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Superman’s Pal, Steve Lieber, Comics Artist

Get some tips on making comics funny!

Artist Steve Lieber is one of the funniest artists in superhero comics today and his new series with Matt Fraction, Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen is wild and wonderful. Steve Lieber’s comics have been published by DC, Marvel, Dark Horse, Image, Valiant and many others. He’s known for his work on the Eisner-winning Whiteout, a graphic novel adapted by Warner Brothers as a feature film, and for Superior Foes of Spider-Man, an Eisner-nominated cult favorite. His comic The Fix was named Best New Comic of the Year by IGN.

Steve is also a founding member of Helioscope, the largest studio of comic book artists in North America. He lives in Portland, Oregon.

Find out:

  • Pro tips on making comics funny– like how creative paneling will kill a joke
  • Jimmy’s outfits are based on Steve’s lawyer
  • What a 10 year old Steve made of the Don Rickles issues of Jimmy Olson by Jack Kirby 
  • “Social class is everywhere. If it’s not coming out in your pictures I’m not sure what you’re drawing”
  • “Humor theory is always terrible.”
  • “I was trained in the state of the art art of the mid 50s”

My review of issue 1.

And here’s my interview with Steve 3 years back about his series The Fix and going to The Kubert School of Art.

By Elana Levin

(Host Graphic Policy Radio/ GP Contributor) – Elana hosts Graphic Policy Radio, our podcast. Elana started reading comics in Jr. High by stealing her younger brother’s copies of X-Men. She immediately identified mutants as a metaphor for oppressed groups and used this to justify her interest in comics to her incredulous friends and relatives.

And has been doing so ever since.

A trained (but not particularly practicing) artist, Elana covers comics art and analyzes comics and the industry from a queer feminist and leftist perspective.

By day Elana leads trainings on digital strategy for nonprofit organizations and campaigns. She has lead fan activism trainings at political conferences and geek conferences alike. She has spoken about Jack Kirby for the SyFy network, The Jack Kirby Museum and hosted panels at NY Comic Con, FlameCon and AwesomeCon. Her critical work has appeared in The Daily Beast, Wired Magazine, The Guardian and the BBC.
She tweets, too much, at https://twitter.com/Elana_Brooklyn