OKAY, HOT- SHOT ! DECONSTRUCTING ROY LICHTENSTEIN © 2000 DAVID BARSALOU

OKAY, HOT-SHOT ! : Original Source

Original Artist: Russ Heath
Russell Heath was born in New York in 1926, and did his first comic work on 'Hammerhead Hawley' at the age of sixteen. In 1946, he was employed by Timely, where he began drawing for several different genres of strips. His best work was on Westerns, especially 'Arizona Kid' and 'Kid Colt Outlaw', which stood out for their realistic artwork and details. Other genres Russ Heath drew were love stories, science-fiction and adventure, such as 'Mad' and 'Frontline Combat' for EC Comics. In 1950, he joined National, where he worked on the full range of comic book features, among which were 'Silent Knight', 'Sgt. Rock', 'Sea Devils' and 'Golden Gladiator'.Apart from his own comic work, Heath assisted other artists, such as George Wunder on 'Terry and the Pirates', Dan Barry on 'Flash Gordon' and Kurtzman and Elder on 'Little Annie Fanny'. In 1981, Heath did his first newspaper strip, a revived version of 'The Lone Ranger' for the New York Times Syndicate. After this folded in 1984, Russ Heath devoted most of his time to animated cartoons.

Russell Heath, Jr. (born September 29, 1926, New York City, New York) is an American artist best known for his comic book work — particularly his DC Comics war stories for several decades and his 1960s art for Playboy magazine's Little Annie Fanny featurettes — and for his commercial art, two pieces of which, depicting Roman and Revolutionary War battle scenes for toy soldier sets, became highly familiar bits of Americana after gracing the back covers of countless comic books from the early 1960s to early '70s.

Heath's drawing of a fighter jet being blown up, in DC Comics' All American Men of War #89 (Feb. 1962), was the basis for pop artist Roy Lichtenstein's 1962 oil painting Blam.

Russell Heath, Jr. (born September 29, 1926, New York City, New York) is an American artist best known for his comic book work — particularly his DC Comics war stories for several decades and his 1960s art for Playboy magazine's Little Annie Fanny featurettes — and for his commercial art, two pieces of which, depicting Roman and Revolutionary War battle scenes for toy soldier sets, became highly familiar bits of Americana after gracing the back covers of countless comic books from the early 1960s to early '70s.

Biography
Early life and career
One version of Russ Heath's famous Roman Soldiers ad that appeared for years on the backs of comic books in the 1960s and '70s
One version of Russ Heath's famous "Roman Soldiers" ad that appeared for years on the backs of comic books in the 1960s and '70s

Raised in New Jersey as an only child, Russ Heath at an early age became interested in drawing. "My father used to be a cowboy, so as a little kid I was influenced by Western artists of the time. Will James was one, an artist-writer &mdash: I had most of his books. Charlie Russell was my favorite because his work was absolutely authentic, because he drew what he lived...."[1] Largely self-taught, Heath began freelancing for comics during one or two summers while he was in high school, inking the naval feature "Hammerhead Hawley", drawn by penciler Charles Quinlan in Holyoke Publications' Captain Aero Comics.

It is unclear if Heath, anxious to fight in World War II, graduated high school; in a 2004 interview, he recalls going "into the Air Force in my senior year of high school, in 1945," after having been "put in an accelerated class so I could get through with high school. I almost made it, but then the Air Force called me and in I went".[2] He served stateside for nine months, drawing cartoons for his camp newspaper, but due to a clerical error, he said, he was on neither the military payroll nor any official duty roster for a significant portion of his time. Upon his discharge, he lived at home on a one-year military stipend of $20 a week before working as a lifeguard at a swim club, where he met his future wife.

While spending several weeks arranging appointments with artists, seeking an assistant's job, Heath was hired as an office "gofer" for the large Manhattan advertising agency Benton & Bowles, earning $35 weekly. He continued looking for artist work on his lunch hour, and in 1947, landed a $75 a week staff position at Timely Comics, the 1940s predecessor of Marvel Comics. While initially working in the Timely offices, Heath, like some of the other staffers, soon found it more efficient to work at home. He and his new wife had been living at his parents' home, and continued to do so for two more years while saving money for their own house; by the mid-1960s, however, they'd had children and were divorced.[3]

The artist said in 2004[3] he believed his initial work for Timely was a Western story featuring the Two-Gun Kid. Historians have tentatively identified a Kid Colt story in the omnibus series Wild Western #4 (Nov. 1948); the second Two-Gun Kid story in Two-Gun Kid #5 (Dec. 1948), "Guns Blast in Thunder Pass"; and the Two-Gun Kid story in Wild Western #5 (Dec. 1948), while confirming Heath art on the Kid Colt story that same issue. Heath's first superhero story is tentatively identified as the seven-page Witness story, "Fate Fixed a Fight", in Captain America Comics #71 (March 1949).[4]

Timely let virtually all of its staff go in 1948 during an industry downtown. By then or before, Heath had gone freelance, doing art both for Timely and for ad agencies.

