{"id":12897,"date":"2014-12-19T09:00:42","date_gmt":"2014-12-19T09:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=12897"},"modified":"2014-12-18T11:21:44","modified_gmt":"2014-12-18T11:21:44","slug":"black-light-the-world-of-l-b-cole","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2014\/12\/19\/black-light-the-world-of-l-b-cole\/","title":{"rendered":"Black Light: The World of L.B. Cole"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"
\nBy <\/strong>Leonard Brandt Cole <\/strong>with an introduction by<\/strong> Bill Schelly<\/strong> (Fantagraphics Books)
\nISBN: 978-1-60699-762-8<\/p>\n

The early days of the American comicbook industry were a whirlwind of spectacular exuberance and the front covers of the gaudy pamphlets that endlessly proliferated were all crafted to scream \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Buy Me! Buy Me!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d from within a sea of similar sights.<\/p>\n

As such, that first visual contact was crucial to success and one of the greatest artists ever to mesmerise kids out of their hard-earned dimes was Leonard Brandt Cole (28th<\/sup> August 1918 – December 5th<\/sup> 1995) who had a master designer’s knack for combining captivating ideas and imagery with eye-popping style and technique.<\/p>\n

Although he also illustrated quite a few interior strips (for Holyoke, Ajax, Farrel and Gilberton), Cole’s true gift and passion was devising attention-grabbing cover images rendered in what he called \u00e2\u20ac\u0153poster colors\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.<\/p>\n

Whether on Horror, Superhero, Science Fiction, Sports, Humour, Crime, War, Western, Rugged Adventure, Jungle, Romance or Funny Animal titles, his stellar, absorbing art was instantly recognisable and in great part is what defines the Golden Age of Comics for us today\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

His influence doesn’t end there, however. A shrewd businessman and editor, Cole started his own studio-shop to manufacture stories for assorted companies and parlayed it into publishing company (initially by buying existing properties from client Novelty Press in 1949) and then diversifying through his Star Comics line into genre novels, prose-pulps, puzzle-books and general magazine periodicals.<\/p>\n

Frequently he would combine his electric primary colours over a black background adding instant extra punch to his renditions of masked champions, soaring spaceships, macabre monsters and a legion of damsels in love or distress\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Before joining the nascent comics industry in the early 1940s, Cole’s background was in science and printing. He studied veterinary science (he held a doctorate in Anatomy and Physiology from the University of Berlin) but was working as a lithographic Art Director when he made the seemingly sideways transition into illustration and comics.<\/p>\n

Incredibly this colossal (272 pages, at 337x235mm), durably Flexibound compendium is his first major retrospective, bringing together a multitude of his most impressive works in one immense, colourful and informative volume<\/p>\n

The astounding career of a comicbook Renaissance man is covered in fascinating detail in ‘Comics by Design – the Weird Worlds of L.B. Cole’<\/strong><\/em><\/strong> by pre-eminent historian of the medium Bill Schelly, whose appreciation ‘Fever Dreams in Four-Color Form’<\/em> is followed by his erudite biography and timeline of the artist, divided into four discrete periods.<\/p>\n

Each section is augmented by photos, covers, original artwork and even comics extracts – ranging from panels and splash pages to complete stories (such as Paul Revere Jr.<\/em>) – covered in lavish detail in ‘Into Comics’<\/em> and ‘Cole as Publisher’<\/em> whilst ‘Out of Comics’<\/em> focuses on his later move into commercial art, education and illustration.<\/p>\n

In the 1980s Cole was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153rediscovered\u00e2\u20ac\u009d by comics fandom and achieved minor celebrity status through appearances at conventions. ‘Art Among the Junk’<\/em> covers this period up until his death when he began recreating his iconic covers as privately commissioned paintings for modern collectors.<\/p>\n

The true wonder of this glorious phantasmagorical collection follows in ‘The Comics Covers of L.B. Cole’ <\/em>which showcases long runs of the artist’s stunning covers – nearly 350 eye-popping poster images – from such evocative titles as <\/strong>4Most<\/strong>, <\/strong>All-Famous Police Cases<\/strong>, <\/strong>Blue Bolt<\/strong>, <\/strong>Captain Aero<\/strong>, <\/strong>Cat-Man Comics<\/strong>, <\/strong>Classics Illustrated<\/strong>, <\/strong>Contact Comics<\/strong>, <\/strong>Confessions of Love<\/strong>, <\/strong>Criminals on the Run<\/strong>, <\/strong>Dick Tracy<\/strong>, <\/strong>Flight Comics<\/strong>, <\/strong>Frisky Animals<\/strong>, <\/strong>Ghostly Weird Stories<\/strong>, <\/strong>Killers<\/strong>, <\/strong>Jeep Comics<\/strong>, <\/strong>Mask<\/strong>, <\/strong>Popular Teen-Agers<\/strong>, <\/strong>Power<\/strong> <\/strong>Comics<\/strong>, <\/strong>Ship Ahoy<\/strong>, <\/strong>Shocking Mystery Cases<\/strong>, <\/strong>Spook<\/strong>, <\/strong>Sport Thrills<\/strong>, <\/strong>Startling Terror Tales<\/strong>, <\/strong>Suspense Comics<\/strong>, <\/strong>Target Comics<\/strong>, <\/strong>Terrors of the Jungle<\/strong>, <\/strong>Top Love<\/strong>, <\/strong>Toy Town<\/strong>, <\/strong>Western Crime Cases<\/strong>, <\/strong>White Rider and Super Horse<\/strong> and many more\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

The pictorial feast doesn’t end there though as ‘Further Works’<\/em> gathers a host of his non-comics covers including books such as <\/strong>The Greatest Prison Breaks of All Time<\/strong>, <\/strong>Murders I’ve Seen<\/strong>, <\/strong>Raging Passions<\/strong> and <\/strong>Love Hungry<\/strong>, as well as magazine covers for joke periodicals like <\/strong>Wit and Wisdom<\/strong>, <\/strong>Sporting Dogs<\/strong> and <\/strong>World Rod and Gun<\/strong>. Gentleman’s publications and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sweat mags\u00e2\u20ac\u009d such as <\/strong>Man’s True Action<\/strong>, <\/strong>Man’s Daring Adventures<\/strong> and <\/strong>Epic (Stories of True Action)<\/strong> also feature: all augmented with articles, working sketches and original drawings and paintings. There’s even a selection of his superb animal studies and anatomical and medical textbook illustrations, plus private commissions, recreations and unpublished or unfinished works\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

<\/strong>Black Light<\/strong> is a vast and stunning treasury of fantastic imagery from a bygone age by a master of visual communication that no fan of popular art could fail to appreciate, but for comics lovers it’s something else too: a seductive gateway to astounding worlds of imagination and breathless nostalgia impossible to resist.
\nBlack Light: The World of L.B. Cole \u00c2\u00a9 2015 Fantagraphics Books. All comics, artwork, photos, illustrations and intellectual properties \u00c2\u00a9 2015 the respective copyright holder. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Leonard Brandt Cole with an introduction by Bill Schelly (Fantagraphics Books) ISBN: 978-1-60699-762-8 The early days of the American comicbook industry were a whirlwind of spectacular exuberance and the front covers of the gaudy pamphlets that endlessly proliferated were all crafted to scream \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Buy Me! Buy Me!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d from within a sea of similar sights. … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Black Light: The World of L.B. Cole”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[81,119,66,108,127,107],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-books","category-comicsacademic","category-horror-stories","category-miscellaneous-superhero","category-nostalgia","category-science-fiction"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-3m1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12897\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}