James Bama

James Bama is an American artist whose work encompasses two major strands: his Western paintings and what can be described - but not dismissively - as pulp art. To the collector, his name is inextricably linked with the adventures of Doc Savage and the paperback covers he illustrated during his time as a commercial artist. He then turned to fine art, which proved even more rewarding commercially and raised his status to Artist and earned him comparisons with Norman Rockwell and N. C. Wyeth.

If one theme can be seen through Bama's work it might be described as "one man (or woman) in the wilderness", as his covers often featured isolated single figures, some alone against expansive backgrounds; it is a style that can be seen in such diverse Bama illustrations as Freedom Road by Howard Fast and Groupie by Johnny Byrne & Jenny Fabian (both Bantam) and Dell's edition of Desmond Morris's The Naked Ape. It is also a theme that has extended into his fine art work where Bama, using photographs of real mountain men and Native Americans as reference, often isolates the figures to create portraits where wheathered facial features, clothing and body language tell a story. In other paintings, landscapes and animals add location to Bama's evocation of the rugged modern day prairie men.

James E. Bama was born in Manhattan on 28 April 1926, the second son of Benjamin Bama, a Russian-born apron salesman, and his wife Selma, also the daughter of Russian immigrants. Raised in New York City, Bama was inspired to draw by the adventure strips of the time, most notably Alex Raymond's Flash Gordon, Burne Hogarth's Tarzan and Frank Miller's Barney Baxter. His father died of a stroke when Bama was 13, and his mother suffered a debilitating stroke the following year; Bama had to cook and clean and began earning money, making his first $50 sale, a drawing of Yankee Stadium, to The Sporting News at the age of 15.

He graduated from the High School of Music and Art and enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps' Eastern Flying Training Command unit in 1944, where he worked as a mechanic and physical training instructor, as well as painting murals. On his discharge, he used the GI Bill to enrol at the Art Students League, where he was learned drawing and anatomy under Frank J. Reilly.

After freelancing briefly - his first sales including Western paperback covers A Bullet for Billy the Kid by Nelson C. Nye (Avon, 1950) and Dead Sure by Stewart Sterling (Dell, 1950) - he began working for one of New York's leading illustration firms, Charles E. Cooper Studios, in 1951. for the next fifteen years, he produced commercial artwork for a range of clients, including the Baseball Hall of Fame, the New York Giants and the U.S. Air Force.

However, it is for his paperback covers that he became known, especially the 62 covers he painted for Bantam Books' reprints of Doc Savage pulp magazine stories. Clark Savage Jr had been the star of 181 full-length adventures in the pages of Doc Savage Magazine (1933-49), 159 of them written by prolific pulpster Lester Dent. The heroic adventurer and scientist had been trained to almost superhuman physical and mental ability and faced a range of supernatural and superscientific foes. Bama was introduced to the saga when Bantam Books began reprinting the series in 1964 with The Man Of Bronze, Doc's debut adventure.

Bama gave Doc a buzz cut, replacing the kiss-curl of his pulp days, and beefed him up, using Steve Holland, a muscular fashion model who had starred in the Flash Gordon TV series in 1954-55, as the basis for his vision of Doc Savage. The books sold incredibly well and all 182 stories were reprinted between 1964 and 1990.

Although much of his early work was Western covers for the likes of Louis L'Amour and Zane Grey, Bama quickly expanded his cover art repertoire to include everything from contemporary novels, thrillers, romances and non-fiction. A small sampling of his work would include A Rage at Sea by Frederick Lorenz (Lion, 1957), Requiem for a Gun by Burt & Budd Arthur (Avon, 1963), The Pillars of Midnight by Elleston Trevor (Ballantine, 1963), President's Agent by Joseph Hilton (Lancer, 1963), Colette Cheri (Berkley, 1966) and covers depicting James Bond and the characters from Star Trek.

As well as Doc Savage, Bama painted many other covers for Bantam, including King Kong by Delos W. Lovelace (1965) and Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1967). Bama had an affinity for classic horror characters, having been a childhood horror movie fan; in the early 1960s, beginning with Frankenstein, he produced vivid box artwork for a series of model kits based on Universal's movie monsters; Dracula, Wolf Man, The Mummy and others followed as well as Aurora's Monster Hot Rods and Monster Customizing Kits.