[edit] The 1950s
Heath's cover of Uncanny Tales #48 (Oct. 1956), with duplicate images and saturated color unusual for the time and medium.
Heath's cover of Uncanny Tales #48 (Oct. 1956), with duplicate images and saturated color unusual for the time and medium.

Heath drew a corral-full of Western stories for such Timely comics as Wild Western, All Western Winners, Arizona Kid, Black Rider, Western Outlaws, and Reno Browne, Hollywood's Greatest Cowgirl. As Timely evolved into Marvel's 1950s iteration, known as Atlas Comics, Heath expanded into other genres. He drew the December 1950 premiere of the two-issue superhero series Marvel Boy, as well as scattered science fiction anthology stories (in Venus, Journey Into Unknown Worlds, and Men's Adventures); crime drama (Justice); horror stories and covers (Adventures into Terror, Marvel Tales, Menace, Mystic, Spellbound, Strange Tales, Uncanny Tales, the cover of Journey into Mystery #1), satiric humor (Wild), and — ironically given his short stateside military service — the genre that would become his specialty, war stories.

Heath produced a plethora of combat stories both for the wide line of Timely war titles but also for the first issue (Aug. 1951) of EC Comics' celebrated Frontline Combat. Heath later did the first of many decades' worth of war work for DC Comics, with Our Army at War #23 and Star Spangled War Stories #22, both cover-dated June 1954.

Other 1950s work includes an issue of 3-D Comics from St. John Publications, and the story "The Return of the Human Torch" (minus the opening page, drawn by character-creator Carl Burgos) in Young Men #24 (Dec. 1953), the flagship of Atlas' ill-fated effort to revive superheroes, which had fallen out of fashion in the postwar U.S.


Russ Heath co-created with writer-editor Robert Kanigher the feature "The Haunted Tank", which headlined many issues of DC Comics' G.I. Combat. Also with Kanigher, Heath co-created and drew the first issues of DC's Sea Devils, about a team of scuba-diving adventurers.


Russ Heath was among the recipients of Comic-Con International's Inkpot Award in 1997.
Howard Chaykin on Heath: "...one of the gods of comics".[5]
* World Talk Radio: Comic Zone (Oct. 18, 2005): Russ Heath
Footnotes

1. ^ The Pulse (April 27, 2005): "Comic Giants: The Russ Heath Interview
2. ^ Russ Heath interview, Alter Ego Vol. 3, #40 (Sept. 2004), p. 3
3. ^ a b Alter Ego, Ibid., p. 23
4. ^ The Grand Comics Database: Russ Heath (chronological search results)
5. ^ Pop Culture Shock (May 26, 2006): "Addicted to Comics" (column) #7: "Howard Chaykin Speaks on Legend and Russ Heath", by Jim Salicrup

References

* Lambiek Comiclopedia: Russ Heath
* Russ Heath interview (excerpted online), Comic Book Artist Special

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russ_Heath"

Categories: American comics artists | Golden Age comics creators | 1

Russ Heath
Interview with the Artist on His DC War Comics Duty
Conducted by Jon B. Cooke
Transcribed by Jon B. Knutson

From Comic Book Artist Special Edition

It is legend that in the early '70s, when a new job would arrive at the DC offices from Russ' Chicago studio, all work would stop, and the bullpen would wait in nervous anticipation as the package was unwrapped, so they could be the first to see the latest opus from a master.

In a comic con program book, renowned writer/editor Archie Goodwin wrote in his tribute to Russ: "Artist's artist. That's something you read somewhere. I haven't heard anyone in comics actually say it. What I do hear said is: 'You see what that crazy bastard Heath did this month?' And everyone stops and looks at the new 'Sgt. Rock' and shakes their head. Then they go back to their drawing boards or their typewriters or wherever, and maybe they work a little longer, try a little harder. And maybe it has nothing to do with a crazy bastard like Russ Heath. But maybe it does."

After over 50 years in the industry, Russ is still hard at work producing glorious work, and he continues to be our inspiration. Look for a special tribute issue in the coming year. The artist was interviewed on July 22, 1999, and he copyedited the transcript.



COMIC BOOK ARTIST: While you worked for Timely/Atlas with Stan Lee, were you looking to get a gig at DC?

