Three Generations of Tarzan: Krenkel, Frazetta and Jones
The naturalistic illustrations of Roy Krenkel (1918–1983) graced the covers of early fantasy paperbacks of Edgar Rice Burroughs and many others. He inspired a young Frank Frazetta (1928–2010) and, later, Jeffrey Catherine Jones (born Jeffrey Durwood Jones 1944–2011). The illustrations here, of ERB’s great hero, Tarzan, show the similarity of their powerful styles. Of course they worked in commercial, graphic illustration which lends itself to this manner of sinuous representation but you’d be hard pressed to find better examples. They drew with such a rare fluidity and each of them are amongst my very favourite fantastic artists.
Links
- Interesting article on Krenkel
- And in the tradition, here’s Barry Windsor Smith
- And the superlative Virgil Finlay