Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Adrift In Space - Noel Cook Part Two of Three

Adrift In Space scans graciously supplied by Michael Baulderstone of the Adelaide Comic Centre. If you're in Adelaide swing by and pay him a visit he has a fantastic collection of Australian comics. Adrift in Space is undated but presumed to have been published in the mid 1940's.

Read part one here.

 














Adrift In Space Copyright 2012 Estate of Noel Cook

Adrift In Space - Noel Cook Part One of Three

Noel Cook was born in Foxton, Horowhenua, New Zealand in 1896. Cook's mother was Australian and his father William Thompson Te Rauparaha Cook, a compositor-journalist, in Foxton and later Masterton. Cook's father established  the Taumarunui Press enabling Cook a large supply of drawing paper as a child. After a brief time employed as a clerk Cook lied about his age to get enlisted and fought in the Great War.
 
After the war Cook took on work at The New Zealand Herald and The Auckland Weekly news. During this time he became friends with George Finey and Cecil 'Unk' White with all three going on to become significant artists and cartoonists in Australia.

Initially drawing in an old fashioned style, text separated from image, Cook evolved, producing wildly inventive work with dynamic layouts often populated by bizarre alien creatures. Cook was noteworthy for creating some of the earliest examples of science fiction comics with Peter and all the Roving Folk produced for the Australian Sunday Times in 1924.  Cook was equally at home illustrating funny animal stories and produced many popular series such as Kokey Koala. Cook could work fast and long hours often completing fifty pages a month.



In the 1950 Cook moved to England working in a freelance capacity on Fleet Street before accepting editing positions with the childrens magazines at Fleetway Magazines. In 1959 whilst serving as Editor and Art Editor of The Children's Newspaper a nine week printer's strike gave Cook the opportunity to redesign the front page relocating the logo allowing for a dynamic cover layout. Two years before Cook passed away 1981 a retrospective exhibition was held in Auckland.


Several exhibitions of Cook's work in Australia, England and New Zealand were held during his lifetime including a group exhibition at the Royal Commonwealth Society that was opened by the Queen Mother. Some exhibitions focused on work with Polynesian themes hinting at Cook's Maori lineage through his father.



Adrift In Space scans graciously supplied by Michael Baulderstone of the Adelaide Comic Centre. If you're in Adelaide swing by and pay him a visit he has a fantastic collection of Australian comics. Adrift in Space is undated but presumed to have been published in the mid 1940's









Adrift In Space Copyright 2012 Estate of Noel Cook

Sources: http://noelcook.comics.org.nz/index.html, http://www.lookandlearn.com/childrens-newspaper/index.php, ACE biographical portraits : the artists behind the comic book characters : the Australian comic book exhibition, Melbourne State Library.

Sunday, May 13, 2012

New Zealand Woman's Weekly Star Wars Newspaper Strip

The Star Wars New Zealand website has a thorough write up on the Star Wars newspaper strip that ran in the New Zealand Woman's Weekly from 20 Aug 1979 to 04 Jun 1984. With striking pink borders and hole punch guides the Star Wars comic page was one of two pages of the magazine devoted to children. Initially written by Don Christensen with conributions by Steve Gerber and Russ Helms the strip was illustrated by Russ Manning up until his death in 1981. This was followed by a several month run by Alfred Alcala, Russ Helm and Archie Goodwin which segued into Williamson reuniting with his  X-9 Secret Agent Corrigan colleague Al Williamson for the concluding years of the strip.


Star Wars by Russ Manning and Don Christensen



Star Wars By Russ Manning and Russ Helm



Alfredo Alcala and Archie Goodwin's adaption of Brian Daley's novel Han Solo at Star's End



Star Wars by Archie Goodwin and Al Williamson



 
Star Wars Copyright 2012 Lucasfilms

Maurice Bramley Marvel Reprints Cover Gallery

As well as illustrating many comics, books, and magazines New Zealand born cartoonist Maurice Bramley created covers for many of Australian publisher Horwitz Publishing House's line of Marvel Comics reprints. Dan Best has a good write up here about Bramley's work for Horwitz including side by side comparisons of where swipes were used in some of his compositions.