RUSS HEATH: Well, the business in those days, it used to be up one year and down the next, and so on - sometimes a lot worse, and sometimes not so bad - but there was a big break around 1950, somewhere in there, and I ended up doing some of Joe Kubert's 3-D book, Tor. And then I went over to DC and showed my stuff to Bob Kanigher, and he gave me a war story to draw.

CBA: How did you get hooked up with Kubert? Was it through Joe, or his partner, Norm Maurer?

RUSS: Well, they were working together at St. John's offices, and I was going everywhere - I had a list of 15 places to go - and I went over there, and I talked to Norm first. As I'm about to open my portfolio, Kubert walks in and says, "He doesn't have to show that. He's okay." Which was very flattering!

CBA: Was "Golden Gladiator" [from The Brave and the Bold] your first DC work?

RUSS: The first was a war story, I think it was a winter story about ice and then, when I finished that one, I got another one. . . I'm not sure of the order of when the "Golden Gladiator" thing. . .

CBA: Were stories being tailored to you? Did you have particular strengths that Bob Kanigher saw?

RUSS: Well, they'd start you on a feature. I did some "Robin Hood," and some "Golden Gladiator." It's like, "All right, you've done the 'Golden Gladiator,' and we've got this stuff on hand, so we'll give you some 'Robin Hood.'"

CBA: As part of Bob's group of artists, were you exclusively on his books?

RUSS: It wasn't by design; you were just working for him, and someone else was working for Julie Schwartz.

CBA: Did you hang out at all with any of the other Kanigher regulars, like Mort Drucker or Gene Colan?

RUSS: Mort was so tied up with MAD magazine. I did hang around with Ross Andru, and we became good friends. I had lunch with Ross about once a week - sometimes his wife would come along - I was usually with a girlfriend, and the four of us would go.

CBA: Were Ross' pencils something to marvel at? Were you particularly a fan of his stuff? Because I always hear artists raving about Ross Andru's pencils.

RUSS: I liked some of the things that they did, but I was more of an illustrator than a cartoonist. Someone like Shelley Moldoff always had a comic approach - like [Fawcett's] Captain Marvel - whereas I was trying to be an illustrator. I read that Moldoff interview in The Comics Journal [#214] and I realized that he was saying the way they drew Batman in the old days, was better than the guys who are doing it now for animation - it was a better take on the character, because it was a comic approach.

CBA: In the late '50s, for a long period of time in their war books, DC was doing basically short stories, and then they started to do series. I think they started with "Sgt. Rock."

RUSS: "The Haunted Tank" started somewhere in there, too.

CBA: Exactly. Were you looking to do a regular strip, or did it just fall in your lap?

RUSS: I didn't like "The Haunted Tank" [in G.I. Combat] as much, although I probably didn't say so - it wasn't good business policy to be negative about anything. You don't know what it does if the writer hears that, and he doesn't want to write for you anymore. You kept your mouth shut. "The Haunted Tank" I liked less because there was always the same four characters - J.E.B. Stuart plus his three buddies - virtually the same story every issue: He'd be talking to this ghost, over and over again. I couldn't believe kids kept wanting to look at it.

CBA: You did hundreds of pages of "The Haunted Tank," didn't you?

RUSS: Yeah, it was probably the longest thing I did.

CBA: And you did that strip for 10 years?

RUSS: I don't know, I have no idea of the years. In those days, in the early days, and before that, it was like "That was my job," and the guy who lives next door is a butcher, and you go off to work, and you worked fast. It wasn't like having a career; it was what you did. And you had a little control over your wages by how many pages you could turn out. A lot of the guys tried to turn it out as fast as possible, and did, but I felt they became hack artists, and I was afraid I'd become a hack, and I wouldn't be able to do good stuff. So, I decided I wasn't going to go for the gold.

CBA: What was your dream at the time? Was it you wanted to remain good, and just didn't want to be like so many other artists who'd churn out pages and maximize their productivity? What were you holding out for?

RUSS: It's like that time I did that story for Blazing Combat, "Give and Take." [For a detailed interview on Heath's Warren work, see CBA #4.] All the guys working on that book who were my peers were doing excellent work. I knew I had to work to the best of my ability against that quality. So, I worked my ass off on that one story in particular, which turned out to be what many people think is the best story in that issue. It's ironic, and I guess it was just happenstance, but everybody turned in a great job on that issue [#4].

CBA: You said in an earlier interview that while you were doing Sea Devils you spent time with a young lady who was going to art school, and she influenced you?

RUSS: She'd been to three art schools, and she moved in with me. I had gotten sick of going over and getting her clothes, and I said, "Why the hell don't you just bring all your clothes over here?" So we set up dual drawing boards. She had no experience, and her work leaned more towards fashion, but she was good at it. She wasn't into comics. But if you go to art school, and you learn some of the rules, like negative space....

