Category: Art

Day Four of Mike Zeck Week and we’re still going strong.  Today we have the inside frontpiece that Mike did for RBCC 132 [December 1976].  The piece originally appeared as an ink wash drawing on the back cover of RBCC 119. That’s some vintage Zeck art, ZONErs.  It was published as above, without the ink wash, in RBCC 132.  At first glance you might not recognize the art as Mike’s work.  Check out the woman’s face though and you can see the Zeck’s style coming through.

Tomorrow is MIKE ZECK WEEK: DAY FIVE.  We’re going to take a look at the splash that Mike did to accompany an article about Adam Strange in RBCC 132.

It’s Day Three of Mike Zeck Week and we’re running his profile and self-portrait from RBCC 132 [December 1976].   Yeah, Mike wore it long back in the day.  His profile tells us:

• Mike’s first RBCC cover was #109.
• Mike was 27 at the time of the profile so let’s see… subtract 1976 from 2009… add in 27… carry the one… oh, never mind.
• Mike first entered fandom in 1970.
• Mike’s first published professional work was the inside front cover to Savage Sword of Conan #2 [which was a “fair reproduction of the same Conan drawing which had graced the cover of RBCC #109]
• At the time of the profile, Mike had worked mainly for Charlton Comics Group where his first published work was text illustrations in Barney & Betty Rubble #11.
• His first story published by Charlton was “Only a Toy” in Scary Tales #2.
• The first story that Mike drew for Charlton was “That Old Gang of Mine” but it wasn’t published until several months after “Only a Toy.”
• At the time of the profile, Mike had completed a five page story featuring The Destroyer for Marvel Comics which wasn’t scheduled to see print until the following summer.
• Mike was a busy guy.  He had just completed an eight page story for Bill Pearson’s Witzend titled “The Avenging Dodo.”
• Mike’s self-portrait was done for the MiamiCon program book the previous year.

Wow!  Does that profile bring back memories.  I can remember how knocked out Big Beatty was when he got his copy of Witzend with Mike’s ink wash story.  Great stuff.  The profile piece posted above actually only shows you 2/3 of the original page.  The bottom third consisted of this Mike Zeck drawing of Jonah Hex.

If you’re a Mike Zeck fan, you know tomorrow is MIKE ZECK WEEK: DAY FOUR.  We’re going to take a look at his inside front cover to RBCC 132.

Hey!  Glad you could make it back for Mike Zeck Week: Day 2.  Isn’t that a cool Zeck Iron Fist splash [from RBCC 132 December 1976]?  Yeah, it kind of goes without saying, but you know I had to. 

If you’re a Mike Zeck fan, you know Mike hasn’t done a regular comic series in years and no longer attends conventions.  His workload for DC licensing keeps him too busy for private commissions so it can be tough to get Mike Zeck original art.  When I first met Mike [through my best bud, John Beatty], Mike was selling his originals for seven dollars a page!  In fact there is a blurb in RBCC 132 which says that this Iron Fist original is 12″ x 15” and is available for $20.00.   Man, those were the good old days.

Speaking of days, tomorrow will be MIKE ZECK WEEK: DAY THREE.  Hope you can make it.

Digging around in the ZONE vault today, I found some vintage issues of RBCC. There was a period of time durring RBCC’s run when you could count on Mike Zeck having at least one piece of art in each issue [and sometimes more].  Yep, that’s Mike’s art above that graced the cover of RBCC issue 132 [from December 1976] which also featured a profile of, you guessed it, Mike Zeck.

If you’re a Mike Zeck fan, you’ll want to check back here daily for the rest of the week.  We’re going back in the ZONE time machine and, just to make it more official (sounding), we’re calling it MIKE ZECK WEEK at the ZONE.  And yes, this is DAY ONE.

It’s no secret that Howard Chaykin is one of my all time favorite comic artist/writers.  Check out part one of Steven Grant’s profile of Chaykin and you’ll begin to understand why.

Sticking with RBCC #145 from 1978 and yesterday’s Mike Zeck front piece post, we have the letters column header created by John Bolton.  Love the side glance the Spirit gives to the arm coming over the tombstone.  Is he about to meet a reanimated corpse decades before the zombie craze swept the world [like a zombie virus]?

Digging around in the ZONE vault and we find a Mike Zeck front piece for RBCC #145 from 1978. Mike was a regular contributor to the RBCC fanzine and he wasn’t alone. Many folks who went on to have successful careers in the comics field were proud to have their art appear in the pages of RBCC.  In this issue you could see the early work of Bob Layton, John Bolton, Dennis Fujitake, David Michelinie, Fred Hembeck, Don Rosa, and Kerry Gammill.

Two ads for fanzines caught my eye: the first, for Fandom Playhouse talked up “the fantastic work of Mark Chiarello” — who at that time was an 18 year old kid with a dream; and the second for a fanzine called Grymalkin which featured the work of Neal Adams, Frank Frazetta, John Byrne, Mike Nasser, George Perez, Don McGregor and many others.  [I may still have some of the art pages from it somewhere in the ZONE vault…]  Grymalkin sold for the outrageous price of a buck-fifty postage paid. 

Man, do I wish I had a time machine.