Bama then changed tack after first visiting Wyoming in 1966; he and his wife, Lynn, a photographer whom he met in 1963, moved permanently to Cody, Wyoming, in 1968. During this period he transited from illustration to making more personal works, often inspired by his new surroundings. Much of his work was of contemporary Western and Native American subjects; wildlife and mountain men feature against stunning Wyoming backdrops.

Bama is inspired by real inhabitants of the state, visiting reservations and meeting trappers and cowboys; his prices rapidly escalated and, within three years, he was making far more than he had as an illustrator.He also sought inspiration in travel, to China, Mexico, Tibet and Turkey.

Bama was the recipient of the Spectrum Grand Master Award in 1998 and was inducted into the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame in June 2000. His work is to be found in the collections of Clint Eastwood, Nicholas Cage and Malcolm Forbes as well as numerous galleries.

Bama, who has lived in Wapati, Wyoming, since 1971, remains a keen on physical training, regularly doing heavy exercise even in his eighties. He is a keen reader and movie viewer.

Bibliography
The Western Art of James Bama, with an introduction by Ian Ballantine (Scribner, 1975; enlarged, Bantam, 1980)
James Bama: A Wyoming Realist by Warren Adelson (Coe Kerr Gallery, 1985)
The Art of James Bama by Elmer Kelton (Greenwich Workshop, 1993)
James Bama: American Realist, edited by Brian M. Kane, with an introduction by Harlan Ellison  (Flesk Publications, 2006)
James Bama Sketchboo: A Seventy-Year Journey, Travelling from the Far East to the Wild West , edited by John Fleskes (Flesk Publications, 2010)

Original prints by James Bama can be found for sale at the Illustration Art Gallery.

Giorgio De Gaspari

For such an incredibly talented artist, almost nothing exists on the internet about Italian painter Giorgio De Gaspari. Although his merits have been praised on blogs - Bear Alley and Cloud 109, for instance - hard facts about the artist are almost impossible to come by. This has been noted even by Italian bloggers, one of whom described De Gaspari earlier this year as "a figure about whom many anecdotes have been told for decades but who is, incredibly, almost entirely absent from the internet."

De Gaspari was born on 30 January 1927, possibly in Varese - or the province of Varese - north of Milan in north-western Italy, not far from the Swiss border. He began his career under the auspices of comic strip artist and illustrator Walter Molino who, in the 1940s, was a leading contributor to Grand Hotel, to which paper De Gaspari also contributed; another strip  ('Uragano, il re della prateria' [Hurricane, the King of the Prairie]) appeared in Success Collection published by CEA in 1946-47. De Gaspari also worked for Il Giornalino di Carroccio and illustrated 'il Giustiziere scarlatto' for Albi Mignon.

In May 1947 his first illustrations appeared in La Domenica del Corriere, a Sunday paper which he was to continue contributing to until February 1970, producing over 1,000 illustrations. De Gaspari's paintings were of high quality and innovative in their use of original material, tools and techniques. He would use any sort of paper, create collages and cut and scratch the images. This experimentation with his artwork did occasionally cause him to fall foul of his editors. In one instance, on a Kit Carson cover painting for Cowboy Picture Library, he used real sand glued onto the page; although it made for a superb, textured image, it all had to be scraped off and a new sandy background painted in by an in-house 'bodger' rather than run the risk of damaging the machinery that turned the artwork into four-colour separations.

De Gaspari was a busy chidlren's book illustrator in Italy for publishers Valladri, Agostoni, Lucchi and Fabbri as well as contributing illustrations to Arianna. Amongst the many titles he illustrated in the 1940s and 1950s were editions of Pinocchio, Don Quixote, The Three Musketeers, Moby Dick, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and various fairy tale books.

De Gaspari's first cover in the UK appeared on the Sexton Blake Library in February 1958, gracing Peter Saxon's 'The Sea Tigers'; his second (and last) cover showed his talent for variety, illustrating 'Collapse of Stout Party' by Jack Trevor Story.

De Gaspari thereafter turned his talents to provinding covers for Fleetway's many pocket libraries, including Cowboy Picture Library (30 covers, 1958-60), Thriller Picture Library (39 covers, 1958-60) and Super Detective Library (4 covers, 1960). 

However, it was with his work for War Picture Library that he is mainly known in the UK. Beginning with the very first issue in September 1958, De Gaspari produced 32 of the first 48 covers (1958-60); his painting began to appear less frequently after that but were still appearing regularly until 1961, during which period (1960-61) he also contributed 12 covers to Air Ace Picture Library and the debut number of Battle Picture Library (1961). A brief resurgence in 1966 marked the end of De Gaspari's original appearances in the UK, although his work continued to appear, albeit infrequently, on book covers and in Reader's Digest Condensed Books.

