folded he started working for Battle Picture LibraryWar Picture Library and the Front Line Series racking up over 200 covers for these three titles alone. He stopped working for Fleetway in about 1968 and started with their arch rival D.C. Thompson on their Commando comics where he contributed hundreds of covers.

Penalva_Front%20Line%2022.jpg

Frontline Series no. 22 - Penalva's original cover art. 

As Penalva was not a "house" artist, but a freelance artist, he was also contributing work to other markets, notably the Swedish. By the mid-1970's Penalva was contributing to the Swedish version of James Bond published by Semic: these were re-prints of the original Daily Express newspaper strips by John McLusky and Yaroslav Horak, but with a Penalva cover. He was also producing paperback book covers for various European publishers.

Not contending himself with the European market, in 1978 Penalva started working for the US market in the shape of Warren where he contributed covers for Eerie, The Rook, 1984 (later re-named 1994) andVampirella, thus aligning himself alongside the likes of Frank Frazetta, Sanjulian (a fellow Spaniard who had also worked for Thompson's Commandocomics) and Enrich. Penalva actually won an award for the cover of Eerie no. 96 as Best Cover of the Year for 1978, and in total he contributed 15 covers to the title.

After Warren closed up shop (rumour being because of the settlement to Harlan Ellison for publishing one of his stories without permission) Penalva re-established himself back in his native Spain where he contributed covers to Zona 84 and Cimoc.

Jordi Penalva has an older brother, Antonio Bosch Peñalver born in 1925, who has created several comic strips in Spain. Brother Antonio signs his work Bosch Peñalver - so Jordi signed his as Jordi to avoid confusion. Antonio Bosch Peñalve has worked on several comic covers for the German market - mostly westerns.

 

 

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Penalva's original art for one of the interior plates in the 1960 Kit Carson Annual.

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Frontline Series no. 22 - Penalva's original cover art.

 

 

 

 

Firstly, let me join with the others in the compliments for such a great thread, full marks all round.

The link is for more original artwork by Jordi's work at Fleetway. 

https://bookpalace.com/acatalog/Jordi_Penalva_Art.html

Obviously just click onto thunbnails to enlarge. (thumbsu

Edited by Gnasher
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On 7/15/2018 at 11:42 AM, oakman29 said:

Yes Nerv I want to thank you for the awesome reporting of these books that deserves their rightful place in the genre.

Late to this party, but I couldn’t agree more. Great thread Nerv :bigsmile:

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On 10/21/2019 at 8:29 PM, Brandon Shepherd said:

I unearthed my Gerber Photo-Journals tonight for a blast from the past (I haven’t looked at these in years and the comic covers are literally a blast from the past!). Volume 4, or Marvel Comics K-Z only has one page covering Marvel Mags. 
:/

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I want to say I have 16 of those?  17 if you let me count my 3/4 cover Savage Tales 1.

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Quick question... I pulled out some of my magazines and noticed that this Crazy 81 (Dec.1981) has, in lieu of a barcode, "Distributed by..." printed in the box... saw this on only one other book.

Assuming this is a "direct" copy, but looking for confirmation from those in the know... thanks.

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On 3/30/2019 at 9:25 PM, Tony D said:

Sorry, I'm a retired plumber who likes to read about physics. You touched on the two topics I know about.

... are you a fan of Brian Greene's "Elegant Universe" ? That book really opened my eyes. GOD BLESS...

-jimbo(a friend of jesus)(thumbsu

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