I thought it may be interesting if some of us sounded off on a few of our favorite artists who weren't involved in comics during their careers. And when I say comics, I mean comic books, graphic novels, webcomics, newspaper strips, or editorial cartoons. As long as they didn't do any of that stuff they can be listed in this category.

I'll start things off...

Salvador Dali - He's been a favorite since I was a tenager. His surrealist flairs caught my eye early on, but his wonderful technical ability never ceased to amaze me. I think "The Hallucinogenic Toreador" is one of the most stunning paintings ever completed.

Chuck Jones - A great animation director with an immediately recognizable style. His cartoons made me laugh as a kid and they still do.

Katsushika Hokusai - Hokusai is probably my favorite commercial illustrator. His obsessive artistic documentation of Mt. Fuji is a telling example of how many different ways one can interpret a single subject.

HR Giger - Giger is a singular entitty in 20th century art. Whether its album covers or movie props or paintings or sculpture. He seems to be able to project his mechanically alien presence into just about anything he sets his mind to.

Gil Elvgren - I think his stuff is pretty much the top of the heap when it comes to 1950's pin-up girls. Really cheeky and fun stuff that practically functions as a time machine.

Jospeh Clement Coll - Coll, I think, is the finest of the late 19th century-era pen and ink illustrators. His accompanying illustrations for Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Lost World" are passionate and lovely.

Claude Monet - I once got an art book that reprinted Monet's paintings in black and white. I thought that was pretty much the dumbest thing ever. It's like shooting a remake of Casablanca without actors.

Gustave Dore - Dore's prints perfectly capture the romanticism era of illustration. Even his work on Dante's "Inferno" and Poe's "The Raven" has an idealized edge to it. His intricate linework, however, is what really does it for me.

Norman Rockwell - Rockwell's stylized paintings are possibly the last great example of modern American art. (At least to me) I was only a casual fan until I saw his work in person at The Norman Rockwell museum. I would certainly recommend anyone to go should they end up in Western Massachusetts.

Man Ray - My token photographer, I suppose. His pioneering movements in surrealism and photo manipulation make him one of the most creative people to ever handle a camera though. So yeah, here he is.

So yeah, there are ten of my faves. Anybody else wanna go?

Caravaggio
Chuck Jones
Alphonse Mucha
Norman Rockwell
Shelby Lee Adams


And, uh...that's all I can really think of right now. XD

Heironymous Bosch.

Botticelli.

Pieter Breugel.

Albrecht Durer.

Frida Kahlo.

Egon Sheile.

Odilon Redon.

Jose Guadalupe Posada.

Coop.

Tom Huck.

Bill Fick.

Michael Barnes.

Well, since Dalí has already been mentioned, I'll just name the other surrealist I quite like. René Magritte. Can't really say what it is I like about his art but the painting with the pipe (ceci n'est pas une pipe) is possitively iconic. I also remember one featuring a pair of feet tat turns into boots at the top that I've always liked.

Besides him there's Kurt Trampedach who's made some interesting if slightly disturbing things. He supposedly uses an insane amount of paint when he works. At least that's what my art teacher told us back then.

And Duane Hanson if sculptures count. I find the idea of replicating the painfully ordinary and placing it in a foreign inviroment very interesting. And those models are disgustingly well made. Not that I've actually ever seen them in real life... sadly.

Hey, Hyena H_ll, I was wondering... what is it about Kahlo you like? I've got to admit that I like some of her work too, but I'm not sure if it's the colors or the motifs. So, is there a special reason you added her, or is it a more general and undefined appreciation like mine?

I like Kahlo for a few reasons:

I tend to like very smooth (non-painterly) linear images, with a strong narrative content. I think the main reason I'm drawn to her work is her use of a sort of "visual vocabulary" that's unique to her; this personal mythology she's constructed through her imagery and symbols in order to tell stories. I like the intensely personal and self-referential nature of most of her work, too. To me it represents the ordering of one's world through the means of art.

Also there's the "I like stuff that's kinda like the stuff I make" theory: Way back when I was in art school, for a while I was doing all these intense/symbolic/self portrait type stuff, and after a couple mentions of her in this or that crit, I developed a liking for her.

On a more personal level, though- when I was in hospital they wouldn't let me have any of my sketchbooks, so to prevent me from clawing my eyes out with boredom, my friend brought me one of my books at random- it turned out to be "The Diary of Frida Kahlo". I think having that particular book at that particular time influenced the way I work (at least in my sketchbook and drawings) probably more than anything else has.

Just Bosch and Escher. Really not much into art as a whole.

