Possibly the most influential American artist of the second half of the 20th Century died two weeks ago, and just about nobody – zip, zilch, nada – knew his name.
We’re talking about Russ Heath, a true master of comic book – and strip – art, who lent his brilliant touch of exaggerated realism to pages published by every major comics house in the U.S. including EC, DC, Marvel, Warren, National Lampoon, and many more including Playboy.
The thing about Heath is that although he wasn’t a big star under his own name, his work affected hundreds of thousands of comics fans and millions of members of the general public…because one of the fans of Heath’s comics was Roy Lichtenstein, who based much of his groundbreaking pop artwork on Heath’s panels…never acknowledging their source publicly or financially.