Examples of De Gaspari's artwork can be found for sale at the Illustration Art Gallery.

Leslie Bowyer

Leslie Bowyer was an occasional contributor to Eagle, illustrating a short story in 1951 and a feature on the Queen's post-Coronation tour of 1954.

He also produced advertising designs and watercolours and contributed to Children's Own Wonder Book (1947).

George Bowe

George Bowe is a bit of a mystery. His career began at least as early as 1948 when he illustrated two books by Enid Blyton and continued until at least 1974 when he drew 'At the End of the Rainbow' in Bonnie.In between he contributed illustrations to Boy's Own Paper, Pony Club Annual, Robin Annual, Girl Annual and Swift Annual in the 1950s and 1960s.

For an artist with a career spanning at least 26 years, it is surprising that nothing else is known.

George Bowe artwork for sale at The Illustration Art Gallery.

Illustrations
Let's Have a Story by Enid Blyton. London, H. A. & W. Pitkin, 1948.
We Want a Story by Enid Blyton. London, H. A. & W. Pitkin, 1948.
The Bard's Cloak by Percy G. Griggs. London, H. A. & W. Pitkin, 1950.
Tiger Hawk by George E. Rochester. London, H. A. & W. Pitkin, 1956.
Ten-Week Stables by Sylvia Scott White. London, Lutterworth Press, 1960.

S. R. Boldero

Stephen Richard Boldero was born Stephen Richard Hamel-Wedekind in Caterham, Surrey, on 3 April 1898, the son of merchant Richard Christian Benedictus Hamel-Wedekind and his wife Tempe Stanley Browne, the youngest daughter of Camillo di Montebello Drew, an officer in the Ceylon police, who married in 1897.

Richad Hamel-Wedekind died whilst his son was still an infant and S. R. Hamel-Wedekind was raised by his mother in Hammersmith and Battle, Sussex. By 1911, Tempe had dropped her married name and was now called Boldero, her mother's maiden name and that of her uncle and aunt who had raised her following her mother's death.


Educated at St. Lawrence College, Ramsgate (1914-15), the now Stephen Richard Boldero trained at the Royal Military Academy and joined the Royal Regiment of Artillery in 1916 before transferring on a short service commission to the Royal Air Force, making Pilot Officer in 1921 and Flying Officer in 1922. He served part of his time in India, from whence he returned in 1924, relinquishing his commission in April 1925 due to ill-health. By then he seems to have been twice married, firstly to Nellie P. Woodley in 2Q 1916 in Steyning, Sussex, with whom he had a son, Alistair J. Boldero, in 1917, and secondly to Eleanor Winifred Wise in 4Q 1926 in Chelsea, Middlesex. The latter marriage ended in divorce in 1934.

Whether he had an artistic bent earlier in life is unknown, but he certainly turned to painting in the 1930s. The earliest trace of his artistic talents I have been able to find relates to the introduction of mobile recruiting offices, via which the R.A.F. hoped to recruit 31,000 men ahead of the (increasingly inevitable) war. A report in The Times (15 July 1938) describes them thus:

The outside decoration of the new type of van has been carried out in two contrasting shades of blue, with the R.A.F. concardes of red, white and blue in the lower panelling on either side of the body. Two chromium-plated show windows display, in colour, representations of life in the R.A.F. at home and abroad. They have been carried out, in cut-out form, by Mr. S. R. Boldero, who has served with the R.A.F. The inside of the van is equipped as an office.

Boldero's cover artwork appeared regularly in the 1950s and 1960s, published by most of the leading paperback firms (Corgi, Digit, Arrow, Pan, Panther, Four Square, Consul). He also had a long association with Souvenir Press, producing numerous dust jackets.

Stephen Richard Boldero lived for many years (at least from 1957-82) at 39 Ranelagh Gardens, London W.6. He died in London in the summer of 1987, aged 89.

S. R. Boldero artwork for sale at the Illustration Art Gallery.

Harold Copping

Harold Copping was a British artist, born in Camden Town on 25 August 1863, the second son of Edward Copping (a journalist) and Rose Heathilla (nee Prout), the daughter of J. S. Prout, the water-colour artist.His brother, Arthur E. Copping, became a noted author, journalist and traveller.

