{"id":17016,"date":"2014-08-04T06:15:02","date_gmt":"2014-08-04T11:15:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/?p=17016"},"modified":"2019-11-26T06:59:25","modified_gmt":"2019-11-26T11:59:25","slug":"it-was-either-art-school-or-this","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/2014\/08\/04\/it-was-either-art-school-or-this\/","title":{"rendered":"It was either Art School or This…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"COMICS-HEAD\"<\/a>\"customize-van-det\"<\/a>Back when I was pondering what I wanted to do with my life, the fast growing\/big money world of van customization beckoned to me like a siren singing a sweet song from the rocks.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"customize-van-det2\"<\/a>I could have been gleefully ignoring the copyrights of famous fantasy artists and reproducing their works on the side of Econoline Vans or, like, painting some awesome skulls on a motorcycle’s gas tank. Then when I had finally milked Frank Frazetta’s portfolio dry, I could try to talk customers into paying for original work — my own fantastic creations furiously wrought on the side of some tricked out van for all of the mother-lovin’ motorin’ world to friggin’ see. I’d be, like, famous.<\/p>\n

Nah.<\/em><\/p>\n

“I want you to paint me and my old lady like that Conan paintin’ on the tank of my bike, and I need it tomorrow!”<\/em> said the scary biker gang guy who wasn’t going to accept “no” as an answer. And he doesn’t want to pay cash. He wants to barter \u2013 payment would be in the form of a van full of fireworks and\/or bootleg cigarettes from down south.<\/p>\n

\"customize-van\"<\/a>Then there was the whole upholstery, install a waterbed, put in a moon-roof sort of thing that I didn’t think I’d really be in to. I just wanted to paint some boss art. I didn’t want to fix the vinyl captain’s chairs on an old Dodge.<\/p>\n

Nope, art school was the\u00a0 prudent investment!<\/p>\n

\"Defenders-26\"<\/a>Now that you’re done laughing, I can tell you that the ad appeared in The Defenders<\/strong><\/em> No. 26 published by Marvel Comics in 1975 \u2013 the heyday of van customization.<\/p>\n

The Defenders<\/strong><\/em> was supposed to be a super-hero team that acted like they weren’t a team and felt more like a group therapy session that decided to suit up and fight evil in between bouts of angst and self-doubt. It was the malaise of the 1970s printed in four colors on newsprint. The Defenders featured the Hulk<\/strong><\/em> who was quickly becoming a tedious, tantrumming man-child back then, Dr. Strange<\/strong><\/em> who was lost without his creator Steve Ditko and a revolving reserve of second and third string characters. The lady with the Veronica Lake hair is Valkyrie<\/strong><\/em>, and the guy with the silly mask is Batman stand-in Nighthawk<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

This issue features The Guardians of the Galaxy<\/strong><\/em><\/a> which is why I ran with this cover. I’m not above trying to ride the coattails of MARVEL\/DISNEY’s hype machine.<\/p>\n