CBA: That rubbed off onto you?

RUSS: Yeah, I had no concept of negative space. Once I realized what it was, I could tell what was wrong with my stuff. Before, it was accidental. This panel worked, that one didn't, and I didn't know why.

CBA: Did you do an enormous amount of research before that?

RUSS: Well, from the time I was a kid, my father used to take me to all these Western movies. On Saturday mornings, they'd have these serials, like Tom Mix, and my father, having been a cowboy, would point things out to me and say, "Oh, no cowboy in his right mind would wear a boot with a heel like that," or "The spurs are on wrong." So, I felt I should try to convince the readers that I knew what I was drawing. And I'd better get it right! Of course, illustrators use a lot of photo research, and of course, you have to know how to interpret the photo; you can't just copy it.

CBA: How did Sea Devils develop? Was that Bob Kanigher's book?

RUSS: Yeah. I guess I was there from the first issue. It started in Showcase, then it got its own book, and I guess I did about 10 or 12 covers and interiors. Whether the covers exactly paralleled the interiors, or what, I can't recall.

CBA: Did you feel you were going to town with the covers? Because they certainly looked it.

RUSS: Yeah, I was trying. I'm paying for it now in doing re-creations! That one with the sunken ship, you know, and some of them were so complicated... almost painted. I just finished a complicated one - it's fun doing them right, like the way the should have been done, and the way they should have been colored, because I didn't have control of the coloring when I initially did the covers. In 98% of all the work I did, I had no color input at all. Color is so important. The colorists weren't artists, and didn't appreciate lighting, using white. They were afraid if they brought it in and something was white, it was like you were lazy and not coloring the whole thing.

CBA: If memory serves, there was some interesting processes used on a number of your covers.

RUSS: The gray tones? Yeah, well, they found it was too expensive to do full-color separations, and they wanted to head in that direction, so they felt if they added tone, they could do it that way. It wasn't such a great idea. You mix gray with a color, and you get mud. It was terribly dull....

Possibly Russ's epitome as one of DC's finest war artists: The double-page splash to "Easy's First Tiger," Our Army at War #244. This also features a very rare turn of Russ as writer. Courtesy of the artist. ©1999 DC Comics, Inc.

CBA: Did you enjoy working on Sea Devils?

RUSS: Well, there were positives and negatives; it certainly was a lot better because of the background - or lack thereof. Underwater, everything could be... you know, you can't make a lump of coral too big or too small, it was whatever you drew it as. Whereas if you're drawing a goddamn building, you know, you'd go crazy. One thing I didn't want to do was stories based in Manhattan. So, with Westerns, the buildings were rough-hewn and didn't have to have all the straight lines, because the more they wiggled, the more authentic they looked. So, it was very good in that sense. But, the four people in Sea Devils would drive you nuts, because you can't draw four people in every panel, or you can't do an arm reaching into the panel to represent two of them, and then draw two of them. I mean, it was a real dumb thing, and of course, if you divide your heroes by four, each one only has one-fourth of the value - it waters it down. So, when you have a single or perhaps two people, you can do more effective storytelling. I think that's why such things as Terry and the Pirates would go on for a year-and-a-half with just Terry, or a year- and-a-half with just Pat... some with both of them, just because it's so hard to do a story about a herd of people. I had taught SCUBA-diving, I got compliments about the attitudes of the bodies and so forth. It was fairly convincing, having done it myself. I knew what a swimmer looked like.

CBA: And there were good sales from the war stories, that got him to make an attempt adding Pterodactyls and other dinosaurs?

RUSS: Yeah, all that kind of crazy stuff. What was really something else was that they passed these edicts down, and you haven't been there in two weeks, and "Oh, did you hear about the new rule? All the GI's are supposed to have stubble beards." And you'd go in two weeks later, and "Oh, did you hear the new rule? No more stubble beards." So I figured, they don't know what they want, I'm just going to draw it the way I want to. Nobody ever said anything. Sometimes in the Kanigher stories, he'd have a lot of things like the tank hidden in a hay-stack, and throwing the grenade down the muzzle of the tank, and stuff like that which appeared multiple times in different stories. I would - maybe to get more room if it didn't conflict with the storyline - ignore the redundant scenes and spread it out focusing on something else, and get more room. He either didn't care, or didn't realize I was doing that.

CBA: You took liberties with Bob's scripts, eh?

RUSS: I don't know how he'll take the news.

CBA: He had a notorious reputation with a number of people as being quite an angry guy.

