#19 Contents:
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SIDE A Cover painting by Alex Ross . . . . . . . . . .1 Inside cover painting by Jack Kirby (date unknown) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 Gil Kane on Kirby . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4 Joe Kubert Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 Kevin Eastman Interview . . . . . . . . . . .10 A Home Fit For A King . . . . . . . . . . . . .13 Hour Twenty-Five . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14 (with Kirby, Evanier, Miller, & Gerber) Gary Groth Interview . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18 The Stolen Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20
Issue #19, April 1998
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Collector Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 Classifieds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24 Kirby Paintings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27 Centerfold: Captain America . . . . . . . .28 (Inks by Dave Stevens, color by Homer Reyes and Dave Stevens) SIDE B Cover inked by Ernie Stiner (Color by Tom Ziuko) . . . . . . . . . . . .1 Inside cover inked by John Trumbull (Color by Tom Ziuko) . . . . . . . . . . . .2 Kirby Collector Bulletins . . . . . . . . . . . .3 The Kirby Squiggle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4 A Monologue on Dialogue . . . . . . . . . . .6 Kirby Forgeries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7 The Art of Collecting Kirby . . . . . . . . . .10 A Provenance of Kirby’s Thor . . . . . . . .12 Art History Kirby-Style . . . . . . . . . . . . .14 Silver Star Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15 The Kirby Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16 Master of Storytelling Technique . . . . .17 The Drawing Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17 A Total Taxonomy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18 Jack Kirby’s Inkers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20 Inking Contest Winners . . . . . . . . . . . .22 In Memorium: Roz Kirby . . . . . . . . . . .24 Kirby Paintings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27 Photocopies of Jack’s uninked pencils from published comics are reproduced here courtesy of the Kirby Estate, which has our thanks for their continued support. COPYRIGHTS: Balder, Black Bolt, Black Panther, Bucky, Captain America, Eternals, Falcon, Fandral, Fantastic Four, Hogun, Human Torch, Ikaris, Ka-Zar, Machine Man, Mangog, Mole Man, Mr. Fantastic, Pluto, Sersi, Sgt. Fury & His Howling Commandos, Sif, Silver Surfer, Thing, Thor, Ulik, X-Men, Zabu © Marvel Entertainment, Inc. • Batman, Big Barda, Brother Eye, Darkseid, Demon, Desaad, Dingbats of Danger Street, DNA Project, Forever People, Highfather, Hunger Dogs, Kamandi, Mr. Miracle, OMAC, Orion, Scrapper, Snake Meat © DC Comics, Inc. • Stuntman © Joe Simon & Jack Kirby • Classics Illustrated, Cleopatra © Gilberton Co. • Captain Glory, Captain Victory, Egghead, Jupiter Plaque, Mayday Shannon, Mr. Invincible, Silver Star, Sky Masters of the Space Force, Space Head, “The Gods”, Unnamed color paintings © Jack Kirby.
Our cover painting by Alex Ross is based on this Kirby pencil drawing, originally published in The Steranko History Of Comics, Vol. 1. Dave Stevens also did an inked and colored version for our centerfold. The Jack Kirby Collector, Vol. 5, No. 19, Apr. 1998. Published bi-monthly by & © TwoMorrows Advertising & Design, 1812 Park Drive, Raleigh, NC 27605, USA. 919-833-8092. John Morrow, Editor. Pamela Morrow, Asst. Editor. Jon B. Cooke, Assoc. Editor. Single issues: $5.95 ($6.40 Canada, $8.40 elsewhere). Six-issue subscriptions: $24.00 US, $32.00 Canada and Mexico, $44.00 outside North America. First printing. All characters are © their respective companies. All artwork is © Jack Kirby unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter is © the respective authors. PRINTED IN CANADA.
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JOE KUBERT INTERVIEWED BY JON
B. COOKE “Mister Invincible” eventually became “Mindmaster,” the abortive movie concept we reported on in TJKC #11.
(Joe Kubert is one of the great masters of sequential art. Aside from co-creating 3-D comics and developing the fondly-recalled Tor comic book, Joe is best remembered for his DC Comics work, including his humanistic Sgt. Rock, Enemy Ace, and the quintessential Hawkman. His adaptation of Tarzan ranks beside Hal Foster’s and Burne Hogarth’s. While he created in 1976 and continues to run the first comic book art school in the world — the Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art — he has never stopped contributing his increasingly personal work to his public. His most recent work is Fax from Sarajevo, the true-life account of innocents caught in the hell that was once Yugoslavia. This lesson from comicdom’s great teacher was conducted on the phone on December 19, 1997. Special thanks to the unwitting Richard Kyle for a question idea here and there.)
