Bill Peckmann &Comic Art &Disney 28 Jul 2011 07:07 am
Walt Disney Comics Covers
- Bill Peckmann has sent me a stash of original comic book covers for the Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories. There are 20 in all, and they all are beautifully drawn and colored. It’s a real charge to see them; for the most part they’re the work of Walt Kelly, and it’s great to see how his comic styling develops. Bill wrote the following about them:
- The issues of “Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories” are in order of publication, it’s not a complete run but it is a fun one. Being the number one selling title of it’s day, it’s easy to see why some of the kids put their names on the covers, I’m guessing they didn’t want to lose them or trade them off by mistake. (Trading comics and bubble gum cards in those days was always going on, easy way to save money.)
All of the covers were done by Walt Kelly, except the very first one (August 1942, “Goldfish Bowl”), that was done by Al Taliaferro, long time Donald Duck newspaper strip artist.
Here are the covers from December 1945 to May 1947.
1(Click any image to enlarge.)
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
on 28 Jul 2011 at 10:38 am 1.David D said …
You can start to see Kelly’s magic touch especially with the non-disney characters…like the rabbit on cover 13. It’s a pity that these artists couldn’t put their names on the work. Kelly was a great cartoonist and I’m glad he made the leap into his own work.
on 28 Jul 2011 at 11:24 am 2.Stephen Macquignon said …
A lot of fun to look at
on 28 Jul 2011 at 12:03 pm 3.Thad said …
They’re all beautifully staged and rendered pieces, and works of art in themselves that made this title something to look forward to every month. I am also very fond of the covers for WDC&S when Barks took over in the 1950s.
on 28 Jul 2011 at 12:53 pm 4.Michael said …
We’ll have a pack of the Barks’ covers in a couple of weeks when we match them with the oil paintings he did revising those covers.
on 28 Jul 2011 at 1:36 pm 5.Uli Meyer said …
Makes your heart all warm and fuzzy looking at these wonderful covers. Great draftsmanship showing the classic characters the way I remember them from my childhood. Thank you for sharing them, how lovely.
on 28 Jul 2011 at 5:48 pm 6.Mark Sonntag said …
This stuff is pure gold, I have some of them in my collection too. Unlike comics today, the covers reflected what you got inside, now for the most part you see a nice cover and awful work inside . . . of course that’s not all comics. The BOOM Disney comics are really nice.
on 29 Jul 2011 at 12:31 pm 7.Daniel Caylor said …
Thanks, Michael. These are not only gorgeous, they’re very helpful for studying staging, proportion and cartoon construction.