I'm very sad to report that illustrator Berni Wrightson has died. His work as a comic book artist & illustrator will live on forever. One of the greats. RIP.
I'm very sad to report that illustrator Berni Wrightson has died. His work as a comic book artist & illustrator will live on forever. One of the greats. RIP.
Sleeping at home is killing the hotel business!
Sleeping at home is killing the hotel business!
Thanks for this post.
Although I didn't know him by his name, I recognize his style from a couple of album-covers he also made for Meat Loaf ect.
RIP
http://berniewrightson.com/MeatLoaf-deadringer.jpg
"Steeern! He's nothing, but a low down, double dealing, back stabbing, larcenous perverted worm! Hanging's too good for him!! Burning's too good for him!!!
He should be ripped up into little bitty pieces, and
BURIED ALIVE!!!!!
I got a text from a friend early this morning. I couldn't believe it when I saw the "RIP." Another friend emailed me very late last night, but I wasn't at my computer.
Bernie was...IS...beyond words. Comics are so much poorer now.
For those who only know Bernie for his album covers and the "Captain Sternn" segment of Heavy Metal, he co-created Swamp Thing with Len Wein in the early '70s for DC Comics. While Bernie worked largely within the horror realm (which is where the vast majority of his output landed), he was also one of the "Good Lizard Men" along with the likes of Al Williamson, Mark Schultz and Steve Bissette (meaning they were more than darned good at drawing reptiles and dinos and scaled beasties). But he was already drawing at a level in his 20s beyond that of many of the other pros at Marvel and DC. When he switched over to Warren Publishing in 1974 is when he put the pedal to the metal.
Within a few years, while still at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Studio_(commune) (which the book was named for), Bernie began working on a sequence of 50 pen/ink illustrations based on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. (If you've never seen it, you owe it to yourself to check it out: https://www.amazon.com/Bernie-Wright...rnie+wrightson) The preview is shitty, but you can see all the art on the Web (buy it, anyway).
Bernie effectively retired in January (he'd had a series of strokes in 2015), but before that, he and Steve Niles had produced The Ghoul and Frankenstein Alive! Alive! The latter only lasted three issues, but it was Bernie's best work in some time. Just fantastic. He's the Master.
Here's one of the celebrated plates from his much-lauded Frankenstein epic.
A sterling example of Wrightson's mastery of mood. Brilliant shading technique. Very precise. Nobody else was doing it like that. I once saw some pages (might have been Vigil's) where he was emulating Wrightson's facial shading, and it looked like exactly that: imitation.Originally Posted by wilcox660
For the record, Bernie was a super nice guy, too. Talked to him a number of times at Comic Con. It was pretty weird to have that kind of access to a comics legend (one year, he was right next to Joe Jusko), while Doofus Actor from the latest Marvel movie had a line around the block.
Wow, what a bummer. A major loss. I have the "Frankenstein" book and it blows me away every time I open it.
"The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"
Looking at his art online, he would seem to have been a modern Gustave Doré.
Same here.
Lou
Looking forward to my day in court.
If you want another (huge) book on Wrightson, get this. Not a copy out there for under $150, though. I have the second edition.
https://www.amazon.com/Berni-Wrights...on+a+look+back
RIP-Awesome illustrator!
"Alienated-so alien I go!"
Len Wein just died. Len and Bernie created Swamp Thing.
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertain...icle-1.3485402
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