“Experimenters take risks— even with humor, Mokkari!” Simyan, Jimmy Olsen
TJKC: When did you first meet Jack Kirby? #146 (1972), p. 4 JOE: The first time I met Jack was very fleetingly when I was probably about 15 years old. I was still going to high school. I had started working in the business when I was 11 or 12, but when I was 14 or 15 the books were selling really well and there were not a lot of people to work on them. It was just a different time as far as the business itself was concerned. I was afforded the opportunity of inking his “Newsboy Legion”; I met Jack at that time. Being a kid, I wasn’t awed or intimidated by the beautiful work that was under my hands, and it was a tremendous experience inking his stuff. Many years later I had of course gotten to know Jack real well; when he was working for DC, we knew each other pretty good. When he first started doing books for DC in the early ’70s, I had a trailer and a whole bunch of kids — five children — and we took the ride out to California. Jack had invited me, saying, “Anytime you’re here, Joe, drop over.” He told that to everybody! And so I did with a 32-foot trailer, five children and my wife! TJKC: How long did you stay? JOE: Oh, just a couple of hours. Both he and Roz were just so warm, so nice that it was just terrific. We just barged in at that time. Afterwards we would talk about it quite often. TJKC: When you were a kid inking “Newsboy Legion,” were you aware yourself of Jack’s impact on the business — was there an impact? JOE: Every artist was very much interchangeable, but there were some guys in a higher echelon. Jack Kirby, Joe Simon, and a bunch of guys like Charlie Biro were recognized by the publishers as the guys who knew enough about the business to put together stuff that really sold. However, the publishers didn’t hesitate to say, “Well, we’re going to put out five Superman books and we’ll hire five different artists to do it. We’ll put out ‘Newsboy Legion’ and we’ll get a whole bunch of guys to ink Jack Kirby’s stuff, or if need be, we’ll get a guy who pencils closely to Jack’s style.” We were kind of interchangeable. It was great for guys like me, just starting out because I was able to get experience in a whole bunch of stuff, in a whole variety of things that pertain to comic books — but having people at that point who were recognized as being movers and doers really didn’t happen much. There were guys, for instance, like Lou Fine who was the “Artist’s Artist.” I remember vividly when I was 13 working for Harry Chesler and there were a whole bunch of artists up there [in the Quality studio]. After high school, at 2 or 3 o’clock, I’d stop off (Harry would allow me to come up and work a couple of hours) and be there when Lou Fine’s stuff would come out. All of the artists would go down to the local candy store where the comic books were sold, and we looked forward to seeing Lou’s stuff. Everyone admired him — not from the standpoint of being a superstar, but just because we admired his work tremendously. We really didn’t know whether his stuff sold or not. It was really hard to tell. At that time, a lot of stuff sold. Comic books were selling like crazy. TJKC: Were you more attracted to the illustrative style of Alex Raymond, for instance, over the more suggestive style of Milton Caniff? JOE: When I started out, even as a kid, there were three icons that all of us looked up to (and I believe you’ll get this from Gil Kane, Carmine Infantino, everybody who started at that time): Alex Raymond (who did Flash Gordon), Milt Caniff (who did Terry & the Pirates), and Hal Foster (who did Prince Valiant). Those were the three people, a terrific mix, that we didn’t have any reservations about admiring, despite the fact that their styles were quite different. 6a
TJKC: Did you start recognizing the storytelling abilities of Caniff or Sickles over Raymond’s illustrative style, which was more like magazine work? JOE: I think probably intuitively. Y’know, I was working strictly from my gut, strictly from intuition. When Caniff did a really dramatic sequence, it would really hit me. To dedicate that to his ability to tell a story... I thought it was just the story that was doing it, not the way that he dramatized it. That only became clear to me when I started the school about 20 years ago and started analyzing all these things. Up until that time I was just drawing the way I felt! I never really analyzed what I was doing or why I was doing it, I was just doing it! It was only when I was trying to start communicating with students to explain how they should do it that I suddenly came to the realization of what I was doing! (laughter)
that, first of all, paid a couple of bucks more and second of all, put them in a higher echelon, they jumped at it. TJKC: How did you get to ink Simon & Kirby’s “Newsboy Legion”? JOE: I just happened to be there, (laughter) which happened more times than not in my business. A lot of times — and I tell the students here at the school the same thing — there are three things that have to be in extant in order to get work: You have to be at the right place, at the right time, with the right stuff. If any one of those things are out of place, you ain’t got the job. When I was up at DC, I might have been bringing in a job and somebody might have said, “Here, this has to be done. You
want to ink this job?” “Sure, fine.” I took it and did it. TJKC: Did you go home and do it, or did you do it in the office? JOE: No, I went home. There were some people who found it more comfortable to work in the office. There were maybe a half dozen, ten guys up at DC who did their work up there. But most of the guys worked on freelance as I certainly did. TJKC: How did you become involved with St. John Publishing? JOE: I always felt from the start that nobody was going to take care of me but me. I always felt that in order to build some security for myself — and I felt this way even as a kid — it would
TJKC: Did that bring a revelation about other people’s work? JOE: Oh, yeah. I knew that I loved Will Eisner’s stuff (I worked up in his office as a kid for a long time just erasing material, sweeping the floors, and maybe doing a half-page of artwork if Will felt that I could fill a hole there) and The Spirit and Will’s ability to design a page and tell a story that was entertaining all the way through. We knew that he was doing something terrific but personally I didn’t know why! (laughter) That is the way it went for us. TJKC: When were you over at Eisner’s? JOE: Early ’40s; a couple of years before Will went into the army. Maybe 1939. TJKC: Did you want to be a comic book artist? JOE: I always wanted to be a cartoonist. Not specifically comic books because when I started out, to become a syndicate artist was really nirvana. That was really heaven, the final destination for anybody who was a cartoonist. Comic books were just a means of getting there. As a matter of fact, a lot of the guys in the comic book business would never even say that they were doing comic books. They were absolutely ashamed of that title. The artists would say, “I’m a commercial artist” (laughter)— never a “comic book artist.” TJKC: Why was there this shame? JOE: Because, at that time, it was a junk medium. The reproduction was the crudest you could imagine. Not like the books you see today, but on the cheapest kind of newsprint. The color registration was often off anywhere from a sixteenth to a quarter of an inch. The colors were absolutely flat. The Sunday newspapers got some good reproduction. Clear color; Hal Foster’s stuff was done absolutely beautifully. But the comic books were looked at as junk, just for kids; one step above coloring books. I was just a kid so to me it was a thrill just doing this stuff. I always admired the work of the guys who were in the business but the guys themselves thought differently. The first opportunity they had either to get into syndication (and not many of them were able to make that jump) and advertising — anything
Jack drew this back-up story for Jimmy Olsen #144 at DC in the early 1970s. 7a
HOUR TWENTY-FIVE Excerpts from the 1986 KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles science fiction talk radio show, where Jack Kirby, Frank Miller, Mark Evanier, Arthur Byron Cover, and Steve Gerber discussed Jack’s battle with Marvel Comics over the return of his original art • Transcribed by John Morrow HOUR 25: If you’re a writer, you get to keep your manuscripts. If you’re an artist, this does not necessarily obtain. Jack, what happened?
