Collection: Neal Adams (1941-2022) Artist Biography and Art Gallery Collection

Neal Adams (1941-2022) was an American Comic Book and commercial artist known for helping to create some of the definitive modern images of the DC Comics characters Superman, Batman, and Green Arrow; as the co-founder of the graphic design studio Continuity Associates; and as a creators rights advocate who helped secure a pension and recognition for Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Neal Adams was inducted into the Eisner Award's Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 1998, and the Harvey Awards' Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1999. Neal Adams was born on Governors Island, New York City, New York, and attended the School of Industrial Art High School in Manhattan, graduating in 1959. He immediately, but unsuccessfully, attempted to find freelance work at DC Comics, and turned then to Archie Comics, where he wanted to work on the publisher's fledgling superhero line, edited by Joe Simon.

In 1962, Neal Adams began his comics career in earnest at the NEA newspaper syndicate. From a recommendation, writer Jerry Caplin, a.k.a. Jerry Capp, brother of Li'l Abner creator Al Capp, invited Adams to draw samples for Capp's proposed Ben Casey comic strip, based on the popular television medical-drama series. The ABC TV series, which ran five seasons, ended March 21, 1966, with the final comic strip appearing Sunday, July 31, 1966. Turning to comic books, Adams found work at Warren Publishing's black-and-white horror-comics magazines, under editor Archie Goodwin. Adams debuted there as penciler and inker of writer Goodwin's eight-page anthological story "Curse of the Vampire" in Creepy #14 (April 1967). He and Goodwin quickly collaborated on two more stories, in Eerie #9 (May 1967) and Creepy #15 (June 1967), and Adams again approached DC Comics.

Neal Adams made his DC debut as penciler and inker of the 8½-page story "It's My Turn to Die", written by Howard Liss, in the anthology series Our Army at War #182 (July 1967). Adams was soon assigned his first superhero covers, illustrating that of the Superman flagship Action Comics #356 (Nov. 1967) and the same month's Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane #79 (Nov. 1967), featuring Superman and a mysterious new costumed character, Titanman. The first instance of Adams drawing Batman in an interior story was "The Superman-Batman Revenge Squads" in World's Finest Comics #175.Adams' art style, honed in advertising and in the photorealistic school of dramatic-serial comics strips, marked a signal change from most comics art to that time.

While continuing to freelance for DC, Neal Adams in 1969 also began freelancing for Marvel Comics, where he penciled several issues of the mutant-superhero team title X-Men and one story for a horror anthology title The Marvel "Bullpen Bulletins" column of Fantastic Four #87 (June 1969). He teamed with writer Roy Thomas on X-Men, then on the verge of cancellation,[31] starting with issue #56 (May 1969). Adams penciled, colored, and, according to Thomas, did most of the plotting, including the entire plot for issue #65. In that issue, his final work on the series, Adams and writer Dennis O'Neil, in one of that creative team's earliest collaborations, revived the Professor X character. While working on the series, Adams was paired for the first time with inker Tom Palmer, with whom he would collaborate on several acclaimed Marvel comics; the duo's work here netted them 1969 Alley Awards for Best Pencil Artist and Best Inking Artist, respectively. Batman's enduring makeover was contemporaneous with Adams and O'Neil's celebrated and, for the time, controversial revamping of the longstanding DC characters Green Lantern and Green Arrow.

In 2005 Neal Adams returned to Marvel (his last collaboration for this publisher had been in 1981 drawing a story for the Bizarre Adventures magazine) to draw an eight-page story for the Giant-Size X-Men #3. The following year Adams (among other artists) provided art to Young Avengers Special #1. In 2010, Adams returned to DC Comics as writer and artist on the miniseries Batman: Odyssey. Originally conceived as a 12-issue story, the series ran for six issues, being relaunched with vol. 2, #1 in October 2011. A total of seven issues were published for the second series until its end in June 2012. Apart from those assignments for DC, Adams penciled The New Avengers vol. 2, #16.1 (Nov. 2011) for Marvel Comics. In May 2012, Marvel announced that Adams would work on the X-Men again with The First X-Men, a five-issue miniseries drawn and plotted by him and written by Christos Gage. Adams produced short stories for Batman Black and White vol. 2 #1 (Nov. 2013) and Detective Comics vol. 2 #27 (March 2014). In February 2016, Adams revisited some of his most notable covers done for DC Comics in the 1960's and 1970's, replacing the original characters with some of the New 52 ones. Adams died in New York on April 28, 2022, at the age of 80. The artwork of Neal Adams is currently credited in 1,464 separate Comic Book issues.