Jim Steranko
By:
November 5, 2011
Listen up lady, this JIM STERANKO (1938–ETERNITY), he’s got Pulp Noir form right up to the kissin’ sky. Juvenile larceny, escapology, comicbooks, Tinsel Town storyboards. And I ain’t just whistling Purple Haze, sister. I snooped around his pad. Looked like this [above]. The Four Color Process nearly flattened me. I found a firefly-glowing calling card: “STERANKO. Designation: ‘Katalyst’. Authorised by The Kouncil of Kosmic-Khronal Konspiracy”. I shoulda clicked my heels, but I hadda check the bathroom. It weren’t no bathroom. It was some kind of fruity “Space” Whammy. I spent nine years in colonial Jamestown. That weren’t no picnic neither. Steranko drew comicbooks. Psychedelic spy shenanigans, laced with Dali, Welles, Kirby and Eisner. He shot the genre to pieces, and left without paying the tab. He’s 73 now, so they say. Nope. He weren’t born — he drew himself into reality, and he drew the Hippest Guy in History. He’s still one helluva good-looking guy. It don’t add up and I dunno what he wants. But when he asks, we’re gonna need the songsheet. I don’t wanna go back to Jamestown, that’s fer sure.
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On his or her birthday, HiLobrow irregularly pays tribute to one of our high-, low-, no-, or hilobrow heroes. Also born this date: Sam Shepard.
READ MORE about members of the Anti-Anti-Utopian Generation (1934-43).