The greatness of Golden Age art. (spoilers I guess)

[The World]

Yeah I know it's not the prettiest or most detailed. But it does have a certain energy that imo most modern art lacks. It's dynamic and bold just the like the character it portrays with exaggerated acting and quirky gesture. It's exciting and often underrated and ignored. I guess I'd like to use this topic to display that greatness from time to time. Such as



Like this image kind of shows what I'm talking about. Middle right panel showing that hard lean in to that truck that Superman stops from being propelled off the side of the cliff and the way his arms are being brace up against it. Given his strength even back then it's probably not necessary for his to put that much strain into it but the scene really makes you feel the effort of Superman's work and comes off very lively. I also like the over the shoulder toss of the giant cat which dwarfs the truck he just saved.

Here's another scene I like from the same story.



First off love the way Supes is posed up on the mountain top like a greek god or something. But the real attraction for me is the shouting match Superman gets into with the scientist through the speaker. The big lettering on the dark background really gives the feeling of Superman's voice booming back to the speaker.

[The World]

Idk but I really like these pages of Lois first putting the pieces together with some continuity going on as she reminisces.

[Kuwagaton]

I'm fond enough of Sikela and the earlier years of Boring, even if it's difficult to tell everyone apart. Despite a lot of talent and solid work ethic, being in such a different market with such a strongly followed house style makes it really hard for me to tell without archive credits. Who drew the pages in your first post?

[The World]

The DC.wiki list a guy called Paul Cassidy for pencils and Wayne Boring for inks.

[The World]

Another good picture. Less action but I just found Clark's response pretty funny also I like the way the artist captures Lois's rage and the pose in the bottom left is nice.

[superduperman]

Probably my favorite GA artist is Jack Burnley. He had a very realistic style for the time.

[Jim Kelly]

To piggyback on this, in terms of the words on the page, I often see the complaint that classic comics overexplain the action. But it seems to me the words support the art, so the combination of both gives the complete story. If you took the words away, you wouldn’t know what the heck the story was. You’d have to have hundreds more panels of art to render each step in pantomime. It’s easier and quicker to cut through all that with a caption, so we get to the high points in the art. And a story can be told in 13 pages rather than 130.

[Kuwagaton]

Ah. I have sort of heard of Burnley and Cassidy.

So although Boring is often known for headlining in the silver age alongside Plastino, Schaffenberger, and Swan, I think he's a pretty great example here. Namely as the artist for very much of the golden age newspapers. I like the simple elegance of a few panels every day to explain, make progress, and hook with the story. And then a huge page with many details in color for the Sundays worked all well as anything in more recent years with regards to storytelling.

Check out the following two pieces from two consecutive days:




as well as a Sunday page:

[Jim Kelly]

Wayne Boring was judged to be the best artist in the Joe Shuster Studio, which is why he landed the newspaper strip, as that paid better and had more prestige. Comic strip artists were a class above comic book artists in those days.

Jack Burnley wasn’t in the Shuster Studio and worked directly for DC, but he did occasionally ghost the Superman strip, as well as the Batman strip. And, of course after Shuster left, the studio’s artists including Boring worked directly for DC. Stan Kaye was Boring’s main inker.

Something I like about that comic book story above, where Lois guesses Superman and Clark are one and the same—“Man or Superman?” SUPERMAN No. 17—is it references both stories from the comic books and the strips, establishing they shared a common continuity. Which wasn’t really the case later.

[andersonh1]

I'm always impressed by how much story is packed into 8 or 12 pages. Even if that old art isn't as technically sophisticated as the modern books, I love the dynamic energy of so many panels. It's great stuff.

[Kuwagaton]

The DC.wiki list a guy called Paul Cassidy for pencils and Wayne Boring for inks.

The thing I really like is that very natural body language Superman. Those are completely fantastic things he's doing, but he looks like a human doing it versus looking rigid and posed. As much as I like flight, that's especially a thing where he's lost dynamic imagery. His leaping about feels like it implies more action and movement.

[Jim Kelly]

The best source for Who Drew Superman? is Bob Hughes.

http://dccomicsartists.com/superart/superart.html

That site might not have been updated in a while, but I believe most of the info is still correct.

[Electricmastro]

In general, I think I tend to like looking at older comics like this since the impression I get is that newer comics tend to be too overly-dark or overly-lit with shading, and comics like these ones feel closer to a middle ground to me, where colors are more solid and have less of a risk of blending into each other while casually reading.