Simon Gane: Difference between revisions

British artist

Simon Gane is a British artist from Bath known for his work in the comic book field.

Gane grew up influenced by the comics of Hergé and Jacques Tardi.^[1] He attended art school in the U.K.^[1] Later comics influences included Christophe Blain and Joann Sfar, as well as the minicomics of Tom Hart, David Lasky, and Adrian Tomine.^[1]

Gane’s work was first published in his “self-produced punk fanzine, Arnie, and various minicomics before being collected in Punk Strips“^[2] (Slab-O-Concrete, 2000).

His first work published in the United States came in 2004 with Eureka Productions in Graphic Classics #9: Robert Louis Stevenson, and the kids’ Godzilla comic, All Flee! (Top Shelf Productions). After illustrating the five-issue comic Paris, written by fellow Englishman Andi Watson and published by Slave Labor Graphics, Gane found a home with Vertigo Comics, first with The Vinyl Underground and then Dark Rain: A New Orleans Story and Northlanders. Gane described The Vinyl Underground as being “set in London and featur[ing] an ad-hoc group of self-appointed detectives who become embroiled in occult-tinged crimes with a strong supporting cast of mobsters and so on.”^[3]

Gane is the official illustrator for the Burning Sky Brewery in East Sussex.^{[citation needed]}

Gane’s work on The Vinyl Underground was deliberately drawn “in a more realistic style” than his usual (self-described as “warped”) work, a move which he felt “[had] a constructive effect on my drawing and story-telling.”^[3]

• (with Darryl Cunningham) Meet John Dark (Slab-O-Concrete, 1998)
• Punk Strips (Slab-O-Concrete, 2000)
• (with Michael Slack) Graphic Classics #9: Robert Louis Stevenson: two-part interpretation of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (Eureka Productions, 2004)
• (with writer Gavin Burrows) All Flee! (Top Shelf Productions, 2004)
• (with writer Andi Watson) Paris, 5-issue limited series (Slave Labor Graphics, 2005–2006, tpb, 144 pages, August 2007, ISBN 1-59362-081-0)
• (with writer Si Spencer and inkers Cameron Stewart and Ryan Kelly)^[1] The Vinyl Underground #1–12 (Vertigo Comics, December 2007 – November 2008) collected as:
  • Watching the Detectives (collects #1–5, 128 pages, June 2008, ISBN 1-4012-1812-1)
  • Pretty Dead Things (collects #6–12, 128 pages, December 2008, ISBN 1-4012-1977-2)
• (with writer Alex Burrows) adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle‘s “John Barrington Cowles,” Graphic Classics: Free Comic Book Day #1 (Eureka Productions, 2008)
• (with writer Mat Johnson) Dark Rain: A New Orleans Story (Vertigo, August 2010 ISBN 978-1401221607)^[4]
• (with writer Brian Wood) Northlanders #37–39 (Vertigo, April–June 2011)
• (with writer Rob Williams) Think of a City page 20 (Internet art project, 2014)
• (with writer Eric Stephenson) They’re Not Like Us (Image Comics, 2014-2017)
• (with writer Bobby Curnow) Ghost Tree #1–4 (IDW Publishing, 2019–2020)^[5]

• (with Betty Hicks) Doubles Troubles (Macmillan Publishers, 2010)
• (with Betty Hicks) Track Attack (Macmillan, 2014)