Frank Frazetta 1928-2010

Coming across his work in the 1960s and 1970s, amid those decades’ absolute disconnect from the recent past and outright suspicion of junk culture, was a specific revelation for their being so very little out there like it. Frazetta’s work was one of the few consistent, visually accomplished gateways to somewhere else, a way of escape available to a generation of kids that was psychologically preparing to die when someone set the skies on fire. Frazetta’s were potent images, strange, of obvious skill and stuffed with conflicting messages. There were the soft women and the more dread, powerful ones. Men faced off against monsters but also nature, and in some cases their own savage impulses. There was light like the light we were used to but also strange colors, light like no one had seen but that Frazetta somehow understood. They weren’t inviting fantasies, but formidable ones, foreboding, aspirational rather than something that coddled or flattered you. If you went through the wardrobe into Narnia, events would likely fall into place, and you were pretty sure you could’ve handled that ring, but if you went to one of the worlds Frazetta painted something was going to eat you or stab you or have your soul. These were fantasies you steeled yourself towards rather than fell into. And so it was with Frank Frazetta’s art: it frequently impressed, it almost always inspired.

From The Comics Reporter excellent obituary of Frazetta, I think this paragraph captures the appeal of his art quite well. It was lush, exciting, exotic, but also a bit scary. Frazetta is of course often dismissed as no more than a panderer to the worst kind of adolescent wishfulfilment, but to do so is to miss both his obvious craft chops, as well as yes, his artistic talent.