Art by Mike Kaluta

Mike Kaluta’s Conan

I love when interesting artists take on Robert E. Howard’s most famous swordsman. This isn’t a slight on John Buscema/Ernie Chan/Tony DeZuniga/Alfred Alcala. I love the old Marvel stand-bys but like watching Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit films, after a while you just want something that looks “different”.

Mike Kaluta (1947-) is one of those artists. Famous for his The Shadow comics at DC, as well as the independent Starstruck, he earned his chops doing illustrations for Ted White’s Fantastic, covers for the DC horror titles such as Madame Xanadu, the adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ The Pirates of Venus even painting the album artwork for Lenny White’s The Adventures of Astral Pirates in 1978. Mike is one of the four artists who were known as The Studio (the others all superstars, Barry Windsor Smith, Jeff Catherine Jones and Berni Wrightson.) Kaluta has done it all.

And he has done Conan. Not the sweaty, brutal Conan, but the subtle, intriguing, dare we say elegant, Conan. Most people would not think that Kaluta was one of the first Savage Sword artist but he did the cover for #3.

December 1974

In late 1983, Mike signed on to do covers for King Conan, soon retitled Conan the King. I remember buying these lackluster comics just for the covers.

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November 1983
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January 1984
May 1984
July 1984
September 1984
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November 1984
January 1985
March 1985
May 1985
July 1985
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September 1985
November 1985

Mike wasn’t done with Conan covers just yet. The 1990s saw three more.

January 1993
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March 1993
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March 1994

And just so you don’t think Mike has slipped any, in 2005 he drew a special insert into Cary Nord’s “Tower of the Elephant” (Conan #22, November 2005) and cover work for Dynamite that shows he has only gotten better.

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December 2005
2007
 
#4 now in paperback!
A stunning first novel!
A classic bestseller!