Sysli
Well, since Dalí has already been mentioned, I'll just name the other surrealist I quite like. René Magritte. Can't really say what it is I like about his art but the painting with the pipe (ceci n'est pas une pipe) is possitively iconic. I also remember one featuring a pair of feet tat turns into boots at the top that I've always liked.

I think it's perfectly okay to name somebody that another person has already selected. For me, one of the mnost interesting parts of discussing art is comparing reasons why people enjoy a particular artists' work. You'll often find that people like the same things for very different reasons. Or, they interpret the meaning and intention of the art in very different ways.

These comparisons can often be invigorating and fascinating.

BANKSY [banksy.co.uk]

That dude is heaps cool.

MC Escher

I used to like Dali until I saw more of his work (crutches holding up enlarged body parts and ants crawling all over things). Now he just sort of creeps me out.

Leonardo Da Vinci. Not only he was an artist, he was a renaissance man.

I liked MC Escher a lot too, if for no other reason that his drawings just pull you in and make you look closer. Also Rembrandt for his sketches, as weird as it sounds the drew people I can almost imagine how he thought of them. Pablo Picasso because of how he tended to question why things were done a certain way and tried to deconstuct art as a whole. I like David Hockney for similar reasons, in his book he was pointing out how the eye sees things different than a camera.

Fredrick McCubbin and Tom Roberts for their creation of the Australian outback/bush mythos still believed by many Aussies even today.
Their contemporary, Arthur Streeton for his brilliant use of colour and the magical way he captured landscapes- both human and natural.

I agree with Hyena on these 3:

Heironymous Bosch.- Delicious imagination, sense of humour... Lovely surreal creations. I love those little goblins in his paintings that are completely covered by a metal funnel that they wear as armour.

Pieter Breugel. - Hi scenes of every day life in the middle ages are so evocative and unique. Leonardo and the rest of the Italians never came close to that sort of thing.

Albrecht Durer. - Amazing rendering skill. Not just technically brilliant but so full of life and interest too. He was delightfully vain as well :)

One modern artist I'll mention is Stelarc-
He was the guy who invented the whole thing of hanging yourself up with fish-hooks, before him that didn't exist. For quite a time after too...
That was a very long time ago though. Since then he's work on human/machine interfaces, syncing his own body up with some fascinating robotics... Last time I saw him though he was working on an entirely artificial computer simulation of himself, -with ai and all that. Plus, he liked my fur hat ^__^

Huzzah! People are showing love for the awesome Charles M. Jones! I always thought he was awesome, then I got his autobiography and that awesomeness tripled. Seriously, "Chuck Amuck" is a great read if you're into the history of Looney Tunes and just funny stuff all around. His animation on "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" was a major influence on my work. The scene where he grins pretty much inspired every evil smile I've ever drawn!

I'm gonna 3rd MC Escher too. His work was just plain awesome.

Brian Froud: I loooove his work on fairies and goblins, the first time i saw his work was in a book my great grandmother had, titled of course: Fairies. It's written and illustrated like a field guide! He also did one on goblins and one about good/bad fairies, and while it's cute, it doesn't have the same serious tone since not all of them are ground in folklore (as opposed to "Fairies" that omitted gnomes from the book because they were "made up"!)

Alan Lee: He also worked on the Fairies book, and he does a lot of fantasy art. Like with Froud, I can't look through a D&D monster guide or similar fantasy artbook without seeing something that isn't totally ripping of either of their styles.
By that, I mean it looks like they actually traced over them!

George Kamitani: The lead artist for what is quite possibly my most favorite game of all time, "Odin Sphere". I'm pretty sure he was the art director on Grim Grimoire as well. The art is beautiful, colorful and I love the character designs to death. I would have mentioned the artist for Disgaea series, but after seeing one particular pedo-bait picture that may or may not have been drawn by him (it looked like it was though)I can't help but feel that ruins the rest of it for me. I don't care if an artist likes to draw (semi)nudes once in a while, but I prefer sexy pictures to be of characters that at least LOOK of legal age!

John Kricfalusi: I know not a lot of people here liked Ren & Stimpy, but I always did love the expressions that John K came up with for his characters. In fact it was a rule in his studio to never use the same expression twice. Which brings me to another animator who was a big influence on him:

Bill Clampett was also an animation great, responsible for many of my favorites like the Duck Twacy episodes. He and Rod Scribner made a great team and their animation was fantastic, it had so much movement and expression! There was no such thing as "tween" frames between these 2.


Henry Fuseli: his paintings are a little creepy, with dark atmospheres and things looming in the background. He liked painting the supernatural and that really appeals to my tastes, one might say!


