A portrait of Gene by his friend and indie comic legend, Dave Sim.

“Gene had not yet reached his full stature in the field [when he died]. His art, already unique and impressive, was still growing. (…) Most of his early work ably reflects two of Gene’s strongest points: his powerful and dramatic use of blacks in his rendering, and his constant experimentation with page design and storytelling breakdowns.” — Archie Goodwin, legendary author and editor for Marvel, Epic, DC and Warren comics

Gene Day—artist, author, publisher and cool dude in general—would’ve turned seventy today. He barely made it past thirty. Since this anniversary snuck up on me, I’ll let the website, Canadian Animation, Cartooning and Illustration, do the heavy lifting in regard to Gene’s bio:

‘Gene Day was an outstanding figure among a group of talented southern Ontario cartoonists who emerged in the 1970’s, until his sudden death in 1982 ended an achievement-filled career only 8 years old.
He seems to have begun his artist career as a jack of all trades. From 1973 he drew editorial cartoons in the Gananoque Reporter and expanded this work to The Leeds Echo, Queen’s Journal, Red Lake Journal and the Kingston Whig-Standard. He was nominated twice for the Ontario Weekly Newspapers Association Editorial Cartoonist Award. In 1978, he co-won the Editorial Page Award of the Canadian Weekly Newspapers Association (now called the Canadian Community Newspapers Association). (…)
In 1978, Day, inspired by the success of [Dave] Sim’s Cerebus, returned to the idea of publishing a comic book. He had previously attempted a mini-comic called Out of the Depths. Black Zeppelin was to be an anthology composed of the various genres: science fiction, fantasy, horror, war etc. By the middle of 1979, it was ready to be published with a release date of December and distribution by Dave Sim’s and Deni Loubert’s Aardvark-Vanaheim Press. Then problems arose and Black Zeppelin had to be postponed. Part of the reason for the suspension was that, in 1980, Day was contracted by the Marvel Comics Group. He began by co- illustrating Master of Kung Fu issue #95 (December 1980). From issue # 102 (1981) he was producing the covers and doing both pencils and inks for the stories. With few breaks he continued this contribution until his death. He died suddenly on October 1982 in his sleep of a heart attack.’

One important fact CACI doesn’t mention is that, by 1980, readers of The Savage Sword of Conan had known about Gene’s artistic talents for several years, his first pinup/’spot’ art appearing therein around 1976. By 1979, Day was also doing art for actual stories in SSoC, with none other than Roy Thomas handling the writing/adaptation chores. Without a doubt, Gene got his break on MoKF by virtue of his previous work in ‘Savage Sword’. Ironically, despite Roy leaving Marvel in very early 1981—and adapting no new Conan/REH stories thereafter—and Day dying in late 1982, their collaborations would continue to appear in SSoC in 1983 and 1984.

Long-time readers of the DMR Blog might recall that I’ve done several posts with ‘Savage Swords’—but never ‘Savage Sword’—in the titles. All of that was, is, and will be a call-back to SSoC and also an (almost) ironic play on SSoC’s title; the thought being that here is the ‘savage’ side that—in the case of, say, Lovecraft or Ray Bradbury—many readers might not have realized existed.

In the case of Gene Day, I’m being quite literal. He was a low-key mainstay of SSoC for about five years during its golden age. Who knows what he might’ve accomplished in its hallowed pages if he’d lived longer? Thus, for this blog entry, I’m concentrating on Gene’s SSoC output. Not all of it, by any means, but a good sampling, in my opinion. A full overview of Day’s career will have to wait.

So, without further ado, here is a gallery of Gene’s SSoC art.