RUSS: We originally - way, way back, you know, before '50 - cartoonists came to work in a short-sleeved sportshirt and dress slacks. One day I went in and he's telling one artist that he's not getting the feeling of this thing, and he makes the guy get down on the floor to get the feeling right.

CBA: To get him to pose?

RUSS: To get him rolling around on the floor and I thought, "Dammit, I'm not going to do that!" So I started wearing a suit and tie. I think Gil Kane picked that up, and everybody wore a suit for a while there.

CBA: So they wouldn't have to roll on the floor?

RUSS: "I'll be damned if I'm going to get down on the floor in my good suit!"

CBA: Were some of you scared to death about working with certain editors?

RUSS: We weren't scared to death, but some of us were more religious about following rules than others, and of course, it depended on how much demand the artist was in. If a guy had a couple of weak pages, he'd be nervous. There weren't too many changes made to my stuff, and I think the better you got, if you had any intelligence, you started anticipating what an editor was going to change, so you did it the way he wanted it in the first place. To me, the most successful editor is one who hardly ever changes anything, because he's explained what he wanted so well to the artist, and the artist is bringing him what he wants.

CBA: During this same time, you were becoming a dominant war artist, along with Joe Kubert. Did you hang out with Joe at all?

RUSS: Yeah, I went out to his house a few times, and we went to a health club or something or other. And we'd go to lunch. He'd always marvel that when we'd go somewhere to have a hamburger, and I'd have a vodka tonic, a martini or something with my hamburger, and he'd have a glass of milk. "You know how much you paid? Your lunch is twice as expensive as mine." I think he thought this was idiotic - but we became good friends.

When I went to Chicago, I was working by mail, it was a different time, and a different age, and I spent almost every evening going out in my sandals and my bellbottoms, going into bars and partying, and bringing people along to party, and carrying on and so forth. That's what was going on in those days, part of the '60s. I started being late with my deadlines, and Kubert would get very justifiably angry, and I remember one time he got so mad he said, "If I had you here in New York, I'd punch you right in the face!" And I didn't blame him! In fact, that's one of the things where I started improving my stuff a lot. I was trying to make up for being late, I wanted to dazzle... if they're distracted by how neat it looked, they're not going to come down so hard on me for being late - or so I thought. Later on, they wised up, and started making longer deadlines. All that pressure disappeared, because if they knew you were usually late, they'd give you a deadline two weeks before they really needed it. Finally, I heard - I didn't realize this - but apparently, because of the lateness, I didn't get a call back... it very well could be true. But Joe and I remained good friends.

CBA: Do you remember how you got "Sgt. Rock"?

RUSS: I don't really know the facts... I'm guessing that Joe wanted to do less of it, or wanted to do more of something else. I remember the first story I did, I tried to ape his style a little bit, so there wouldn't be a sudden shock to the reader; you can see it in the first story I did. I'd do my version of his explosions. Years later, somebody said, "How does it feel to be known for not just your work, but known for 'Russ Heath explosions'?" and I thought that was kind of neat.

CBA: Marv Wolfman told of opening up a job from you and just being floored. Mark Hanerfeld remembers vividly opening up your "Easy's First Tiger" [Our Army at War #244] story, Neal Adams hovering over him, dying to look at the work.

RUSS: They'd gather around the office to see what I'd done. Archie Goodwin wrote a flattering piece about that in a convention program.

CBA: With your strength as a renderer of the female form, were you ever interested in doing a regular heroine adventure strip, like "Black Canary"? Skintight costumes look awfully good.

RUSS: Not back in those days, because most of the stuff was censored even if it happened to just look sexy. When did Wonder Woman ever look sexy? Not until the TV show.

CBA: Man, you would've done one bodacious Wonder Woman!

RUSS: They wouldn't have allowed it; if I'd drawn it like I wanted to, they wouldn't have accepted it. I stuck some stuff in the war stories here and there, like a nurse....

CBA: What would you call your high point working at DC? What was the most memorable, pleasant experience you had?

RUSS: Oh, I think when I look through the "Sgt. Rock" stories. Each one had a special deal. As much as they were alike, they were all different. I liked to interject something to make the stories more interesting, like snow... there was a story we did about blood, by having it on top of the snow, it made it different. I'd make one a rainy thing, to establish weather, instead of just hanging back in limbo, make it winter, and get a chance to draw different clothes and there was the snow effect, too. There was a "Sgt. Rock" job where he gets his voicebox temporarily cut, which was a neat winter story... there were a couple of good winter war stories.

