2017.04.29 East Coast Comic Con, Secaucus, NJ
As anyone who attends a large convention knows, you can spend a lot of time standing on line. This takes time away from the potential to meet someone. I was standing on line to obtain a signature from Joe Giella, a silver age artist. I then realized I was standing in front of Gerhard's table. He was speaking with two fans and started sketching. My first thought was, it is possible he does not have a full dance card this late in the afternoon. I leaned in to speak with with wife to ask if it was possible to still obtain a sketch and she respond yes, of course it was. Wow!
A sketch from Gerhard was a dream for me, however the US Postal Service has not issued any aardvark stamps. I chose a generic Star first day cover for the sketch.
Gerhard started his association with Dave Sim's Cereus with issue #65, in 1984. Gerhard often described his job as drawing tables and chairs behind an aardvark. Besides his work on Cereus, Gerhard has worked on Stephen R Bissette's Tyrant #1, colored Oni Press' Free Speeches #1 and provided a panel to Locust Moon's Little Nemo: Dream Another Dream, a beautiful look at the classic comic from the perspective of various artists
It was a pleasure meeting Gerhard and his wife. He has recently provided illustrations for a children's book The Wish, written by Shelley Byers
It was a pleasure meeting Gerhard and his wife. He has recently provided illustrations for a children's book The Wish, written by Shelley Byers
Joe Giella, Inkpot Award 1996, studied at the Arts Students League in Manhattan and obtaining his first job on the humor feature "Captain Codfish". He would obtain some freelance work at Fawcett Comics to ink Captain Marvel. He moved to Timely/Marvel finishing backgrounds and making pencil corrections on Captain America Comics, Human Torch, Sub Mariner and others.
At DC Comics he would start inking Flash, Green Lantern, Black Canary and other titles for Julius Schwartz. He would ink Alex Toth westerns and Sheldon Moldoff Batman stories and Gil Kane's Green Lantern...
Giella also assisted on King Features Syndicate comic strips Flash Gordon and The Phantom, inking Dan Barry and Sy Barry. Up until 2016 Giella was drawing the comic strip Mary Worth.
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