Greg Capullo has been my favorite artist ever since his run on Spawn in the 90’s. I remember going back to the comic shop to by second copies of some issues so I could take it apart and hang it on my wall next to my bed.
I frankly probably follow writers more than artists (thus I’m here), but certain artists will cause me to buy a book like Jae Lee, P Craig Russell , Barry Windsor Smith, Mike Deodato, David Finch.
Love Greg Cappullo, especially when he’s doing Batman, Jim Lee of course, Jock, George Perez… there are others of course but these are some of the ones that jump out for me. And yes, there have been comics I really wanted to read but the art put me off so much I couldn’t finish them.
Yes, I won’t read a book if I don’t like the artwork. Comics are, first and foremost, a visual medium. Favorite artist? That’s another tough one. But I’m going with the much underappreciated Curt Swan. This man drew Superman for forty years! His clean, realistic renderings made me a Superman fan for life. I believe he is the yardstick by which all Superman artists should be measured.
Yeah as a kid I didn’t really think about it but now as I see the older stuff I do I definitely see the power of a Curt Swan. A similar prolific artist over a Marvel was Sal Buscema, not exactly the most beautiful artwork but I really like his early Defenders and Rom.
Ed McGuiness, EVS, Mike S. Miller, Alex Ross, Michael Turner. Honestly theres many, many more. I’ll tell you my favorite underrated DC artist is the late great Mr. Dick Dillin. His Bronze Age work was fantastic.
I can’t name just one favorite, so I’ll list some of them.
John Byrne
Curt Swan
Dick Giordano
Neal Adams
George Perez
Jerry Ordway
Norm Breyfogle
Jim Aparo
Alex Ross
Ivan Reis
Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez
Jim Lee
Gary Frank
Phil Jimenez
Jason Fabok
Evan “Doc” Shaner