“You can hide a platoon of assassins in a complex deal! “ Don Rickles, Jimmy Olsen #141 (1971), p. 16
The top panel of page 19 of X-Men #17 (bottom) was pasted over. Shown here are Jack’s unused pencil layouts and margin notes that remain under the paste-up.
JACK KIRBY: What happened was that Marvel decided to return the pages to the artists, and they sent the releases out to the various artists that did work for them over the years. My release was quite different than the others. It was a release I couldn’t sign, and that created a controversy. It mystified me; I don’t know why I got this kind of a release. It was a four-page release; it was almost like a contract, whereas the average release was something I could sign. I would’ve signed it, and there would have been an ordinary exchange of release and pages. They created a situation in which I was stuck; it became a legal thing, and I’m sorry about the circumstance itself — but it was they who sent the release out, and it was I who can’t sign it. So they kept my pages. HOUR 25: You have done thousands and thousands of pages over the years. And I must say it’s only Marvel we’re talking about; with DC, there’s no problem. KIRBY: According to statistics, I’ve done one quarter of Marvel’s entire output. There’s a lot of hard work
here. Jack’s work is the basic stuff that Marvel Comics has, across twenty years or so, turned into the most powerful comic book publisher in the country. The ideas that sprang from him into pictures — into a visual style they use full-time, all the time now — have not been credited to him by Marvel. Everyone in the industry, everyone anywhere near it, knows what his contribution was. Marvel is refusing to acknowledge this, and now they’re withholding from him his own physical artwork which they are withholding from no one else. I read these documents they want him to sign; it’s the most offensive legal creation I’ve ever read. It’s very insulting. STEVE GERBER: I think it’s important to point out also that they never paid for the physical artwork. They don’t own the physical artwork; it’s there only because, apparently, possession is nine-tenths of the law at the moment. COVER: In the latest issue of The Comics Journal, they had cataloged and accounted for three-quarters of the pages. For some reason since then, they’ve decided that there’s only 88 pages, and if the situation’s changed, they’re not saying how or why. HOUR 25: Did they give you a straightforward reason for this, Jack? KIRBY: I can only guess, and I’m not going to discuss any guessing on my part. It’s very hard to communicate with Marvel; they rarely answer. I leave it entirely to my lawyers. I’m trying to do it in a conventional and sensible legal manner; I try not to offend Marvel in any way, I try to be as polite as possible. I regard management as important people to work for; I always have. My job has always been to sell books. When you sell books, you benefit the publisher as well as yourself. What I do is not out of any innate disregard for management. I see it as a business; I’ve been a publisher myself.
behind it, and a lot of hard thinking behind it. It’s something that’s highly individual, highly creative, and above all, it sold very well. ARTHUR BYRON COVER: As I understand it, when they sent you the four-page more complex form, they’d only admit to having 88 pages of artwork out of all the thousands of pages you did. KIRBY: There’s eight books involved. There’s 88 pages involved. There’s thousands of books I did, and all they offered was eight. FRANK MILLER: It’s very important to keep in mind that we’re talking about an extraordinary situation 14a
HOUR 25: The Comics Journal reported there was a panel at Comic-Con in San Diego last July, and Jim Shooter paneled with you and Frank Miller and some others discussing this. Shooter was in the audience, and he stood up and said at one point that he thought you should have the art back. He also said that as Editor In Chief at Marvel, no decisions were made without his concurrence. That would seem to be a reasonable way to work things out, but it seems the reasonableness ended right there. KIRBY: They’ll return my art, if I’ll sign that release — and I can’t sign it. MILLER: Beyond the amount of work Jack did and how well it sold, the fact is it’s still making money. The most popular comic book in the country is the X-Men, which is one of Jack’s. If you go down the list, probably five out of the next six down will be his. What he did for comics was enormous. The whole shape of comics in these times is based on Jack’s work.
