Jack Kirby - Graffiti Art Pioneer
Do you like graffiti and all the letter styles from the simplistic broadway block , semi-wildstyle, 3-D and all the way to the pinnacle of the dynamically illustrated, undecipherable abstracted wild-style with its' maze of arrows, connecting bracket extensions and exciting color-schemes? How about the other iconography, the bubbles? You know, those bubbles that can appear in both the interior and/or exterior of any graffiti letter style. The most common Graff-bubbles are seen grouped in threes, the main bubble, then a medium sized one morphing out of the main bubble and a third smallest bubble which is narrowly separated from the 2nd bubble creating a sense of an upward motion. Did you ever wonder about the origins of the 'Graff-bubbles' and how they became an integral element as a major graffiti motif since the original pioneers of New York Subway Art began to include this design element into their letter-styles but minimized the amount of the Kirby-krakle around 1970. Looking back at graffiti-art's rich history consisting of over five and half evolving decades that spawned from the 1960's Pop-Art movement and the Post-Modern Abstract movement of the 70's.
The many of the early NYC pioneer writers in their teens and as young adults were 'comicbook kids', growing up reading and looking at the pop-culture art of Marvel and DC Comics. The juggernaut comic artist who is considered not just as a part of comic history but was comic history is the king, Jack Kirby. Jack Kirby was the co-creator along with Stan Lee who founded Marvel Comics in 1962. It was Jack Kirby who illustrated Stan Lee's character ideas such as their first collaborative title the Fantastic Four, Spiderman, the Avengers, X-Men, Hulk and many other famous superheroes and villains such as Dr. Doom and Magneto.
It was Kirby who brought dynamic action to the comic panels and literally a new energy never before seen, the Kirby Krackle. The krackle was Kirby's way to demonstrate a powerful frequency generating energy field made up of a cluster of bubbles around a figure or shooting out of the hands projecting a powerful beam of destruction. Kirby pioneered his contemporaries and later generation of comic book artists to the present day, just as he has done unintentionally with graffiti artists all over the world. Jack Kirby was comic history and was also a part of graffiti-art history as well, not many if any at all have made this connection, much less write about it. Just goes to show, Fumeroism, it's not just an art-style, it's a lifestyle.
Credits to H. Chalfant and Marvel Comics
