In the introduction to the first Marvel Masterworks edition of the Rawhide Kid, Stan Lee suggested that the Kid was a superhero prototype. When the series debuted about a year before the first issue of the Fantastic Four, it seemed that Kirby and Lee were indeed getting in the zone. Compared to the run of the mill Western heroes, the smoldering young Kid certainly felt like a superhero in his skin tight, ink black outfit. He was supernaturally fast on the draw and a real scrapper in a fight. Next to Kirby’s steely eyed six footers, the Rawhide Kid was a bantamweight, a wiry little black leopard.

As he did with the good Captain, Kirby put the Kid through his paces, pitting him in brawls against multiple foes twice his size. Throughout his career, Kirby’s fight scenes had always taken advantage of the sequential continuity of panels on a comic book page, using a certain degree of follow through motion from one frame to the next. The lithe black silhouette of the Rawhide Kid inspired Kirby to really explore the limits of kinetic continuity. The positioning of the Kid’s negative shape was like an anchor for the eye, a naturally spotted black to give contrast and motion.

Black spotting is by some considered to be a mysterious art trick and is often not well understood. In reality it is a reasonably simple concept. It is essentially about the contrast between light and dark. A black shape or dark shadow placed behind or next to another object will push that object fore ward or better define it. In this case, it is the Kid’s black costume that makes him the focus of attention when he is strategically positioned in relation to other figures. This page from Rawhide Kid #32 is one of the best composed of the series run.

1- RK#32

Norris sent me this biography:

Norris Burroughs was born in New York City. He began attempting to draw comics at age four, when he realized how much he enjoyed putting pictures in sequence in order to tell a story. Burroughs discovered Kirby when reading "Taboo, the Thing from the Murky Swamp" in Strange Tales #75. He then became fascinated with the continuity of Kirby’s fight scenes in Rawhide Kid. Picking up the first issue of the Hulk and subsequently the character’s appearance in Fantastic Four #12 clinched it. He was evermore a Kirby fanatic.

Burroughs is the illustrator of several book covers, including The Phillip K. Dick anthology. Most recently, he has written and drawn Voodoo Macbeth, published by Engine Comics.

He was recently profiled by the Marin Independent Journal .

As I said in my previous entry regarding the MoCCA Festival last weekend, it's great to see artists at their tables with their comics, mini-comics, postcards and stickers. Not only did I fire up some Jack Kirby stickers to offer at the table, but I got the OK from Lisa Kirby to print a thirty mini-comic edition of her dad's only solo-produced autobiographical story, "Street Code."

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The great thing about the MoCCA Festival is seeing comicbook artists at their tables with their comics, mini-comics, postcards and stickers. The publishers' tables offer wonderful things, but the MoCCA Festival is really about the creators.

When I learned that the Kirby Museum would have a table at the Festival (I registered late and was wait-listed), I knew I needed Jack Kirby stickers. But what kind of stickers? After some consultation with Museum member James Romberger, I picked two images. The first is Kirby's late 1960s/early 1970s "logo signature" as was used on the Marvelmania posters he produced around that time.

Feeling very much in the MoCCA Festival's D.I.Y. head, I ordered some 2" white weatherproof vinyl labels and some 1 1/2" orange fluorescent labels, and got to inkjet printing on my HP Photosmart 8750. I just had to make some fluorescent stickers, as I love the Third Eye posters from the early 1970s. (Really should have an exhibit of those posters here.)

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I'll provide some more details about the MoCCA Festival this past weekend, but in the meantime, check out my interview with new Museum member (and "The Best of Simon & Kirby" raffle winner) Gabriel Perez from Strangers With Comics. - Thanks, Gabe!