Reproducing Cole.

This blog is dedicated to the work of Leonard Brandt Cole, a Golden Age comics publisher and artist. The vast majority of Cole’s work was comics covers—eye-popping covers informed by a poster artist’s aesthetic. Later in life his work was reigned in as Comics transitioned through Senate hearings and the Comics Code, with the artist eventually settling into a specialty in wildlife illustration. The definitive book on Cole’s work, “Black Light: The World of L.B. Cole” is being published by Fantagraphics Books in December, 2014.

As a graphic designer, I intend here to ruminate on what makes Cole’s work so wonderful, particularly in an era before the idea of Graphic Design was fully formed. Cole had marketing savvy and the artistic talent to stand out on the shelves in an era when hundreds of comics titles were released each month. The image above illustrates the power of Cole’s most iconic work. It also shows the quality of restoration work done on hundreds of Cole’s comic book covers for “Black Light.” For those interested in book production, these are some of the best restorations seen in any book on comics.

There’s a history of debate around this work, primarily focused on reproduction as artifact (nostalgic, yellowed, worn pages) and reproduction utilizing Photoshop to attempt something close to the original intent of the artist. There is little question about how best to showcase Cole and his searing color palette. After much experimenting I’m proud of the process developed to honor the artifact while rebuilding Cole’s colors—mainly removing the yellowing and fading of age without biasing the image towards blue/green garishness or blowing out the whites of the pulped page.

I’m grateful to Gary Groth for making this project happen; to Bill Schelly for his superb biography included in “Black Light”; to Mike Catron for corralling so many of Cole’s covers; and to the passionate collectors who provided superb scans and have long appreciated the genius of Len Cole.