MARK EVANIER: It’s not that uncommon for a new artist to apply for work at Marvel and be handed old Jack Kirby books, and told, “This is what we want.” MILLER: It was done with me. EVANIER: There are artists to this day in the business who make their living tracing old Jack Kirby panels, rearranging them slightly, using it for their own purposes, and calling it their work. HOUR 25: Fans come up to you with original pages of your own art; where do they get them? KIRBY: I never ask because it embarrasses them. I tell them that the art is stolen; I have my own ideas on how it’s passed around, and I’ve investigated it. It’s not a complete picture, but I have a hazy picture of what really happens. If they’re young people... I had a very young boy come up to me with a page of my artwork. I don’t have the heart not to sign it. I’m not going to embarrass that child, or a female, or a very sincere fan, so I sign it. I have a high respect for the people in comics. I know the average comic fan is a heckuva guy. EVANIER: It should be pointed out, a lot of people have made a lot of money selling Jack Kirby originals, and Jack is not one of them. MILLER: What we’re talking about here is a wealth of work, but the only thing that’s in dispute here is the original physical artwork to it. This is one more way a lot of people besides Jack have made money off his genius. HOUR 25: Jack, what are you going to do? KIRBY: What I have to do; what any American has to do. Call it corny if you like. I’m up against a corporate giant. They’ve got a heckuva lot more weapons than I have. If I have one lawyer, they have ten. It’s a hard battle; I do it slowly, I do it piecemeal. It’s a thing that lasts a long, long time. MILLER: Another thing that’s being done is The Comics Journal circulated a petition among professionals, and there’s been since then a protest on the part of comics professionals on Jack’s behalf; writers and artists speaking out on his behalf, hoping to at least shame Marvel into behaving like humans about this. HOUR 25: In the current issue of The Comics Journal, Frank Miller wrote a piece, and you begin it by saying you were at a cocktail party full of professionals, and you mentioned Kirby’s name, and the silence was real thick. MILLER: It happened many times when the subject came up. I hope that it’s a temporary effect; I hope it’s just a simple stroke of fear running through things. I hope that at the very least, the rest of the professionals will join in signing that petition. This is one of the very few huge issues to strike the industry. It’s really up to each artist’s conscience as to whether he participates in supporting Jack. Simple gratitude is what any-
Journey Into Mystery #117, page 16. it all over again, and in the ’70s with the New body working in comics owes Jack. We owe him Gods. It just goes on and on. very simply our livelihood. I would not have the career I have if not for him. MILLER: It does show how the conditions of the industry have been very bad off and on. The EVANIER: This is not just the plight of people 1960s turnabout that really comes from Jack’s who worked for Marvel on Jack’s characters. work followed a period of pretty dismal downThere would probably be no industry today if ward sales. I believe he has repeatedly built the not for Jack. The fascinating thing about Jack’s industry up almost single-handedly. The induscareer is that in the 1940s, he innovated a whole try has generally not invited people to do their kind of super-hero in Captain America, the Boy best work, because of some legal things they Commandos, the Newsboy Legion. If he had insist on. Jack had always done his best, and his stopped there and never created anything else, best has always been better than anyone else’s. we’d still be talking about a giant here. Then in the 1950s, he innovated romance comics, Black HOUR 25: So what you’re going to do now is Magic, Fighting American, Sky Masters, keep your attorneys writing letters, and apply Challengers of the Unknown. In the ’60s he did 15a
The STolen ArT
First, imagine a locked and secured storage room. It could be someone’s basement, a bank vault — it might even be a warehouse somewhere. In the room is a stack of art about 4' high. Perhaps it’s moldering, perhaps it’s fresh as the day it was drawn, but it hasn’t seen the light of day for almost 35 years, and it has a potential street value of millions of dollars. The only question is: Does this room exist at all? To get into that room, we need to start more broadly, on the ugly topic of art theft. The following is based on interviews with a dozen collectors and industry people. It should be read as an accumulation of opinions, not necessarily hard facts. There are few topics in the Kirby legend about which there are more bruised feelings than the ownership and distribution of his artwork. There are, as they say, heated differences of opinion. Though they
might not have all the details at hand, most art collectors know that a good percentage of Jack’s art was “stolen.” I put quotations around that word not to be coy, but because even a small amount of research shows that the word’s meaning rapidly becomes slippery. In the Golden Age, comics were considered worthless. It’s generally suspected that most of Jack’s art circa World War II was thrown away or re-used for paper drives. But not all of it. For instance, two pages from Captain America popped up within the last year, and a cover is rumored to exist. Were these given away? Or did someone walk out of the offices with them on the sly? I’ve heard both versions of the story, and after fifty years, it’s probably hard to prove one way or the other. If the art was given away, was it the right of the artist or the publisher to hand it over? Hard to say. For years, DC relied on a legal decision that, for copyright protection, they needed to destroy all original art — the argument being that if an artist claimed ownership of the art, he might have a crack at owning the character. DC’s policy meant that most of Jack’s “Green Arrow” and Challengers of the Unknown artwork is lying in pieces in a landfill. However, some of the art that was supposed to be destroyed managed to survive, because staffers who were also art fans saved it. If they sold this art, was it stolen? Sure — but from whom? DC, who would have destroyed it? Or their artists, who legally had no clear rights to it at the time? The story gets wilder when we turn to Atlas/ Marvel work from the time of Jack’s 1958-59 return until the end of the Silver Age. Most art before 1960 was thrown away to make room for the newer stuff, which sat in a warehouse or in the offices, until 1974 when Marvel started returning it to the pencilers and inkers. Jack, of course, went through an epic legal battle before his Silver Age art was returned in July, 1987. However, of the almost 10,000 pages he penciled through 1970, he was returned roughly 2100. So what happened to the rest of it? The gut reaction most people have is “it was stolen!” To a large extent, this is correct. However, to better understand what happened, we need to think with the 1962 corporate mentality. They were selling products that cost 10¢, later 12¢. There was no back issue market, no organized fandom to answer to. The art, if it had any value at all, held only sentimental value. Marvel — and in the early days, Marvel was just a couple of guys in an office, not a conglomerate — gave out art for promotional pieces, or as thanks to messengers, or when kids wrote in asking for mementos. The art that was given away was rarely Kirby. Some early collectors say that Don Heck Iron Man pages were the most likely things to be freebies — Kirby was different, even then. Mark Evanier says that Jack asked for his pages back in the 1960s, but couldn’t get a clear response.
by Glen Gold 20a
(left) Pencils from Thor #152, page 7.