Theodore Geisel: Otherwise known as "Dr. Suess". I loved his illustrations as a child, and I haven't stopped loving them!

Argh, I hate it that I can't name so many artists who happened to work in comics BUT also beyond comics (for example Frazetta who drew some comics but his main interest were always fantasy paintings, not to mention not being able to name Philippe Druillet whose entire graphic novels were basically excuse to string together 20-30 full page pieces + some just as amazing sequentials... Dave McKean and so on, plenty more)... sooo...

from the ones mentioned already I like these more or less

Salvador Dali
HR Giger
Bosch
Breugel
Escher

...
And now ones not mentioned.

Dan Ouellette
Zdzislaw Beksinski
Wojciech Siudmak

And that's all that pops into my brain at the moment. Basically I like bizarre stuff that works your brain and imagination... but the thing I like the most is telling sequential stories (which automatically falls under comics, thus it is off the list)...

Yoshitaka Amano is so amazing.

I'm also very fond of Henri Toulouse-Lautrec.

cirienphoenix
Yoshitaka Amano is so amazing.

Oh yeah, him too! Can't believe that I forgot to mention him.

Brendan Monroe is a favorite for painting. I'm attracted to diseases ans creatures and he does a lot of those.

Andrew Bell is also a favorite because of his creatures. Creatures in My Head might loosely qualify as a comic, but I think it more of a blog.

I'm also a big fan of Broken Crow, a Minneapolis based graffiti artist who works primarily with stencils. His work has influenced me a huge amount in the last year.

C215 is another street artist who specializes in stencils. I like him for the same reasons as Broken Crow.

Banksy helped rekindle my interest in urban art, but I can't claim him as a huge favorite.

Finally, I would say Thom Maye has always captivated me because I can't quite figure out how he gets the effects he does, and I'm fascinated by his emotive subjects and the feelings that I get from seeing people without faces.

Claude Monet. I've been lucky enough to see not one, but two of his paintings in person, and it's totally something I will never forget.

imperial boy-Amazing cityscapes are just amazing, okay? >>

Norman Rockwell-No idea, his art is just so pretty and cheerful and nostalgic. I would have liked to meet him if he was still around.

Definitely Cindy Sherman- for weird reasons not completely explicable here, I've always felt like she was my soulmate.

Goya, but only his dark period-- those boring court paintings are BoRiNg!

Basically, I have to say that my trip to Museo del Prado a few years ago was one of the most artgasmic, memorable experiences of my life. They had rooms and rooms full of ruminative Goya masterpieces-- some of my favorites being:

Saturn devouring his son (probably for sentimental reasons, too, since I think we had a poster of it in my old house when I was young) :



This one, "Leocadia", inspired me with its color scheme. I wrote in my little notebook, "make sure to use muted blue sky with burnt sienna/umber!!!"


this one too-- insanely awesome.



I could actually just post all his paintings here but *holds self back*

Another painting-- this one nearly made my have some sort of terrific heart attack---


it's by Annibale Carracci. ughh it looks so much cooler in real life.


And I gotta agree on Durer. I love Durer.


OMG and Gustave Dore!!! I a'Dore' him! lol.

this picture he did of Satan from Milton's Paradise Lost just makes me wanna join sides with the prince of darkness... sexy and tragic!!

1. Alex Pardee- He may have done the webcomic "Bunnywith" (at snafu-comics.com/bunnywith)but now he mainly does solo works, all of them really cool/gross. If you want to see some go to eyesuckink.com

2. Michael Whelan- He was an artist for many of Stephen King's books and also did some work with Meatloaf. Go to http://www.michaelwhelan.com/catalog/comps1.php to see the collection of his that I reall adore.

A lot of the artists already mentioned (Dali and Picasso, Michael Whelan for his work with Sepultura, HR Giger on the cover art of "To Mega Therion" by Celtic Frost alone).

Adding to that list:

-Ralph Steadman. He did a lot of works with Hunter S. Thompson, and has this really raw, energetic style where he just slashes at the paper with ink.

-Lionel Feininger. A lesser known cubist who started out as a cartoonist.

My Favs are:

1) Amedeo Modigliani - He was a bohemian artist during Picasso's time and his trademark style was to paint people with swan necks and vacant eyes.

http://nuevogallery.com/images/Amedeo%20Modigliani/fdjgh.jpg

http://nuevogallery.com/images/Amedeo%20Modigliani/modigliani%20fd.JPG

http://nuevogallery.com/images/Amedeo%20Modigliani/djfb.jpg

2) Horace Pippin - He was a great American painter who fought in WWI. His painting arm was wounded during the war, but he found ways around this handicap, and manipulated that arm with his other arm in order to draw and paint. He was discovered by Andrew Wyeth (another great American Painter).