These are just excerpts from Russ Heath's interview.

davidbarsalou.homestead.com/LICHTENSTEINPROJECT.html

www.flickr.com/photos/deconstructing-roy-lichtenstein/

www.valleyadvocate.com/gbase/Arts/content?oid=oid:688

davidbarsalou.homestead.com/roylichtenstein.html

davidbarsalou.homestead.com/roylichtensteinsee.html

www.umassmag.com/nypop/barsalou.htm
www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2006/10/18/lich...

www.masslive.com/springfield/republican/index.ssf?/base/n...

ASIFA-Hollywood: The International Animated Film Society


www.asifa-hollywood.org/2006_10_01_blogarch.html
Can a Copyright Thief Sue to Protect His Stolen Images?

Alex Beam of the Boston Globe has an article on Roy Lichtenstein, the man who made a fortune on the backs of real artist like Wally Wood and Joe Kubert. lichtenstein creator or copycat


I have had very little respect for the fine arts copyist and even less for his foundation that is trying to protect his stolen images. They make you click on a copyright disclaimer (almost like a porn site) before you can view the stolen comic book art. Here is the Joe Kubert dog they use as an image on their disclaimer.

The article deals with art teacher David Barsalou and his web site Deconstructing Roy Lichtenstein LICHTENSTEINPROJECT that catalogs the source materials from which Lichtenstein stole his images.

The Lichtenstein Foundation is still claiming that good ol Roy made major changes in his images. The only changes I see are due to poor draftsmanship on the part of Lichtenstein.
Look at the hand on the right. It sucks. It looks like a bad copy by someone that does not know the first thing about anatomy.

P.S. all the images in this article were under some kind of copy protection. I stole them under fair use.

Thanks to Jon Reeves for the link ¶ 8:20 AM

THE DAILY BRIEFING

www.thedailybriefing.com.au/

Alex Beam in The Boston Globe writes about art teacher David Barsalou's (rather obsessive) collection of 140 or so comic book panels from the 50's and 60's. Not much of a collection, you might think, but these are the same panels which were copied and zoomed up in size by Pop artist Roy Lichtenstein, who then sold them for lots of money, and neither paid royalties, nor gave attribution, to the artists who drew the originals.

Roy Lichtenstein ontmaskerd. ( Gepost op 10.17.06 door Uw Moeder )
www.appelogen.be/2006/10/17/roy-lichtenstein-ontmaskerd/
Dat Roy Lichtenstein z’n inspiratie zocht in comics is geen geheim. David Barsalou ging op zoek naar de comics achter de schilderijen.

From : Eric
Sent : Wednesday, October 11, 2006 10:42 PM
To :
Subject : WOW! I never knew.

David,
For years I have been a fan of Lichtenstein’s work and today a little bit of that fandom has died.
This afternoon I happened across a BOINGBOING article on your Deconstructing Lichtenstein webpage!


www.boingboing.net/2006/10/11/roy_lichtenstein_swi.html

I had no idea Lichtenstein did not create these famous images on his own!

From : Greg Morrow
Sent : Thursday, October 26, 2006 2:19 PM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : Deconstructing RL

I found your impressive website via Colleen Doran and Lea Hernandez, and I wanted to compliment you. It's an impressive piece of scholarship. Thank you for the hard work.

I posted a pointer on my blog and a discussion broke out. You may be interested.

Greg

The Legal Reader
www.legalreader.com/
A daily dose of links to interesting legal news and Other Fancy Stuff, live from San Francisco.
Lichtenstein: Creator or Copycat?
Art teacher David Barsalou has an interesting avocation. He has found and catalog ed almost every comic book panel later blown up and sold for megabucks by 1960s Pop Art icon Roy Lichtenstein. So far, Barsalou has about 140. You will see a sample on this page, or go to his website, Deconstructing Roy Lichtenstein.

Color me naive, but I never thought Lichtenstein's work was a direct copy of scenes from comic books. I assumed that he stylized certain scenes suggested by the comic vernacular of the 1950s and 1960s. ``He tried to make it seem as though he was making major compositional changes in his work, but he wasn't," says Barsalou, who teaches at the High School of Commerce in Springfield. ``The critics are of one mind that he made major changes, but if you look at the work , he copied them almost verbatim. Only a few were original." . . . .

[L]ichtenstein's fans, and the collectors who now pay millions of dollars for individual canvases, will continue to revere his work. But what are the implications for copyright law? Barsalou correctly points that musicians who ``sample" other artists' music have to pay them royalties. Does the Lichtenstein estate owe compensation to the creators of the original work?
After visiting a Lichtenstein exhibition in Chicago, attorney Mark Weissburg wrote an article titled ``Roy Lichtenstein, Copyright Thief?" ``I was struck by the fact that Lichtenstein was never sued for copyright infringement," Weissburg wrote. `Under copyright law if you copy a protected work without permission you are breaking the law . . . . The Copyright Act also prohibits what are called `derivative works.' These are works that play off of or incorporate or embellish another work. Virtually every one of Lichtenstein's paintings was either an out and out copy or at least a derivative work.