Since Marvel kept being acquired, it sometimes counted art as an asset, sometimes not — depending on whether it was good for their net worth. Stan Lee thought about opening a gallery, or selling it, but since no one was sure of the legal status (remember DC’s vision of copyright problems), and since no one valued the art, plotting a course wasn’t a high priority. In the meantime, the art was stored, sometimes in the offices, sometimes in a warehouse. Some was lost in transit, and some was quite blatantly stolen. In 1969 and 1970, two Marvel staffers (let’s call them Irving and Forbush) showed up at a Saint Louis Convention with hundreds of pages of art for sale, including Kirby Fantastic Four pages from 1963. These sold for about $10-15 a page. I’ve heard a few explanations of their actions — mostly that this was 1970, and in a counter-culture sort of way, Irving and Forbush were pissed off about the corporation — but many people I talked to simply call what they did “stealing.” Around 1971-72, the Guy who ran Marvelmania had Marvel send him a stack of original art. The idea was that he would stat it to make posters and promotional materials. However, the Guy ended up using it in lieu of salary to pay the kids who worked for him. This art included pages from Journey into Mystery #83, Spider-Man #20 and #51 (not Kirby, but hey, Ditko and Romita are nice) and various Kirby/Sinnott Fantastic Four books. Then he took the balance of the art and sold it to a comic book shop in Hollywood. One collector I talked to remembers seeing Kirby pre-hero monster pages gathering dust there. I myself have seen a page from Tales of Suspense #92 that has the “Marvelmania” stamp on the back. Marvel never pursued the return of this art, so it’s unclear whether they even considered it stolen. Jack, who was much more clear on the subject — sure it was stolen — managed to recover some of it for his own use. The Comics Journal #105 has an excellent and lengthy article about how Marvel treated their art between the early ’70s and 1986. In short, it was stored haphazardly for years, but then catalogued carefully on a master list. According to the list, almost all of Jack’s work — save some of the origin issues and much of his prime FF work — was still in Marvel’s hands as of 1980. But by 1987, when Jack’s art was returned, thousands of pages were gone. What happened? The specifics are hard to determine. Generally speaking, a lot of stuff was stolen. There are a couple of factors at play — first, several people inform me that the master list was wildly inaccurate. If it said, for instance, that an envelope contained 22 pages of X-Men #4, it might not really have that at all. Next, the art was beginning to be recognized as valuable. As the price of comics went up, so did interest in art. Frankly, there were some flat-out unscrupulous people working in the office who helped themselves when the opportunity presented itself.
Though accusations are rampant — if you were within a hundred yards of Marvel’s offices before 1986, someone somewhere swears you have FF #1 pages on your living room wall — no bombs will be lobbed today. Instead, I’ll tell you what many people have told me. During Kirby’s negotiations, his art was ordered moved from its warehouse — located at 16 West 22nd Street, according to The Comics Journal — and into a storage area at Marvel’s offices. Several people emphasize how close this area was to the elevator, meaning a clean getaway. Shortly thereafter, art by Kirby and Ditko that was previously on Marvel’s master list began showing up at New York conventions for $40-60 a page. Though Marvel was asked to step in and get the art back, they claimed that they didn’t have an accurate list of their holdings, and so couldn’t prove the art was in fact stolen. For the most part, the story of art theft ends here. But there is one niggling detail that I haven’t yet covered: That four-foot stack of art, the one worth so many millions. Few Atlas/Marvel covers from before Summer 1965 have turned up. The first published covers that have appeared on the market are for Journey into Mystery Annual #1, Avengers #16, FF #40 and Astonish #67 — all from Summer ’65. It’s as if someone grabbed a small pile, letting the rest go to mulch. There are two schools of thought on this: First, someone has the rest of the covers; second, that they were destroyed in the printing process. To refresh your memory, we’re talking about Amazing Adventures #1-6, Amazing Fantasy #15, Avengers #1-15, Fantastic Four #1-39, Hulk #1-6, Journey into Mystery #52-115, Rawhide Kid #17-47, Sgt. Fury #1-20, Strange Tales #68-135, Tales of Suspense #4-67, Tales to Astonish #1-66 and X-Men #1-12. In other words, the most valuable pages that Jack drew in his life. Since at least 95% of the interior pages to these books have survived (the earliest I know of being a complete story from Tales to Astonish #1), some people think the covers must have been destroyed. The few covers widely known to have survived are either unpublished (an alternate X-Men #10, for instance), or statted from the splash (Tales to Astonish #34). Furthermore, everyone who is known to have removed artwork from the Marvel offices has, at one time or another, let some greater or lesser piece of it go, to friends, at auction, in trade, etc. I’ve been doing historical research, looking into fanzines from the 1960s, and though some tempting artwork shows up, no pre ’65 Kirby covers — not even Rawhide Kid covers — are advertised. I called Eastern Color Printing, which handled Marvel’s comics, and talked to the man who, for over thirty years — the entire Golden and Silver Ages — saw every issue get printed. He told me that all the art, covers and interiors, went back from the engravers to Marvel in the same envelope. So no, the covers weren’t destroyed. Also, Atlas covers that immediately predate the Kirby run exist — such as the cover to Rawhide Kid #16. Why would that exist and Rawhide Kid 21a
