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Most Important / Impactful Living Artist
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159 posts in this topic

When I think of impact I think about those who brought a particular style that many others tried to copy.

When I think of living I think of those that are still drawing breath. (So Kirby is excluded)

In no particular order...

Romita Sr comes to mind as does McFarlane.  They changed the Spider-man game.  To this day, Romita and McFarlane's take on Spider-man is the inspiration for many who tackle the character.

George Perez, Miller, Jim Lee instantly come to mind. 

 

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26 minutes ago, Buzzetta said:

When I think of impact I think about those who brought a particular style that many others tried to copy.

When I think of living I think of those that are still drawing breath. (So Kirby is excluded)

In no particular order...

Romita Sr comes to mind as does McFarlane.  They changed the Spider-man game.  To this day, Romita and McFarlane's take on Spider-man is the inspiration for many who tackle the character.

George Perez, Miller, Jim Lee instantly come to mind. 

 

IMO.

The thing with Perez is that he is very workmanlike. He is the definition of a comic book artist. Solid at everything but does he excel at anything that would make him one of the most important or impactful artist living. Has he pushed the industry forward in anyway or inspired others to take on his style? Now if you are taking into account his body of work then he is without question a Mount Rushmore figure....but his art falls just a bit short. 

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1 minute ago, Blastaar said:

but his art falls just a bit short. 

Sure does, ex-nostalgia.

When the Bronze  generation finishes passing through and out of paying record prices for their nostalgia, the hobby overall (via ongoing prices paid) will not look too kindly on his body of work.

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2 hours ago, vodou said:

Sure does, ex-nostalgia.

When the Bronze  generation finishes passing through and out of paying record prices for their nostalgia, the hobby overall (via ongoing prices paid) will not look too kindly on his body of work.

Don’t see it that way. That he worked on so many hundreds of books across so many companies, his impact and importance I think is locked up. Just on volume and longevity alone his influence was great and widespread. 

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3 hours ago, Blastaar said:

IMO.

The thing with Perez is that he is very workmanlike. He is the definition of a comic book artist. Solid at everything but does he excel at anything that would make him one of the most important or impactful artist living. Has he pushed the industry forward in anyway or inspired others to take on his style? Now if you are taking into account his body of work then he is without question a Mount Rushmore figure....but his art falls just a bit short. 

Does not excel at anything? I would beg to differ with that assessment. Perez was great at a lot of things. Great story teller, great draftsman, a master at drawing complex scenes involving tons of characters. For me, I was most impressed with his ability to give characters different body types. Ever notice how a lot of artists have characters that look the same? Same build, same facial features, stuff like that. Go look at Perez's later work on Teen Titans (issue #39 is a good example). Look at how the characters builds and facial structure differs, it's masterful. He experimented with different ideas such as the title sequence from "Who Is Donna Troy". He worked on numerous seminal stories. The template for "Major Event" comic art IS George Perez. Numerous artists have cited Perez as an influence including Jim Lee, Phil Jimenez, Tom Grummett, heck even Alex Ross was greatly inspired by Perez in his youth. Just because the industry isn't littered with carbon copy imitators doesn't mean that Perez lacked influence. 

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44 minutes ago, Pete Marino said:

Todd changed how Spider-Man was drawn, Jim Lee has changed how every other comic was drawn.

Todd was successful in launching the third largest comic book publisher in the industry. No Todd, no Image. Plus McFarlane Toys and Entertainment. 

 

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5 hours ago, zhamlau said:
7 hours ago, vodou said:

Sure does, ex-nostalgia.

When the Bronze  generation finishes passing through and out of paying record prices for their nostalgia, the hobby overall (via ongoing prices paid) will not look too kindly on his body of work.

Don’t see it that way. That he worked on so many hundreds of books across so many companies, his impact and importance I think is locked up. Just on volume and longevity alone his influence was great and widespread. 

Nothing against George Perez but "volume and longevity" is almost the same argument that has been recently made in favor of Sal Buscema.  And I also don't have anything against Sal Buscema.

If nostalgia has no relation to importance or impact then how should we define importance or impact ??

Edited by Will_K
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8 hours ago, Blastaar said:

An argument I would like to see is who was/is more impactful to the industry Neal Adams or Todd McFarlane? 

Not an argument at all. Neal Adams paved the way for Todd McFarlane, as well as Jim Lee. That “super-realistic” style and his panel layouts set him apart. Just like good (dead) Will Eisner. 

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On 9/12/2019 at 11:06 AM, grapeape said:

Crumb almost fits in his own category of influence and genius. I can’t really explain what he’s doing but I love looking deeply into his art hand finish.

 

 

Is "genius" the right word or is "perversion" more accurate?  hm

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4 hours ago, Will_K said:

Nothing against George Perez but "volume and longevity" is almost the same argument that has been recently made in favor of Sal Buscema.  And I also don't have anything against Sal Buscema.

If nostalgia has no relation to importance or impact then how should we define importance or impact ??

Because the key word here is “Impactful”. If you drew more books, at a very high quality, than nearly anyone else in the industry...you are going to have a greater potential for impact long term. More collectors/future artists are going to grow up reading and eventually being influenced by the art you produced. It’s really I think pretty straight forward. Your work has to be seen routinely, to be everywhere, to have the greatest potential impact on the widest possible audience. 

Plus his work sells exceptionally well, which is the standard many people seem to use to determine if someone was “great” or not.

 

 

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29 minutes ago, zhamlau said:

Plus his work sells exceptionally well, which is the standard many people seem to use to determine if someone was “great” or not.

Dead on. I call this the Thomas Kinkade Standard of Greatness.

image.thumb.png.b9cca66394dab31cd10ef11efc4d93b1.png

See it enough times and surely you will be mesmerized into...buying!

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2 hours ago, batman_fan said:

Is "genius" the right word or is "perversion" more accurate?  hm

The art work genius. The subject matter sometimes is not my cup of tea. Now perversion I think I know when I see it displayed but some think the statue of David is perverse.

The artwork of Crumb genius. 

 

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40 minutes ago, vodou said:

Dead on. I call this the Thomas Kinkade Standard of Greatness.

image.thumb.png.b9cca66394dab31cd10ef11efc4d93b1.png

See it enough times and surely you will be mesmerized into...buying!

Can we please toss Tom Kinkade into the bin? R I P man no disrespect but ENOUGH ALREADY.

Whats next? Sal Buscema post 1985 ?

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5 minutes ago, grapeape said:

The art work genius. The subject matter sometimes is not my cup of tea. Now perversion I think I know when I see it displayed but some think the statue of David is perverse.

The artwork of Crumb genius. 

 

The documentary on Crumb was amazing.  He definitely had an "interesting" childhood and his brothers were even more "interesting"

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