Hey, where’s the raccoon?<\/em><\/p>\n

Sorry, different guys with the same name. This is an earlier incarnation of that group. Hey, if you have a good, alliterative title, you stick with it!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back when I was pondering what I wanted to do with my life, the fast growing\/big money world of van customization beckoned to me like a siren singing a sweet song from the rocks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[335],"tags":[556,17,8,312,726,9,3251,3253,718,3254,2452,1097,308,3252,336],"class_list":["post-17016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-what-i-miss-about-comics","tag-556","tag-cartoon","tag-cartoons","tag-comic","tag-comic-book","tag-comics","tag-customized-van","tag-dr-strange","tag-frazetta","tag-group-therapy","tag-guardians-of-the-galaxy","tag-hulk","tag-marvel","tag-the-defenders","tag-vintage"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1ed1x-4qs","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":5647,"url":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/2011\/12\/19\/comics-toy-tie-ins\/","url_meta":{"origin":17016,"position":0},"title":"What I Miss About Comics…Toy Tie-Ins","author":"Joe_Williams","date":"December 19, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Back in the early to mid-70s, the Evel Knievel Stunt Cycle was the hottest toy in the country. Manufacturers couldn't keep with with demand. It was on my younger brother's Christmas list, and he had to make due with the Evel Knievel Scramble Van. My brother had to console himself\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "What I Miss About Comics"","block_context":{"text":"What I Miss About Comics","link":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/category\/what-i-miss-about-comics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/COMICS-HEAD.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/COMICS-HEAD.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/COMICS-HEAD.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":39189,"url":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/2022\/10\/05\/flying-a-kite-at-night\/","url_meta":{"origin":17016,"position":1},"title":"Flying a Kite at Night?","author":"Joe","date":"October 5, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"I was flipping through an old comic when I came across this advertisement which made me think of the truly terrible 1979 version of Dracula starring Frank Langella as the count and Laurence Olivier recycling his awful accent from A Little Romance as Van Helsing. What reminds me of this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Halloween"","block_context":{"text":"Halloween","link":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/category\/halloween\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/dracula-kite-1979.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/dracula-kite-1979.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/dracula-kite-1979.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":17,"url":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/2009\/07\/28\/co2-comics\/","url_meta":{"origin":17016,"position":2},"title":"CO2 Comics","author":"Joe_Williams","date":"July 28, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"The guys at CO2 Comics have a couple of my efforts in sequential art a.k.a. FUNNIES up at their fabulous web comic site. Right now you can read There's No Escape From a Deadline, my comic used for marketing printers and service bureaus, and Hot Topics, my fire safety comic\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "News"","block_context":{"text":"News","link":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/category\/news\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"CO2_Comics","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/07\/CO2_Comics.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":38592,"url":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/2022\/09\/01\/aaaaay-wear-the-fonz\/","url_meta":{"origin":17016,"position":3},"title":"AAAAAY! Wear the Fonz!","author":"Joe","date":"September 1, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"This Fonz T Shirt ad appeared in Justice League of America No. 138 published by DC comics in 1977. This is an issue that I may have gotten as a stripped comic for a penny. Back then, unsold comics were returnable to the company that distributed them to newsstands and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "What I Miss About Comics"","block_context":{"text":"What I Miss About Comics","link":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/category\/what-i-miss-about-comics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/AAAAAY-detail.jpg?fit=640%2C282&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/AAAAAY-detail.jpg?fit=640%2C282&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/AAAAAY-detail.jpg?fit=640%2C282&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":23581,"url":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/2018\/05\/01\/ask-your-father\/","url_meta":{"origin":17016,"position":4},"title":"Ask Your Father","author":"Joe_Williams","date":"May 1, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Ma, it says right here that they'll send ya 'ONE PREGNANT MALE who will give birth to as many as 25 babies!' How can that be, Ma? How can that be? This was an advertisement that regularly appeared in comic books, and it was the sort of thing that always\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Curious Clutter"","block_context":{"text":"Curious Clutter","link":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/category\/curious-clutter\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/All-Star-Comics_No65.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":37973,"url":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/2022\/06\/22\/what-i-miss-about-comics-perfectly-legitimate-ads\/","url_meta":{"origin":17016,"position":5},"title":"What I Miss About Comics – Perfectly Legitimate Ads","author":"Joe","date":"June 22, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"This along with a number of other classified style advertisements for perfectly legitimate products and services appeared in Marvel Spotlight No. 25 published by Marvel Comics in 1975. It was a comic adaptation of Ray Harryhausen's 1958 fantasy epic The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad. My guess is that Marvel was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "What I Miss About Comics"","block_context":{"text":"What I Miss About Comics","link":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/category\/what-i-miss-about-comics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/AUTHENTIC-LOOKING.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/AUTHENTIC-LOOKING.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/AUTHENTIC-LOOKING.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17016\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willceau.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}