Copping grew up in St. Pancras. He studied at the Royal Academy Schools and won a Landseer Scholarship to study in Paris. He was a successful painter and illustrator, living in Croydon and Hornsey during the early years of his career.

According to James Thorpe, in English Illustration: the Nineties: “Harold Copping’s work, capable and honest as it was, does not inspire any great enthusiasm; there are so many artists doing illustrations equally satisfactory in literal translation and equally lacking in strong personal individuality.”

Nevertheless, Copping was a notable illustrator of Biblical scenes and in order to achieve some authenticity in his work, notably an illustrated edition of The Bible published in 1910, he travelled to Palestine and Egypt. This version was a best-seller and led to many more commissions for Copping.

A trip to Canada inspired the collection of watercolour sketches Canadian Pictures. Amongst the many books he illustrated were The Gospel of the Old Testament, Scenes in the Life of Our Lord, Scripture Picture Books, The Pilgrim’s Progress, Tales from Shakespeare, Character Sketches from Dickens, Longfellow and others.

Copping was married to Violet Amy Prout in 1888, and had children Ernest Noel (1889- ), Romney (1891-1910) and Violet (1891-1892). Following his wife’s death in 1894 (aged only 29), Copping was married a second time, to Edith Louise Mothersill, in 1897 and had children Joyce (1901-1934) and John Clarence (1914-1977).

Copping lived for many years at The Studio, Shoreham, near Sevenoaks, Kent. He died at home on 1 July 1932, aged 68, after some years of ill-health and a Memorial Fund was set up in his name to provide for his widow and children, raising over £500.

Harold Copping artwork for sale at the Illustration Art Gallery.

Mike White

Mike White has had a career in comics that has lasted almost forty years. Interested in drawing comics, he began sending samples off to companies before moving to London and visiting agencies. His earliest work appeared from Micron in around 1963/64 in their schoolgirls' libraries. As White recalls, the company would accept artwork from artists who were still learning their craft and he is not especially proud of these early efforts.

White first major strip was 'Jackaroo Joe' for Valiant in 1965-66 and his talents for adopting the styles of other artists led him to working in the style of Mike Western in Champion where he took over the artwork for 'School for Spacemen'. Other strips for Fleetway in the late 1960s/early 1970s include 'The Lords of Lilliput Island', 'Cannonball Craig', 'The Team Terry Kept in a Box', 'Whiz-Along Wheeler', 'The Test Match Terrors'; at the same time he was working for D. C. Thomson, usually working on one-off strips rather than series.

White was a regular on Action in 1976, filling in on 'The Running Man' before taking on the series 'Hell's Highway'. In the revised Action - which was removed from the shelves for some months for retooling - he drew 'Hellman of Hammer Force'.

He then found regular work in 2000AD, drawing many episodes of 'Tharg's Future Shocks', 'Ro-Jaws Robo Tales' and 'Tharg's Time Twisters'. He notably drew the Abelard Snazz strories written by Alan Moore and stories by Steve Moore and Grant Morrison. He dew a run of 'The Mean Arena' in 1981-82, written by Tom Tully. He teamed up with Tully again to draw 'Sintek' in Tiger in 1982-84.

He continued to draw for D. C. Thomson, his strips including 'Deep Sea Danny's Iron Fish' and 'Roul the Warrior' in Buddy and 'We Are United' in Champ. The latter began a run of football strips that would run for around a decade. He convinced one editor that he knew quite a lot about football but actually knew almost nothing and had to read up about the game to understand even the off-side rule.

After drawing 'Dexter's Dozen' for Roy of the Rovers, he took over the lead strip and drew 'Roy' for six years, updating the look of the strip and introducing a number of new players - he took over the strip shortly after a devastating terrorist attack left 8 members of the team dead. In his first few months, White helped Roy to victory in the Littlewoods Cup Final and the Championship Trophy, missing out only on the F.A. Cup. (which Melchester went on to win in 1990). During White's tenure, Roy also broke the record for the most goals scored in league and cup games when, in May 1992, he scored his 436th goal.

White was convinced that comics were not going to last and began requesting that his agents find him illustration work; by the time the boys' adventure comic ground to an end, White was already established. In recent years he has drawn illustrations for historical educational books published by various firms, amongst them Thalamus, Templar and Miles Kelley Publishing.

He continues to draw comics, most recently for Commando, having drawn his first cover in 1997 and his first interior artwork in 2003. His latest story appeared in March 2011.

Mike White artwork for sale at the Illustration Art Gallery.