Well, Gentle Readers, it's time to play catch-up once again. I intended to do two posts for March 25, but was unavoidably detained. Since I'm in a designated "essential industry", my situation has become a phantasmagorical saraband of both overtime and time off. This blog entry--one that I consider mandatory to post--is my first step toward getting things back on track.

The artist, Ken Barr, died on March 25, 2016. Until he breathed his final breath, Mr. Barr was--in my opinion--the greatest living Scottish artist working in the fields of SFF/Horror art. He earned that title over and over again during the course of a career that spanned more than four decades.

Kenneth John Barr was a denizen of Glasgow, Scotland, an honor he shared with Sean Connery. He apprenticed to his father, a sign-painter, as a teenager. That job taught Ken some basic skills that would be put to later, more glorious use. Upon reaching adulthood, Barr did a stint with the British Army, serving a year in Egypt--that experience providing him with some background for later, classic covers.

Barr's first pro work was for the UK magazine, Nebula Science Fiction. After several years working in London--including several covers for the UK war comic, Commando--Ken decided to seek greener pastures in the US of A. From 1968 to 1974, he did quality work at DC, crafting war comics under the editorship of the legendary Joe Kubert. Meanwhile, Ken was doing outstanding cover art for the Warren Magazines: Eerie, Creepy and Vampirella.

Ken really began making a splash when he hired on to do covers for Marvel's black-and-white magazines in 1974. What followed was a string of classic covers for The Savage Sword of Conan, Marvel Preview, Doc Savage, The Rampaging Hulk, The Planet of the Apes and The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu.

This was when Barr truly began coming into his own. The cover for The Rampaging Hulk #1 was a tour de force. The Hulk is tossing a tank at some US soldiers who are trying to slow him down with a bazooka. All of it is depicted in a blazing palette of reds, yellows and greens. This one cover encapsulates Ken's previous career in war comics, but takes everything up a notch...all the way to pulpish Technicolor Valhalla.

It's no coincidence that Barr, around the same time, started doing paperback covers. He hit a homerun with his first ever such cover: Zelazny's The Guns of Avalon in 1974. From there, for the next few years, Ken would craft more paperback covers, mostly in the realm of heroic fantasy/sword-and-sorcery. Then Barr got the contract with Fawcett Books to do all the covers for their reprint run of classic Andre Norton novels--which I mentioned in a post a few days ago.

Barr’s cover painting for Andre Norton’s Shadow Hawk. — Barr’s cover painting for Andre Norton’s *Shadow Hawk*.

Finally, somebody was paying Ken Barr what he was worth...and it showed. Andre Norton fans have long-agreed that this was the best run of covers for Norton's books ever. Barr pulled out all the stops. Not only are his covers great illustrations of the Norton novels, but they stand the test of time as art in their own right. One can see the unevenness in quality of previous covers from Barr. That did not happen with the Norton covers. I can only attribute this to Barr--being a Scotsman and aware of the value of a dollar--only giving his clients covers worthy of what they paid him.

Barr "officially" retired from doing pro work in 1987, returning to spend the rest of his days in Scotland. SFF art editors were now looking for the (abominable) posed, static, and lifeless "photo-realism" of Boris and his ilk. That said, Ken still produced several works a year, some being paperback covers and other being work for the comics industry.

In 1994, Comics Images put out a a set of trading cards devoted to Ken Barr titled Ken Barr: The Beast Within. Sal Quartuccio of SQP productions put out a new edition entitled The Beast Within: Ken Barr in 2007.

Ken Barr, in some ways, was the quintessential "modern pulp" artist. In my opinion--even moreso than Frazetta, in some ways--Barr epitomized the look of "modern pulp" as expressed in the 1960s-1980s era. The "look" of his covers harkened back to Walter Baumhofer and Earl Norem, but--at his best--he amped things up with that blazing pallette of colors, taking things to an entirely new level.

A few years back, when the whole PulpRev movement was just gathering steam, I would post about it on social media. More often than not, I would use Ken Barr paintings to get across what it was all about. That's what Ken Barr did. He took classic "pulp" stylings and made them modern in a way that still resonates today. Feel free to check out the gallery of Ken Barr art below.

Raise the mead-horn high in memory of Ken Barr, my friends. Scots Wha Hae!