#17, the first Kirby issue, not survive? Long-time collectors all have “the-one-thatgot-away” stories about earlier covers that they apparently saw: FF #8 and Annual #2 are frequently cited as having once been on someone’s table at some con sometime. A well-respected historian tells me he once held a pre-’65 Ditko Spider-Man cover. Another high-roller makes no secret of having the covers to Journey Into Mystery #80 and #89, from 1962 and 1963. So, there are a few covers that might exist. This leads us back to the “they’re all in someone’s basement” argument. Who exactly is that? You’ve got me. Every time I come up with a good answer, someone has indisputable proof that it’s someone else. All we can do is wait and see if they turn up eventually. I for one hope they do, not just for posterity’s sake, but because I’d like to own one or two of them. There are questions, however, about ownership rights that are somewhat ambiguous. First, there’s the moral side of it — thinking about not just the pre-’65 covers, but all of Jack’s art — how do you feel about buying stuff he didn’t get back from the company? I have to admit that because I’m a collector, I want very badly to come up with an answer that lets me buy the art. With that in mind, remember: By this time, it’s hard to tell if some pieces came from Jack or not — most dealers can’t provide an extensive provenance for the art they sell. Granted, about 75% of his Silver Age art seems to have been stolen, so unless you know for sure that Jack got it back, you have a 3 in 4 chance of buying something that is, on a moral level, shady. When it came to pursuing much of this stuff, Jack and Roz were often far too generous in many ways. What does the estate say now? Co-trustee Robert Katz says that the lawyers tell him “the trust representing the Kirbys will take whatever steps it needs to to protect the family interests.” What exactly does that mean? It sounds like they’re leaving their options open. Having Jack’s art sell publicly for high prices can help the family’s interests... or maybe not, depending on the exact situation. In any case, the situation is currently in flux, with no definitive legal answer — it’s more of a personal issue. Most of the art I own came from the Kirbys, but I’m no saint — I can’t rule out buying something from the darker side of the street. But not because I’m ethically vacuous. Let’s give the last words on the subject to the man himself. I met Jack Kirby only once, at the 1993 San Diego Con. I asked him what he thought of his art going for such high prices when he was unable to participate in the profits. He said, in that James-Cagney-meets-the-Thing voice, “You ever hear of a guy named Peter Paul Reubens? He drew art for a sou, and he died a pauper. Now you can’t touch a Reubens for less than two million. Me, I drew art and made enough to keep my family fed. And if it’s selling for so much, that’s flattery. They think of it as fine art, and that’s enough for me.” And it’s enough for me, too.★
pencils. This is called lightboxing. Greg Theakston, for instance, lightboxed the pages of the Kirby Super Powers books, returning Jack’s pencils and retaining his own, inked versions. The only problem: When he sold the inked pages to a dealer, the dealer sold them as if they were Kirby originals. by Glen Gold Here’s the slippery part of it — the dealer (to my understanding) t the 1997 San Diego Comic Convention, an excited fan rushed to neither claimed nor denied that they were Kirby originals. Instead, he show John Morrow the excellent deal he’d just gotten: An inked set them on the table as “Kirby/Theakston” pieces, technically corBlack Panther piece by Jack Kirby, about 5X7 inches, for $100. rect, and counted on customers not asking questions. This is probaAnd this was an excellent price, except for one problem: It was a fake. bly the most common form of forged Kirby artwork. For instance, the The money was returned, the fan became wiser, and the Kirby piece? Black Panther work mentioned at the beginning of this article was It might still be out there. If it isn’t, I can tell you one thing: There are lightboxed from a sketch printed in the Kirby Masterworks book. other forgeries, many of them convincing. When your pulse is racing Soon after, I saw another inked version of another sketch from that at the thought of getting some Kirby art, take a moment, take a deep book, in which Jack boxes with a monster. breath, and ask yourself, “Is this real?” So, how can you protect yourself from buying a lightboxed piece? Here’s a quick forgery primer for the art collector, with some First, examine the piece closely — are there pencil marks visible suggestions of how not to get taken. First of all, over 99% of the Kirby beneath the inks? Some inkers (Royer, for instance) erase very vigorartwork I’ve seen offered for sale is genuine, and only a very small ously, but still leave behind trace pencil marks. Other inkers (Ayers amount is what I’d call “dubious.” Even then, the motivations behind comes to mind) leave many penciled lines visible. Second, ask the them range from the innocent to the cynical. To begin, let’s consider dealer if the piece has Kirby pencils underneath. In my experience, the primary tool in producing dubious Kirby pieces: The lightbox. even the ethically-challenged dealers don’t lie — they just hope you To state the obvious: Kirby penciled but very rarely inked his don’t ask the question, or they answer vaguely (“Pencils? I don’t own work. The inker’s job was to go over Jack’s pencils with a brush know, I just know it looks like Kirby to me”). Third, remember most (or pen), generally by using the same sheet of paper. However, there sketches were never inked, and if they were, they were commissioned were occasions when inkers put the penciled page on a table with a pieces that should be signed or otherwise authenticated. Just because bright light as its surface, then inked on a separate page, on top of the something is signed doesn’t necessarily mean it’s real — Jack signed Marie Severin’s version of the Thor #175 cover and at least one Neal Adams cover. Also, more Why would Jack do two versions of the cover to Captain America #200? An inked version is than one person interviewed for this piece said known to exist, and the background figures here look a bit shaky, which makes us suspect this that the only part of Kirby artwork that’s easy pencil version is a forgery. But the Kirby signature looks legitimate, so you be the judge. to forge with practice is Jack’s signature. One weapon against getting taken is more of a pain than most people care for: Try to be familiar with all published examples of Kirby sketches. The Masterworks book, perhaps because it contains so many pencil pieces, seems to have produced the greatest number of frauds. Because it’s printed on lightweight stock, it’s easy to slap it on a light table and trace over the images. Back issues of the Kirby Collector should also provide you with many of the known sketches. I was told that someone found and almost bought a gorgeous inked Kirby street scene until they realized that it was actually the double-splash from Jack’s “Street Code” story in Argosy, which was in fact only penciled, never inked. If you are neither obsessed nor blessed with a photographic memory, the next best way to protect yourself is to ask other people — dealers, trusted friends — what they think about the piece. What about a lightboxed, or re-inked, version of an original page, such as an interior page? This occurs rarely, to my knowledge. Interior pages are the hardest to pass off, for several reasons: First, it takes more work to do six panels of Jack’s work than one quick sketch; second, interior pages are generally worth less than covers and splashes, and thus forging them is less cost-efficient. Also, the format of the page is fairly difficult to forge properly. Take a look at the average page of original art. Not only does it have pen and ink, but it also has a number of features that require great patience to forge: Statted pages numbers, a mark at the top (either rubber stamped or hand-written) 7b