From : Lindsay S. Tiemeyer
Sent : Friday, October 13, 2006 8:36 PM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : question on lichtenstein

Hello,

My name is Lindsay Tiemeyer and I am currently writing a law review article on Intellectual property law in the United States.
Specifically, I am taking famous works from the pop art area, and analyzing them in the context of modern-day copyright and trademark law. Needless to say, Lichtenstein is a key figure in my article.

I was wondering if you would be wiling to send me the pictures you have posted on your website, minus the "Deconstructing Lichtenstein" text you have written across them. Also, do you have the information on the original artist for each of those works?
If you could do that for me, I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks in advance. Take care,
Lindsay


Lindsay S. Tiemeyer
lindsay.tiemeyer@gmail.com

From : Lindsay S. Tiemeyer
Sent : Friday, October 27, 2006 7:06 PM
To : "DECONSTRUCTING ROY LICHTENSTEIN"
Subject : Re: question on lichtenstein

Interesting. Thank you so much. I'm actually working on peoples' perceptions of Lichtenstein at this very moment... so PERFECT timing.

Thank you for thinking of me. I appreciate it.

I hope you're well.
Lindsay

From : Marije Matthew
Sent : Monday, October 9, 2006 4:46 PM
To :
CC : Sandy Goldberg
Subject : Source image for Lichtenstein's 'Whaam!'

Dear David

We found your site 'Deconstructing Roy Lichtenstein' and were hoping you
might be able to point us in the direction of the copyright holders of the
source image for Lichtenstein's Whaam! that appears on your site. The
company I work for, Antenna Audio, is currently producing a multimedia tourfor Tate Modern and Whaam! is one of the works we're covering on the family tour. We'd love to show the source material, but then we'd also like to give kids the opportunity to manipulate the image themselves, for which of course we'd need permission.

Any help gratefully received!

Best wishes,
Marije

Marije Matthew
Head of Creative Management, UK
Antenna Audio Limited

J307/9 Tower Bridge
Business Complex
100 Clements Road
London SE16 4DG UK

e: mmatthew@antennaaudio.com
w: www.antennaaudio.com

From : Matthew Moring
Sent : Wednesday, October 18, 2006 4:28 PM
To : DeconstructingRoyLichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : Comic list

Hi-

I saw your site featured in an article in the Globe today. I've long thought about collecting those Lichtenstein-sourced comics as a nice subset of my comics collection. Do you have a checklist of the
sources?

thanks,
Matt

From : Boyd, Norman
Sent : Wednesday, October 11, 2006 10:59 AM
To :
Subject : Lichtenstein
Hi David
I’ve been asked by a lecturer in our College to do a talk to his Graphic Design students on comics – a personal passion of mine he found out about!
I just wanted to make sure you’re happy for me to point the students to your site:
davidbarsalou.homestead.com/LICHTENSTEINPROJECT.html

I work in the Library at Barking College, UK
Thanks a lot
Norman
P.S. I should have said, it’s a great scholarly resource- well done!
Norman Boyd
Systems Librarian & Workshops Coordinator
Barking College
Dagenham Road
Romford
RM7 0XU
www.barkingcollege.ac.uk
vle.barkingcollege.ac.uk/learn > Library

From : ~Olivia~ Munro~
Sent : Thursday, June 29, 2006 3:17 AM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com

Hi there ,
I was wondering if you could please give me any info on how Lichtenstein produced his comic book images like what materials and processes he uses
Thankyou...

From : Pat Conant
Sent : Monday, October 23, 2006 12:51 AM
To : DECONSTRUCTING ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Subject : Re: NEW LINK

Hi David,
That was an interesting article on your work regarding Lichenstein.
I thought of you a few weeks ago when I saw the memorial in the newspaper to your wife. How are things going for you and are you still at the University of Hartford? Did you take some time off from your teaching or are you still there?

Thanks for sending me the article I will post it at school....yes, I am
still there, but hopefully only until June.

