Comics lost one of its greatest stylists when Carmine Infantino moved into management at the end of the 1960s at the peak of his powers. Sadly, by the time he picked up his pencil again a decade or so later, he was still good but past his prime.
Some artists handled the shrinking of the art boards in the mid-60s well, some did not. Infantino may be one of the latter. I used to think the problem was that at or about the same time, he underwent some sort of eye surgery and I presumed that affected his art. Nowadays, I'm not so sure. But by the time he became management ca. 1967, no, he was past his peak. The last year or two on the Flash was, compared to his earlier work, relatively bad. (To be clear, though, I always enjoyed his post-peak work.) Infantino's peak was a very approximately ten year period or so, that lasted till the board size was reduced, and what made it great was the incorporation of a design element. (Off the top of my head, I'd put the period some time after Showcase 4 up to the shrinking of the boards.) Made his work look like no one else's. When he stopped incorporating the design element, he was just a penciller. And to confuse things, somewhat: When he did his last run on the Flash (deliberate pun), his editor, Ernie Colon (I'm told) exposed Infantino to manga and got more stylized breakdowns out of him. It was part of an overly extended storyline, but dang, it was gorgeous.
Big big big Infantino Flash fan. Grew up reading the many superman related titles, batman too. Liked the JLA. But when I had to have almost the entire Marvel output of the seventies, I had to abandon DC. I kept Flash and LSH though. Carmine was special. The tilted walls of the Venusian buildings here are trademarks of his. This post for me was great fun.
Some artists handled the shrinking of the art boards in the mid-60s well, some did not. Infantino may be one of the latter.
ReplyDeleteI used to think the problem was that at or about the same time, he underwent some sort of eye surgery and I presumed that affected his art. Nowadays, I'm not so sure. But by the time he became management ca. 1967, no, he was past his peak. The last year or two on the Flash was, compared to his earlier work, relatively bad. (To be clear, though, I always enjoyed his post-peak work.)
Infantino's peak was a very approximately ten year period or so, that lasted till the board size was reduced, and what made it great was the incorporation of a design element. (Off the top of my head, I'd put the period some time after Showcase 4 up to the shrinking of the boards.) Made his work look like no one else's. When he stopped incorporating the design element, he was just a penciller. And to confuse things, somewhat: When he did his last run on the Flash (deliberate pun), his editor, Ernie Colon (I'm told) exposed Infantino to manga and got more stylized breakdowns out of him. It was part of an overly extended storyline, but dang, it was gorgeous.
Big big big Infantino Flash fan. Grew up reading the many superman related titles, batman too. Liked the JLA. But when I had to have almost the entire Marvel output of the seventies, I had to abandon DC. I kept Flash and LSH though. Carmine was special. The tilted walls of the Venusian buildings here are trademarks of his. This post for me was great fun.
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