Kirby Forgeries
A
which was inked, but had no pencils underneath it. This piece made the rounds, fooling even some high-powered collectors until they looked carefully for the lack of pencil marks. Next is an ersatz New Gods #4 cover that immediately looked suspicious to the collectors who saw it last year. They had familiarized themselves with the appearance of stats and logos and paper stock of 1970s DC covers, and this piece looked weird. It was on the wrong paper and the logos were reproduced crudely. (It’s very hard to describe what stats and logos should look like, and reproducing them here can’t really show off the textures and glue stains that make them authentic. My suggestion is that you try to find an original art dealer at the next con you attend and look carefully at the covers; see how they’re pasted up on a very specific weight of paper stock that has its own special markings.) The death blow to that New Gods cover was when a potential buyer learned, through the collectors’ grapevine, that another collector had owned, and still owned what was unquestionably the real version. Ultimately, it was determined that the other New Gods #4 piece was in fact a recreation, perhaps by Vinnie Colletta — but that didn’t stop someone from trying to sell it as Kirby. This has also happened with pages from the Heroes and Villains book, in which dozens of inkers lightboxed over a hundred different Kirby pieces. Some of these inkers innocently sold their finished pieces as “inks-only/ no-Kirbypencils promised,” only to have them show up later advertised as Kirby originals. It would be helpful in the future if all inkers who lightbox Kirby sign their names and also indicate, somehow, “This is my work, not Jack’s.” The Captain America #200 (see previous page) cover is somewhat of a mystery. A penciled version and an inked version are both known, but the owner of the inked version swears his has pencils underneath. Is this penciled version authentic? Did Kirby do, for some reason, two identical versions of the same cover? I asked the dealer who was representing the penciled cover if the back was clean or dirty, and I never received an answer, so I don’t know what to think. But I’m glad I didn’t get it — I couldn’t live with the uncertainty. A few months ago, a guy running an ad in Comics Buyer’s Guide had sketches by Kirby, among others, advertised for insanely low prices, about a fifth to a tenth of what the market would bear. Only, they struck me as fishy. Luckily, I have about ten friends who live for this sort of thing — I faxed them copies of the sketches and, to a man, they agreed these pieces were forgeries. But I had already suspected it, because their composition felt wrong. It’s hard to forge Jack’s pencils — just ask the hundreds of artists who wish they drew like him. He never drew a line that looked unsure of itself, he kept perspective in his head, and he never seemed to sketch out figures as much as discover them. If a sketch looks tentative or awkward, it’s probably not his work. And, as a general rule: If you think the deal is too good to be true, you’re right! So far, we have just considered pages and sketches and ’70s covers. What about the higher end of the market? Because of conditions peculiar to people who can drop $15,000 at a time for a single piece, this arena is ripe for abuse. Collectors generally don’t like to advertise the pricier pieces in their collections. Furthermore, huge pieces frequently trade or sell far from the public eye, with little attention or opportunity for questions to be asked. Because of the secretive nature of the high-end, I can only call this a rumor, but last year, three early Kirby covers from the Silver Age allegedly came up for sale, then were withdrawn when the buyer suspected they were forgeries. I wish I knew more to this story — what exactly tipped him off, for instance, and where they came from — but so far, it’s still just a rumor. The whereabouts of many early Kirby Marvel covers are unknown; they were either destroyed or locked away somewhere safe long, long ago. Should, say, a forged cover to Fantastic Four #1 appear out of nowhere, it’s possible that the owner of the real cover wouldn’t speak up for fear of being found out. And since the Fantastic Four #57 cover just sold for about $30,000, there is great incentive for a forger to start spitting out Kirby covers. On the other hand, a forger would have to
Some of the bogus Kirby art that has appeared for sale recently. Buyer beware!
indicating what book it’s from; a Comics Code Authority stamp on the back; dialogue; white out; perhaps a “continued next page” printed indication; art stats; Kirby’s notes in the margins (sometimes); blue pencil lines; etc. All of this takes work to reproduce. Furthermore, Jack’s pages all have a secret — well, secret until now — feature that makes them if not impossible to reproduce, then at least very, very difficult. So let me introduce you to a new thing to look for: The Kirby Seasoning. Jack drew on the same table for so many years that by the early ’60s it developed a layer of pencil grit and assorted crud on it so thick that the pressure of his hand actually marked the back of the paper. The mark got darker the longer he spent on the page. This isn’t a fool-proof method of authentication, but it’s worth knowing about. If you’re interested in a Kirby page, turn it over. Is it filthy, with a sort of graphite marbling? If so, it’s probably okay. If it’s clean, however, don’t panic — look for Jack’s pencils on the front. His stuff from the 1950s and early 1960s, before the table became “seasoned,” is relatively white compared to the late ’60s and ’70s. In the ’80s, he occasionally drew at Mike Thibodeaux’s house, so his later pages sometimes are clean. Otherwise, until someone figures out how to forge it, this is a fairly good method of authenticating the work. Everything I’ve ever seen that was lightboxed — Theakston’s Super Powers pages, and some Destroyer Duck artwork, for instance — has been spotless on back. Because they’re worth so much more, it’s far more likely that covers, splashes and pin-ups are the items to be forged. The bestknown example that comes to mind is a Fighting American pin-up, 8b
SECOND PLACE (AMATEUR): Mike Roberts, Bixby, OK
SECOND PLACE (PRO): Roy Richardson, White Plains, NY
THIRD PLACE (PRO): Mike McLester, London, England THIRD PLACE (AMATEUR): Patrick Lamb, Dover, NJ
