My dealings with some artists just deserve their own chapter. Good frigging God, every time I see Steranko, he warrants a whole new entry for himself! What a character! What a personality! Here is my first time meeting him.
On December 14th, 2002, I was poking into my local comics shop, and they had a flyer out that said Steranko and Pulitzer Prizewinner Michael Chabon were doing a signing, that very day, together, in the Bay Area. I looked at my watch. There would be a presentation beginning within the hour, and then a signing to follow. I ran home, packed up my comics work, and headed out, braving a horrible rainstorm.
I had just gotten my Kirby style monster stories inked by Dick Ayers, and was now fully envisioning getting pin-ups of giant monsters from artists. I went into town to Kinkos to try to make copies of my work to show him. The storm was so awful, it had knocked the power out, and Kinko’s was closed. I realized it would be more cluttery and embarrassing, but I would have to just take the original pages down to show the legendary Steranko what I was doing.
The rain was POURING down. It was a miserable drive. It took a couple hours, and I picked a Bay Area friend up along the way. By the time we reached the store, after the run home, then to Kinko’s, then to my friend’s, the talk was long over. There was a huge line going around the wall and up an aisle of the shop, with Steranko at a table at the front. He was still signing.
Steranko had designed a poster for this event, and everyone who came to the signing would get a free copy, signed by Michael Chabon and Steranko. Michael had left, but he had signed all the posters before leaving. Steranko was handing them out.
I milled around for a while and hoped the line would die down, but it remained the same consistent length for probably an hour or so, so finally I just got in line and waited, with my portfolio. I didn’t want to speak with him in front of all these people (How do you ask people about pin-ups?), but what can you do. I waited there for I don’t know … a half hour? Finally I got to the front.
I had been listening to his banter with the people in line in front of me. I really liked his personality. He was smiling and joking, and he’s got a sharp, smart wit. He’s cocky, he’s edgy, but in a teasing way that I found hilarious and fun … but intimidating.
The person in front of me had an original piece of Steranko’s art from the seventies. It was used as an ad for some Hulk hologram jewelry or something, and I remember seeing it in a ton of my old comics. This guy wanted Steranko to sign it. Steranko said he would only sign it personalized, writing the person’s name on it. Otherwise, he wouldn’t sign it. The guy finally decided he didn’t want it signed. You could tell the guy was either thinking about selling it on Ebay tomorrow, or at the least, selling it on Ebay in the future, and that’s exactly why Steranko wouldn’t sign it.
It must be frustrating for artists, doing sketches or signing books, and then finding them on ebay the next day on sale and selling for a fortune. Of course as artists, we want to do favors to our fans, and give back to them, and give them autographs or sketches, or something personal for being a fan and buying our products and giving us support and appreciation. But so often, people aren’t doing it out of love, they’re just trying to make a profit. The artist never sees any of that money. So the artist is trying to be a nice guy, and s/he gets screwed. Obviously, Steranko’s signature has a money value.
On the other hand, we the artists had the opportunity to charge whatever price it was worth to us at the time we handed it over. Or we could have had faith in our future and held onto our artwork and used all the space it would have taken to have stored it away somewhere, like our fans choose to do, and waited for that moment when it would be its most valuable, and then sell it on ebay ourselves. And if the moment never hit, like it often never does with some artists, or some artists’ books, then we would have just been out of luck, like our fans would have been. Or we could buy copies of our old issues for their going market rate, or look for deals on our old issues, like our fans do, and then sign them and sell them on ebay ourselves for a higher price. Or we could sketch stuff and just put the sketches straight up on ebay ourselves.
It’s easy to see people making a profit that we aren’t making, and not really think about the work and time the profit-makers put into it, and feel like we’re not getting our cut. And it’s true artists historically have been underpaid and taken advantage of. It’s a complicated issue. I have mixed feelings about it. It makes me think about how throughout time, artists probably haven’t been paid well, unless they happened to have good business sense. Can’t it be enough to just try and be a good artist without worrying about that other stuff? Michelangelo’s or Van Gogh’s masterpieces sell for a fortune, but they never really saw any of that fortune, relatively speaking. They were just doing what they loved. Or maybe they didn’t even love it, but they had a talent for it, and figured they could probably make a living at it. They were just work for hire, looking for a job at a time, and doing a day’s work to try and make a day’s pay.
So now I was at the front of the line, face to face with Steranko.
I had brought a book for him to sign. He asked my name and personalized his signature. I tried to motion to my portfolio and pull out my Ayers-inked drawings, but he cut me off, “I don’t have time to look at those right now, I was supposed to leave here an hour ago.” I tried to just ask if he does pin-ups, but I was still new at asking artists, and didn’t really have a quick, concise way of asking, and I couldn’t get the words out. I asked if he had an email or website I could contact him through. “No, no, I never got into that computer stuff”, etc, just shrugging me off. Then he decided he’d wasted enough time with me. He still had his smiling, joking persona, but he basically turned away from me and addressed the next person in line, and acted as if I wasn’t there anymore, even though I hadn’t moved.
I was speechless with shock and disappointment, not just that he shrugged me off and wouldn’t even listen, but also because he was supposed to give me a free poster, goddamnit, and he didn’t give me one. So I’m standing there waiting for him, and he’s just ignoring me this whole time. Finally, the woman assisting him glanced kind of reluctantly at me, and I asked her if I could get a poster. And she said, oh yes, of course, and tried to get Steranko’s attention, but he ignored her too. He’s still smiling at whoever’s in line that he’s addressing, and thanking them for their kind comments to him. Finally, after maybe a full minute or two of this, he looked at her and gave the expression of, “Oh, I’m sorry, were you trying to get my attention?”
She asked in a tip-toeing fashion. She pointed out I hadn’t gotten a poster, and could he sign one for me. So he signed a poster, and finally looked at me and addressed me. He said, “Don’t worry, we’ll look at your stuff at the next convention. I just don’t have the time right now.”
I appreciated that he said that. I could understand now that he was busy. But then he followed up with, “I’m gonna be in L.A. tomorrow for another signing. Maybe you could come to that signing.” I’m thinking, He can’t be serious?!! I’m thinking, Oh, I’ve got nothing to do. Maybe I’ll just head to L.A. tomorrow. It’s only an hour or so airplane flight if I can get a ticket for the next day, or a seven hour drive. That’s a real good possibility.
So after that, my friend and I stuck around and just kind of poked around through the comic shop, just to be in the Steranko atmosphere. He was still there for some time, even though he was supposed to have left over an hour ago, and he seemed to be getting kind of irritable or at least tense, the longer he was there. I heard him making comments, very polite to all his fans, that he’d been here well beyond the time allocation of the signing, but that he really had to be somewhere, maybe to catch a plane. Finally, he finished signing for everyone, grabbed up his things and shouted to his booking agent or whoever it was, “I AM LEAVING NOW! I AM ON THE PLANE!” and stomped out and was gone in a flurry. What a presence! What a force of nature!
And it’s dark, and the storm is finally letting up a little, and I need to drop my friend back home and then make the two hour drive home, and I’m thinking, what a relaxing Sunday. I’m so glad I saw this was going on today and decided to come down.