Opening Reception: Thursday, December 4 – 7:00 PM

Colan: Visions of a Man without Fear
with special guests Gene and Adrienne Colan

The Cartoon Art Museum is honored to celebrate the life and work of cartoonist Gene Colan with a retrospective. One of mainstream comics’ most significant artists, Gene Colan was born in New York in 1926 and studied at the Art Students League of New York under illustrator Frank Riley and surrealistic Japanese painter Kuniashi. Colan’s official career in comics began in 1944 at Fiction House and Timely, and over the last 60 + years he’s worked at almost every major publisher, including EC, Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, Bongo and Archie. His most memorable work includes unsurpassed runs on Daredevil, Iron Man, Sub-Mariner, Captain America, Captain Marvel, Dr. Strange, Tomb of Dracula and Howard the Duck, not to mention inspired depictions of Conan, Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman.

Beginning in the 1980s, Gene took on more varied and unusual work, including Nathaniel Dusk, Ragamuffins, The Spider (a graphic novel), Stewart the Rat, and Michael Chabon’s The Escapist. Colan has taught at both the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan and the Fashion Institute of Technology. Colan is the recipient of a Shazam Award, two Eagle awards and in 2005 was inducted into the Will Eisner Hall of Fame.

This exhibition has been assembled by Guest Curator Glen David Gold, local author of the novel Carter Beats the Devil and many comics-related essays.

Cartoon Art Museum, 655 Mission Street, San Francisco