MOST ORIGINAL (as chosen by editor John Morrow): Fred Hembeck 23b
Steve Sherman writes: Here is a photo taken of Roz at her 75th birthday party on September 27th. Little did I know that it would be the last one. Roz was laid to rest next to Jack on Friday, December 26th at 12 p.m. It was a small crowd, mostly family and close friends, including Stan Lee, Sergio Aragonés, Mike Royer, and Mike Thibodeux. At Roz’s service, Mike Thibodeux, Steve and Robert Katz (Roz’s nephews), Tracy Kirby, Mark Evanier, Mark Miller, and Neal Kirby spoke about Roz and what she meant to all of us. It truly is the end of an era, not only in terms of the history of comics, but for the extended Kirby family. Roz was a remarkable lady; not only a gracious hostess to the multitude of fans who trekked to the Kirby home over the decades, but a very funny woman whose sense of humor never faded, even in the face of Jack’s passing and her own illnesses. For close to 30 years, Jack and Rosalind Kirby were the “unofficial” Uncle and Aunt,
Every time we went to a restaurant, Jack would look at the menu and announce what he was going to order. And then Roz would tell him what he should eat and he would change his order... because he knew (a) that she was always right and (b) that she had only his best interests at heart. You couldn’t help but appreciate the synchronicity: Jack sitting there ’til all hours, cobbling up tales of great champions, protecting the world from total annihilation... and Roz sitting there in the next room, protecting Jack. Compared to her, the super-heroes had it easy — because Jack, God love him, needed a lot of protecting. We never saw her go off-duty, never saw her flinch. One time at a convention in the ’80s, a stooge for one of the comics companies started yelling at Jack, denouncing him for a stand which struck all of us as a simple matter of independence and integrity. Before any of us could rush to Jack’s defense... before Jack himself could even raise his voice, there was Roz, telling off the corporate goon better than any of us could. The guy is still probably trembling... because nothing scared her when her life partner was threatened, and Jack was the same way about her. When I think of her today, I think of her courage and I think of
In Memorium: Rosalind Mom and Dad, to Southern California comics fans. Their home was always open, their hospitality legendary. No one left without feeling that they had experienced something special. It was with profound sadness that those of us who gathered at the Kirby home realized that this would be the last time. After countless Fourth of July parties, weddings, birthdays, and celebrations, the time has come to close the book. The artwork will be removed from the walls of the studio where Jack created a multitude of heroes, the kitchen where we gathered to laugh and tell stories; all will be packed up and moved. And we will be left with memories of two people who touched a generation of fans around the world. Hopefully, Jack and Roz are together again, somewhere, somehow, because that’s the way it should be.
her compassion. I think of how proud she was of her family: Susan, Barbara, Lisa, and Neal, and all the grandchildren and in-laws and nieces and nephews and everyone. And then there was that extended family: All of us writers and artists and comics fans who thought of Jack and Roz as surrogate Aunt and Uncle. There’s no way to estimate the number of talented folks who received valuable encouragement and inspiration from them both. Since word spread that we had lost her, they’ve been calling to commiserate. One author was practically kicking himself that he hadn’t yet sent her his new book. It may well be a huge hit but something will always be missing for him: He didn’t get to show it to Roz and get her approval. It was never dull around them. I remember Jack telling the story of sitting there in his studio one day when Roz was coming home from the store. Her foot slipped on the brake and she plowed through the back of the garage, right into Jack’s workspace. No one was hurt and Jack, in a strange way, enjoyed the shock of it all. He said to me, “I’m sitting there drawing and I hear a noise... and suddenly, here’s Roz comin’ right through the wall.” Then he paused and added, “You know, we’ve been married half a century and she’s still finding ways to surprise me.” In an equally strange way, I think Jack would have liked the fact that she survived him a few years. Not that anyone wished that loss on her, but she did deserve that brief time in the spotlight. The day before Jack’s funeral, she told me she was worried that all the people who called and came to the house would drift away... because really, they only cared about Jack. That never happened. They called and they came, to the point where she sometimes announced, tongue-in-cheek, she was sick of all the attention. At the San Diego Comic Convention, they stood and cheered her, because they knew that Jack Kirby was a two-person operation. Today, we’re all sad to lose her. But we’re glad he’s got her back.
Mark Evanier’s Eulogy For Roz Kirby: One Tuesday in July of 1969, I drove down to Irvine, California to meet my favorite comic book artist. I thought I’d meet him and maybe get an autograph and an interview for my fanzine but it didn’t work out that way. When I left, I had no autograph and no interview, but I did have two new people in my life... two people who would come to be important to me in ways I cannot fully articulate, even now, even to myself. I was not alone in this experience. Millions of us loved the comic books that came out of the Kirby house. Most of us who were privileged to visit there instantly came to love the man who made them happen, and the woman who made them possible. We loved Jack because of his brilliant imagination and his outstanding decency and sense of humanity. And we loved Roz because... well, first of all, because she loved Jack. She dressed him and fed him and drove him and cared for him. And often, just this side of dawn, she’d go into his studio and tell him to, for God’s sake, put down the pencil and come to bed. You rarely see two people who so totally and truly belonged together, each putting themselves second so the other could be first.
Dr. Mark Miller’s Eulogy for Rosalind Kirby: My name is Mark Miller, and I believe that I am one of hundreds, if not thousands of non-kin Kirby family members. Like so many others in this huge extended family, I treasured my moments with Rosalind and Jack. Like so many others I considered it a thrill and an honor to drive up Sapra Street to the home of the King and his Queen. My first trip to the Kirby household occurred about 15 years ago. As many of you have experienced, Rosalind welcomed me as if I were another family 24b