Although Bernie wrightson may not have been a name of maximum popularity, the passion of their testimonials are nothing short of surprising, and it is that nobody unsheathed the soul of a monster like Wrightson, who found the beautiful in the grotesque.
A few sticks of his pen revealed the twisted green lips and frown of Swamp Thing, a monster he created with the writer Len Wein, while the precise placement of each stroke on a werewolf's furry body makes the beast still shoot off the page. Wrightson's little lines were magical, and they are ones that are undoubtedly still missed after his death on March 18, 2017.
Best known for his transformation from the classic Mary Shelly, the monster that became known by the name of its fictional creator, his 1983 book, Bernie Wrightson's Frankenstein, supplementing Shelley's tale, forever changed the image of the monster from Frankenstein.
From his book Frankenstein, Alive, Alive! in 2012. Source: Horror Artist Bernie Wrightson's Official Site
And Wrightson was a product of the second generation of comic book fans and began contributing to fanzines in the late 1960s, before breaking into the comic book industry in 1969, with work for web of horror y DC's Showcase, including two numbers from the dark fantasy strip "night master”. Although his initial work was crude, he was also presented as powerful, with lush inks, dynamic anatomy, and a knack for telling stories - especially dark and terrifying ones - as you would expect from an artist whose favorite movie was James Whale's masterpiece of 1931, Frankenstein.
Although Wrightson's craft was horror, he was too talented and versatile to be easily pigeonholed, and he drew other beloved stories and illustrations of fantasy, swords, and witchcraft.
Born in 1948, into a working-class family from Baltimore, Wrightson did not recall receiving much encouragement for his early artistic endeavors from his parents, but as he observed in a 2015 interview on Comic Book Creator, He acknowledged drawing since he could remember. Comics and comic strips were early influences, with Wrightson citing the brave prince of Hal Foster, Flash Gordon, drew by MacRaboy, y Buz sawyer by Roy Crane like your favorite comics.
Wrightson was only five or six years old when he began to read EC Comics, the most visceral of all those that were on sale, where they drew Graham Ingels and Frank Frazetta, so his childhood was marked by a profound influence on his aesthetics. Another major influence on Wrightson was horror movies, as his popular interest in dinosaurs resurfaced in the late 1950s. providing another fundamental piece for your future.
The editions Ace Books de Edgar Rice Burroughs With covers and frontispiece illustrations by Frazetta, they were also essential to Wrightson, for thanks to them, he began to read novels from cover to cover.
In addition to his influences from popular culture, Wrightson learned about drawing by watching the famous art instruction show from John gnagy on television and taking the famous artists correspondence course. His first published drawing appeared on the letters page of Creepy #9 in June 1966, showing a man being dragged into an open grave, and a headstone that read the inscription "Bernie Wrightson, Dec 15, 1965".
Your version of Batman Source: LA Times
In the following years, Wrightson caused a stir in zine circles with his numerous illustrations influenced by Frazetta and Ingels. A meeting with his idol Frank Frazetta at a 1967 convention in New York further inspired Wrightson to start creating his own stories. It was at that convention that Wrightson also met Al Williamson, Jeffrey Jones, Michael Kaluta y Dick giordano. He also met the editors of fanzines Rich hauser y Roger Hill, and soon began to contribute so much in Spa Fon as in Squa Tront.
In 1966, Wrightson got a job at The Baltimore Sun as an illustrator, his first professional work as an artist, where he also published his first work, The man who committed suicide en House of Mystery #179 March-April 1969, a title with which he would have a long association.
For the next several years, Wrightson contributed painted covers and interior stories of the three numbers of webofhorror, a Warren-style horror magazine published by the owners of Cracked.
In 1971, with a script by Len Wein, Wrightson illustrated Swamp Thing en House of Secrets #92 in July 1971. The reader's reaction was instantly and overwhelmingly positive, and by the fall of the following year, DC I was posting a title of Swamp Thing with Wein's scripts and Wrightson's pencils and inks.
The comics fandom reacted enthusiastically to the new title, and Wrightson was soon given the art assignments for the new title. Shadow de DC. After ten numbers of Swamp Thing, Wrightson went on to other assignments, though over the years, he made various covers of the character for various reprints and collections of his original stories. To this day, he remains one of his signature characters.
In the mid-1970s, Wrightson also did covers and interior stories for the Mystery Comics list of Marvel, including a well-remembered adaptation of a story by King kull, The Skull of Silence (Creatures on the Loose #10).
One of the things that Bernie wrightson is most remembered is for being a founding member of The Studio, the loft space he shared with Michael KalutaJeffrey Jones y Barry Windsor Smith, from 1975.
Cover for Swamp Thing. Source: Daily Press
It was during this period that Wrightson began work on the graphic novel adaptation of Creepshow de Stephen King, and then what was widely regarded as his masterpiece, Frankenstein, in 1983, where he enjoyed the peak of his fame.
In January 2017, after a series of health problems that included brain surgery, Wrightson announced his retirement from drawing and public appearances. He remained a fan favorite from the beginning of his long and prolific career.
Among the many awards he received over the course of his more than 40 years working as a cartoonist and illustrator They include: Shazam Awards for Best Cartoonist (Dramatic Division), in addition to winning the 1972 Shazam Award for Best Individual Story (Dramatic Division) for Swamp Thing # 1. Due to his work with Jim Starlin on the Heroes for Hope charity comic , Wrightson shared a Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award.
In 1975, Wrightson won the San Diego Comic Con Inkpot Award. The National Society of Cartoonists recognized his work in Frankenstein, Alive, Alive! in 2012 in the comic category. The year 2015 gave Wrightson final recognition for Swamp Thing, his Frankenstein illustrations, and indeed all of his work when he received the Inkwell Special Recognition Award.