Eisner's Influences

http://comicartville.com/rareeisner.htm


"The early Man Ray films interested me tremendously. I used to go down to the New School and spend hours looking at these old Man Ray experimental films; and it gradually dawned on me that these films were nothing but frames on a piece of celluloid, which is really no different than frames on a piece of paper. And pretty soon, it became to me film on paper, and so obviously the influence was there."

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Will Eisner brings some holiday cheer to the boys in the motor pool

Another reminder why they call it the Eisner

The Post-war Spirit stories have such beautiful, fully realized quality that it's easy to forget that comics was a very young medium, still in the process of being invented by its creators, particularly Eisner, the artist who, as Jules Feiffer put it, was the artist other artists stole from.

The story of P'Gell is justly remembered for the extraordinary sexuality of the titular character, but it also shows Eisner playing with visual storytelling, using the repeated motif of translucent curtains to suggest depth and build mood and enhance the sensuality of the piece.

Great stuff.

Early Eisner

In 1939, Will Eisner was 22 years old. He had already established himself as one of the most successful entrepreneurs in a booming new medium. More importantly, he was pushing that medium, both through his own art and through the artists working for him. His art was always a notch above the rest and from the beginning he was creating new techniques in what we now call sequential storytelling.

Yarko is nearly forgotten now (he only made one American appearance -- Wonder World Comics #8), but it stands up better than many of his longer lived competitors.

Enjoy.

Will Eisner's PS Magazine

Will Eisner was the most influential comics creator... period. With all due respect to remarkably talented men like Kirby, Cole, Siegel and Shuster, Lee, Barks and all the rest.

Eisner saw not only the artistic potential of comics but the commercial and instructional potential as well. With that in mind he created American Visuals Corporation and PS Magazine (featuring the beloved Connie Rodd).

Now the good people at Digital Comics Museum have downloaded a whole truckload. You can see that Eisner had put a lot of thought into the problem of teaching through sequential art. You'll also notice he has pretty much solved the problem of holding soldiers' attention while instructing them.

For a character with magical powers he wasn't very lucky

But he was very good.

Out of the seemingly endless crop of Mandrake impersonators who cropped up in the Golden Age, Mr. Mystic was one of the least successful, but he was possibly the best drawn of the bunch. Bob Powell achieved what might be his personal best on this back feature for the Spirit Section (quite an accomplishment given Powell's portfolio).

Will Eisner created the character and wrote the first run of stories including this memorable tale from 1940.

Dave Berg before Mad

Though Dave Berg's "Lighter Side" was the most aggressively mundane feature to appear in Mad, focusing on ordinary people facing everyday urban and suburban life, his earlier work often featured surreal images and fantastic settings. These tales were also marked by beautiful artwork that often reflected the influence of his boss at the time, Will Eisner.

From 1942, here are the adventures of Sir Butch.







From Ibis #1

Dr. Drew and the Philosopher's Stone

Another well drawn tale from Jerry Grandenetti (with not-too-surprising oversight by Will Eisner).









Fiction House, 1953