Klaus Janson

Klaus Janson
Born January 23, 1952 (1952-01-23) (age 60)
Coburg, Germany
Area(s) Penciller, Inker, Colorist

Klaus Janson (born January 23, 1952)[1] is a German-born American comic book artist, working regularly for Marvel Comics and DC Comics and sporadically for independent companies. While he is best known as an inker, Janson has frequently worked as a penciller and colorist.

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Early life

Born in Coburg, Germany,[2] Klaus Janson emigrated to the United States in 1957, settling with his family in Connecticut,[2] where he lived in Bridgeport from 1957 to 1972.[3]

Career

After a short stint as assistant to Dick Giordano in the early 1970s,[4] Janson came to prominence as the inker over Sal Buscema's pencils on The Defenders. Since then he has freelanced on most of the major titles at Marvel and DC. He is most famous for his collaboration with writer-artist Frank Miller on a 1979-1983 run on Daredevil and on Batman: The Dark Knight Returns in 1986.[5] Janson has frequently pencilled and inked for various Batman titles, including Gothic with writer Grant Morrison.

Janson's work as an inker and occasional penciler at Marvel Comics includes collaborations with John Romita, Jr. on Wolverine, The Amazing Spider-Man and Black Panther. His other work includes Batman: Death and the Maidens, World War Hulk, Battlestar Galactica, Superman, Logan's Run, and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. At present, he is inking John Romita's pencils in Avengers.

Janson wrote a short story in the anthology miniseries Batman: Black and White #3 (August 1996).

Janson has taught sequential storytelling at the School of Visual Arts in New York City, since the 1990s[6] and has written both The DC Comics Guide to Pencilling Comics and The DC Comics Guide to Inking Comics. Janson also holds annual seminars at Marvel for the editorial staff and their up-and-coming artists, and teaches short courses on comics storytelling for the New York-based Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art.[4]

Awards

Bibliography

DC Comics

Marvel Comics

References

  1. ^ Comics Buyer's Guide #1650; February 2009; Page 107
  2. ^ a b Klaus Janson at the Lambiek Comiclopedia. Accessed August 14, 2009.
  3. ^ "Connecticut Talent". Connecticut Historical Society. Archived from the original on September 27, 2007. http://web.archive.org/web/20070927212433/www.chs.org/comics/creators.htm. 
  4. ^ a b Bio, Museum of Comics and Cartoon Art
  5. ^ Manning, Matthew K.; Dolan, Hannah, ed. (2010). "1980s". DC Comics Year By Year A Visual Chronicle. Dorling Kindersley. p. 219. ISBN 978-0-7566-6742-9. "It is arguably the best Batman story of all time. Written and drawn by Frank Miller (with inspired inking by Klaus Janson and beautiful watercolors by Lynn Varley), Batman: The Dark Knight revolutionized the entire genre of the super hero." 
  6. ^ a b Klaus Janson at the School of Visual Arts