
By Dick O.
Comic art in its original form (generally ink over pencil on 11”x17” art board) allows one to admire the artistry of comic book production in close detail. My appreciation of penciling, inking, lettering and colouring, acquired from poring over countless original art pages, would never have developed just from reading comic books. This in turn has resulted in an increased affinity for artists and styles that I’d previously paid little attention to.
For the purposes of this column, OA refers to the original art of the individual pages found in your monthly comic book floppies and graphic novels. Generally, each OA page (and cover) is an 11″x17″ art board containing hand-drawn pencils (by a penciller) under hand-applied black inks (by an inker). OA can also refer to art from comic strips, non-American comic books and unpublished commissions.
Each piece of published OA is one-of-a-kind, automatically making it more exclusive than any comic book. No matter the price, you can always be assured that nobody else owns the same page of OA as you!