Bill Sienkiewicz: Revolution

I found the long-awaited collection of Mr. Sienkiewicz's work to be strangely underwhelming considering the massive body of work he has done over many decades.While "Stray Toasters", "New Mutants" and "Voodoo Child" sections contain decent amount of good work, the rest of the book suffers from odd choice of images as well as a few redundancy. Some of the choices, I feel, are not up to par for even regular convention sketchbook let alone this handsome edition.The "Daredevil/ Elektra" pages that could have been a great anchor section of the book is but a handful of so-so pieces. And a "Notebook" section, that supposedly spans over 30 years but yet consists of just 5 pieces, seems like an afterthought.Missing are many of the sumptuous work that came to define Mr.Sienkiewicz's career. Where are the works or studies from "Moby Dick", "The Shadow", "Big Number" or "Love and War", as well as "Elektra Assassin" and "Moon Knight" ? We got random piece of those here and there...or none at all.I was very much looking forward to the book and expecting a blockbuster monograph. Instead, the book I got feels anemic at best. I am rather disappointed.PS: On the plus side, the interview is insightful and the essay by Ben Davis is a nice walk down 80s comics memory lane. But they are not the reasons why you buy this book.

I should preface this by saying I have been a Sienkiewicz fan since 1984 and I didn’t even have to look up how to spell his name when I typed this up. Bill is a major influence on me and I wouldn’t have the love of illustration and art that I have now without his work. I would buy comics just because he did the cover for them. So it pains me to say that this book is kind of a waste of time. It’s definitely only for the die- hard fans as I can’t see this winning over many new fans.I’ve sat with this for a while to really try and figure out why I was so disappointed with this book and it comes down to this: it feels like a rushed mess. I’ll try to explain why I feel that way and have included a couple photos to help illustrate what I’m talking about.Scope: The content is severely lacking the finesse or scope of books like Dynamite’s , Image, or Desperado’s excellent Art of series (Brian Bolland, Sean Phillips, Timothy Bradstreet, Jose Gonzalez, etc) or evening the wonderful Daniel Zimmer Illustrator books (Al Dorne, Robert Fawcett, etc ). Instead this book feels like an extended version of one of Sienkiewicz’s convention sketchbooks which are great for what they are but as the first volume of (of three proposed books) what is meant to be Bill’s “Art of” books it is very underwhelming. I do feel that Bill’s work deserves more than a single volume like the Dynamite books but the first volume has so many convention sketches, book plates, and half finished images it feels like it’s already scraping the bottom of the barrel.Layout:The layout is a disaster. There are a lot of blank white pages. Sometimes with a one sentence description of the art across from it but no other details. I would have loved some in-depth information about the artist’s intent, method’s, or even anecdotes. Art bleeds into the gutters on a two-page spread that leaves 4/5 of the opposite page completely blank. Sometimes art is full bleed other times crammed into the gutter leaving a one inch white border at the edge of the paperI assume this book was made with Sienkiewicz’s input - ask him about the piece!The book is divided into projects but for some reason the Stray Toasters section has 2 pages of Jimi Hendrix art and one New Mutants page.Writing and interview:I expected more. The 12 page ( really more like 7 pages with the art and large font choice) interview is Hollywood press junket style questions such as “What are your thoughts as you sit in front of a clean white sheet of paper?” This is also a general “about your career overall” interview instead of specific questions about the projects that are highlighted in the book. Neither Stray Toasters, Elektra, Voodoo Child, not 30 Days of Night are even mentioned in the interview. We get zero insures into these projects from Bill himself. A more appropriate format would be an interview about each project in the chapter about said project. Comics Journal #107 is still one of the best interviews with Bill ever. Even just reprinting that interview would have been better than what was printed here.The article by Ben Davis is much more insightful but again there is a disconnect between the text and imagery. Davis brings up 1986’s Slow Dancer that was published in Epic Illustrated and refers to fig. 12 which is a watercolor study from 2010 that has nothing to do with the story.I really really wanted this to be an amazing book that collects and examines one of my favorite artist’s of all time but it doesn’t even come close. I only hope that they learn from this volume and get a good editor to whip the subsequent volumes into shape and give fans and Bill Sienkiewicz the kind of book they deserve.

If you're a Bill Sienkiewicz fan get this book! If you don't know who he is, get this book! I can write a very long review for this book but I won't so I'll keep it nice and short. I grew up admiring Bill's work when I was a young kid between the pages of Moonknight and then later, Electra and The Shadow comics. When my best friend introduced me to Bill during a Comic Con in NYC, he was friendly and super giving of his time. I follow him on Twitter and Facebook, allowing me to know a little more of the man. Plus, the artwork he posts is simply amazing. He should have a permanent gallery on both coasts.This book is great because it offers so much artwork and interviews. I learned quite a bit about him and his artwork that I never knew. If I had one gripe about this book is the fact that the publisher didn't utilize every iota of space in it. There are a lot of blank pages in the book which could've been used to display more artwork. I found this disappointing as I wanted more. Either way, this is a great book to add to my collection. I will have to find a way to somehow get him to autograph it...

I received this as a Christmas present. Sienk is one of my favs so I was glad that the book had plenty of pictures of his work as well as stories about the artist and the pictures. I would recommend for any Sienkiewicz fan!

Excellent book. Brilliant artist. I met him a few times at a comicbook convention. He's really cool. This book is awesome. Definitely buy it if you're a fan. Hes a great illustrator/artist. Very inspiring to my own art.

My copy's back cover is attached upside down. Not sure if I got the one unlucky one some tired intern put together wrong or if it's every copy but I'm going to try and get a new version.

Just like his art this is a shot gun shot of words and images. It's a wonderful sampling of Bill's work that leaves a treasure map for anyone unfamiliar with his work to follow his career so far. A true legend gets his due.

This book is beautifully crafted with amazing pictures from one of the most amazing artists working today. Very well written interviews and worth every penny. Bring on the next volume!

I liked much of it but as it is part of a series I need to see what the others include to make an opinion

En la página 120 hay un dibujo que ocupa toda la pagina. En la descripción pone "Batman cover for DC". Ni es Batman ni el personaje pertenece a DC. Es Galactus y pertenece a Marvel. Error muy grave en este tipo de ediciones. Es como si compro un libro de arte y en el cuadro de "Las Meninas de Velázquez" me pone “La Gioconda de Leonardo Da Vinci”.

A extensa carreira de Bill Sienkiewicz na indústria de quadrinhos norte americana, rende essa bela coletânea de suas pinturas, desenhos e ilustrações ao longo de anos dedicados às artes.Conta com entrevistas e alguns trabalhos hoje em coleções particulares.Poderia ser ainda melhor mas vale pelo registro de um dos maiores e mais influentes artistas do meio.

After waiting for a longtime for a book compiling Sienkiewicz's works, I find this volume absolutely disappointing: a very outdated layout, a strange selection of works (why so many pages of several comic books which most of the fans already own?), a low quality in many of the sketches shown. I hope this is the first of many more Bill's books, but the following must improve a lot.

Hermosa edición hardcover azul con textura repleta de piezas maestras del dios de la ilustración Sienkiewicz. Independientemente de que seas fan de los cómics o superheroes, es increíble la cantidad de energía que irradia cada una de sus piezas.