Best Wishes,
PAT Conant

From : Davies, Paul - Times Sent : Friday, October 13, 2006 3:56 PMTo :
Subject : From The Times

Hello-We have a weekly column dedicated to the internet, here at the Knowledge, and have written a positive piece about your website. Would it be possible for you to email to me some hi-res images of both the source and Roy's interpretations please. Concentrating on the female faces examples on your site.
I need these asap please and send them to: playpictures@thetimes.co.uk
Thanks!
Paul Davies
PictureEditor
The Times Knowledge
Times House
1 Pennington Street

London E98 1TT

From : Ralph Mcginnis
Sent : Friday, October 20, 2006 3:02 AM
To : DECONSTRUCTING ROY LICHTENSTEIN
Subject : Re: credit

Thanks for writing back. Check out my essay The Omission of Comics
www.postroadmag.com/11/criticism/McGinnis.phtml
Thanks,
Ralph McGinnis

From : Ralph Mcginnis
Sent : Thursday, October 19, 2006 7:00 PM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : credit

I think that to really give weight to this collection you need the names of the artists attributed to these comic panels

Thanks,
Ralph McGinnis

six feet five
www.6ft5.org/?p=116

Pop art not ageing well?

12 Oct, 2006 Inspiration

i was intrigued by pop art early on. Andy Warhol still fascinates me and there was always something fast about Roy Lichtenstein. A sense of humour that appealed to me. Today I was pointed at David Barsalous webpage saying that Roy was a copy cat. It was even mentioned at boingboing. Am I supposed to feel cheated? I dunno. Maybe it doesn´t really matter.

edit. binarybonsai got a good conversation going in his comments on said topic.

From : Philipp Arlt
Sent : Monday, March 27, 2006 2:03 PM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : Sources

Hi there,
I'm a student from Germany and certainly I'm working on a presentation about roy lichtenstein and his sources.

I found your site and I really like it. A great collection of Sources and Paintings.

Could you please send me the URL of the sources? I have to work with them, so your tags are kinda disturbing - naturally I will mention you and your work in the credits and sources of the project.

Best regards
Philipp Arlt

The Vine www.newsvine.com/lichtenstein
Lichtenstein: creator or copycat?
Oct 18 - Seeded by lauhal
Source: boston.com

Art teacher David Barsalou has an interesting avocation. He has found and cataloged almost every comic book panel later blown up and sold for megabucks by 1960s Op Art icon Roy Lichtenstein. So far, Barsalou has about 140.
arts, art, copyright, artsvine, artist, lichtenstein
9
18 Comments
!
Deconstructing Roy Lichtenstein
Oct 11 - Seeded by winsomecowboy
Source: davidbarsalou.homestead.com

art as fraud, fraud as art, celebrity as catalyst , catalyst as celebrity. Hot chocolate as therapy.
arts, roy, lichtenstein, deconstructing

The Words of Jason
hegyessy.com/blog/
Last “modern” artist falls off my respect list

October 18th, 2006 / Art / No comments

Granted that my list of modern artists (non realists) that I enjoy have been small, and for someone who got a -A to +A in various Art History classes you would think that I would have known the following:

Roy Lichtenstein is a phony.
There I said it! Phony to the bone. Roy Lichtenstein was one of the few modern artists (he was classified as a pop artist) that I enjoyed. Anyone could recognize “his” art. Turns out that he pretty much just copied and pasted his stuff on to the canvas. Check out the following damning evidence: Deconstructing Lichtenstein

I mean, he didn’t even bother changing the speach bubbles on most of them! Bah Humbug!!!

From : Taliaferro, Tony
Sent : Friday, October 20, 2006 5:33 PM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : Eye-opening site

What a great job you did with this site – it’s shocking..

From : John Irvine
Sent : Wednesday, October 11, 2006 8:30 PM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : Lichtenstein

Thanks for the site.

Did he take good comic art and copy it badly on purpose? In every instance, the original comic panel is just better art.
-John

From : Don Quaintance
Sent : Thursday, October 19, 2006 2:55 PM
To : deconstructingroylichtenstein@hotmail.com
Subject : lichtenstein source Mr. Bellamy
Dear David Barsalou,

I saw the article about your research on Lichtenstein sources and I couldn't resist contacting you. Your perseverance is impressive and I wanted to tell you that, but I also have an ulterior motive.

About 6 years ago I was working on a Pop art museum publication that contained Lichtenstein's Mr. Bellamy (1961) in the collection of the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. We made a fairly serious effort at pinning down the comic source but struck out. I felt we were close looking through newspaper strips of the time such as Steve Canyon.

We were looking for the source imagery-wise, but also trying to confirm if the character Mr. Bellamy in the word balloon was actually part of the original comic. Some art historians have tried to tie this name to Lichtenstein's early dealer Richard Bellamy of Green Gallery, NYC.

The Lichtenstein Foundation couldn't locate any source material for us either. The tone of the article on your work suggests that they have not been very cooperative with your efforts.

Anyway, the short story is: do you happen to know the source for Mr. Bellamy? Image attached

Many thanks.
Best,
Don Quaintance

Don Quaintance
Public Address Design
3280 Sul Ross, #2
Houston, Texas 77098
don@publicaddressdesign.com