Frazetta Book Cover Art

Vanguard follows last year’s hit Fantastic Paintings of Frazetta book by J. David Spurlock with definitive reference on Frazetta Book Cover Art.

Frazetta is the revolutionary fantasy artist of Conan, King Kong, Death Dealer, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Lord of The Rings and more, whose original art sells for millions. This new 2022 Frazetta book follows last year’s hit, Fantastic Paintings of Frazetta and is similar to Vanguard’s earlier Frazetta Definitive Reference book. But, it is superior in at least one regard. Instead of cataloging Frazetta items with mostly smaller illustrations, this new book is devoted solely to the artist’s single, most beloved venue, Book Cover Art. By focusing on this specific area, the book boasts room enough to feature every single one of Frazetta’s famous and highly collectable illustrated book covers, beautifully and authentically reproduced at a larger size on a page to itself. All are presented in chronological order which, gives readers a unique ability to follow Frazetta’s evolution as an artist. Accompanying text includes commentary, original publication titles, publishers, dates, and rare quotes from the artist himself. For this Definitive Reference to feature the Complete Collection of Frazetta’s decades of book cover illustrations, in a single beautifully produced volume, is a dream come true for Frazetta fans, art and book collectors and historians alike.

Author Biography

J. David Spurlock is an award-winning author, historian, educator, advocate for artists’ rights, documentary filmmaker and associate to star talents Frazetta, Basil Gogos, Neal Adams, Steranko, Joe Kubert, Carmine Infantino, Julius Schwartz, Wally Wood and many more. Spurlock’s book How to Draw Chiller Monsters, for Random House, rose as high as #18 on the Bookspan best-seller list.  Spurlock’s IPPY Award-winning book, Alluring Art of Margaret Brundage, has been universally acclaimed including by MTV and by the Village Voice who proclaimed it one of The Best of 2013. In 2012, Spurlock was appointed Director of the Wallace Wood Estate. Wood is the Hugo Award recognized illustrator of Galaxy and Planet Stories as well as the comic-book Hall of Fame co-creator of MAD, Mars Attacks, Daredevil and Weird Science. A partial list of Spurlock’s guest speaking engagements include: many San Diego Comic-Con presentations, 2013 WorldCon (various lecture panels including on Robert E. Howard, Copyright Law, and on Margaret Brundage); with Stan Lee for Dragon Con TV and a live audience if 4,600; The Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine re-launch convention; the Frank Frazetta tribute event at the San Diego Comic-Con; Rutgers School of Law; and University of the Arts in Philadelphia.

About the world’s greatest heroic fantasy artist, Frank Frazetta, The New York Times said, “Frazetta helped define fantasy heroes like Conan, Tarzan and John Carter of Mars with signature images of strikingly fierce, hard-bodied heroes and bosomy, callipygian damsels” Frazetta took the sex and violence of the pulp fiction of his youth and added even more action, fantasy and potency, but rendered with a panache seldom seen outside of major works of Fine Art. Despite his fantastic subject matter, the quality of Frazetta’s work has not only drawn comparisons to the most brilliant of illustrators, Maxfield Parrish, Frederic Remington, Norman Rockwell, N.C. Wyeth but, even to the most brilliant of fine artists including Rembrandt and Michelangelo and, major Frazetta works sell for millions of dollars, breaking numerous records,

This innovator’s work has inspired generations of artists, movies
and directors including the Conan films, John Carter of Mars, the Lord of the
Rings trilogy, Robert Rodriguez’ films including From Dusk Till Dawn, Ralph
Bakshi films, the epic, award-winning Game of Thrones series, Tim Burton’s
Sleepy Hollow, Disney’s animated Tarzan films, Francis Ford Coppola’s
Apocalypse Now and George Lucas’ Star Wars series. The Forbes magazine article
Schwarzenegger’s Sargent led with the line, “Which artist helped make
Arnold governor? Frank Frazetta, the Rembrandt of barbarians.”