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/counting_on_art/img/img_pippin_domino_players_lg.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/counting_on_art/popups/pop_bio_pippin_1.htm&h=342&w=591&sz=69&tbnid=QEbC98Mts93zQM:&tbnh=78&tbnw=135&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhorace%2Bpippin&usg=__2pCpbPt31nYhZdx-HVf9ykvpmWQ=&ei=t3EFS5-pBofOlAeyoMmmDA&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=2&ct=image&ved=0CAwQ9QEwAQ

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/counting_on_art/img/pippin_harmonizing.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/counting_on_art/popups/pop_bio_pippin_4.htm&h=342&w=436&sz=46&tbnid=vaXXOGGt73vlSM:&tbnh=99&tbnw=126&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhorace%2Bpippin&usg=__q_gfgEBZqQDV59-hmHA9IILFHe8=&ei=t3EFS5-pBofOlAeyoMmmDA&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=3&ct=image&ved=0CA4Q9QEwAg

3) Vincent Van Gogh - I don't think he needs an exerpt.

4) Picasso - I loved his blue period the best.

5) Dr. Seuss - Awesome writer and artist. I once read that he would spend about a year creating each of his 40+ books, and he worked 10 hour days. That's dedication for you.

Hyena H_ll, that is so cool that you mentioned Tom Huck! If you are ever in St. Louis, you could probably just stop by Evil Prints, he's super friendly (and teaches printmaking classes there).

On top of many artists listed here, I`ve developed a recent interest in Artemisia Gentileschi. After doing a paper on her life I`m seeing a whole new level in her art.

Even though I can never get her books I'm a big fan of Lisa Yuskavage, if you decide to look up her art don't do it at work, school, or in front of children.

Adolphe William Bouguereau is a fave of mine but I have a think of French boudoir paintings. It's really funny how I never remember his first name but I always remember the painting "Young Girl Defending herself from Eros" my brain is funky.

List wise now

Chip Kidd (he counts he's a designer!)
Caravaggio
Artemisia Gentileschi
Hokusai
Jean Leon Gerome
Michelangelo
William Blake (the man didn't just write, he painted and inked too!)

Hokusai
Hiroshige
Giger
M.C Escher (who seems to be getting a lot of love here).
Arthur Rackham (he doesn't seem to have been mentioned, but he did a lot of dark fairy tale illustrations for things like Alice in Wonderland and old legends.
Here's one of my favourites-

J.C. Leyendecker is the coolest commercial artist.

Norman Rockwell stalked him and basically took elements of Leyendecker's art and incorporated it into his own.

I like Rockwell anyways.

Sven Nordquist - Swedish children's book illustrator. This man pretty much defined my childhood - I still go back and read his books fifteen years later. The amount of crazy detail (emphasis on both crazy and detail here) in his work is astounding. I can read his books dozens of times, and each time discover something new in his artwork that I hadn't seen before. Really good at watercolour as well. Example from one of his most famous works

Arthur Rackham, Gustave Doré, Yoshitaka Amano, Toulouse-Lautrec - there are so many people on my list that if I were to list them all, we'd still be here tomorrow.

don't know if its been mentioned buuuuut

Genndy Tartakovsky

Dexters Lab and Samurai Jack are both fantastic cartoons.

-Don Judd (big minimalist fan)

-Michelangelo

-Donatello (his wooden Mary Magdalene piece is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen, though I've only seen it slides)

-Goya

-Honore Daumier (though the question of his status as a comic artist is debatable)

-Lynd Ward

-de Kooning and Motherwell ( I hate the politics of expressionism, but enjoy the pieces)

-David Smith

-Richard Serra

Oddly enough, my comics are more inspired by sculptures than paintings and other 2-d mediums



Can I bring up non-visual artists, because if I can I'd have to bring up some writers

John Updike- I love his modest storytelling, and it relies heavily on introspection.

Dante - I'm in the middle of reading Purgatorio, I read the inferno last summer. I'm actually enjoying the challenging of deciphering the medieval stanzas, the poetry is beautiful, and its overall discussion of free will in the world of a omnipotent god is really interesting.

Julian Barnes-favorite post-novelist, with a great sense of humor

Hemingway- This stems from my from my love minimalism, Hemingway is blunt but with elegance. Plus, I mean, Hemingway was one of the manliest men to ever man manliness. He drank like a man, fucked hookers like a man, and when he wasn't doing that he was shooting sharks with harpoons...like a man!

Fitzgerald- you just have to love his quick wit, and his ability to capture the energy of a generation