Frank Quitely interview
You’ve worked with Grant Morrison on a number of acclaimed comic series such as All-Star Superman, We3 and Batman and Robin. What do you like best about working together?
For a start, he's really easy to work with because, on a technical level, he's so good at what he does. But the stories themselves are so good, and the themes they explore are themes that resonate strongly with me, so when I work with him the work always 'matters' to me. And I also feel that we 'click' when we're working together, which is very satisfying, creatively.
When you draw iconic heroes such as Superman or Batman, do you tend to homage other artists or add your own interpretation to the characters?
I don't homage other artists by trying to copy their style, but other artists are obviously a huge influence on me. My earliest memories of Superman are the classic Curt Swan incarnation, but there have been so many others since: Frank Miller, Dave Gibbons, Bruce Timm, Tim Sale... but ultimately I have to do it my own way.
How would you describe your own artistic style?
I think my biggest influences in comics are Dudley D. watkins, Moebius, Katsuhiro Otomo, Mort Drukker & Jack Davies, and quite a few more, and I can see bits of their various influences in my own work, but they're influencing a natural style I developed through constantly drawing my own way, throughout my life, and that's to do with me, and the way I see things. How can we ever really know? I suppose the short answer might be a predominantly line-based, fairly realistic, slightly cartoony, style, usually without photo-ref, with an emphasis on story-telling, facial expression & body language.
Batman and Robin introduces many new characters to the Batman universe such as Scarlet and Professor Pyg. Where did you get your inspiration for these new character designs and how much creative freedom were you given?
Grant described Pyg as Henry Higgins in a pig mask (I'm paraphrasing here), Siam as a triplet of martial arts guys, conjoined at the shoulder-blades, Toad reminiscent of the Wind-in-the-Willows character, Big Top as an enormously fat bearded lady/man dressed as a show-girl... you get the picture. I designed them around the descriptions I was given, but as always, if you had given those same descriptions to 10 different artists you'd get 10 very different sets of characters.
How does your creative process differ between working on cover art and drawing an interior page?
Covers, like a book illustration, or a poster, or a T-shirt design, have to convey an idea in a single image. An interior page, on the other hand, is a visual narrative, a story or piece of story that moves through time and space in a sequence of related moments. The two are very, very different things all together.
What’s the story behind adopting the pen name ‘Frank Quitely’?
I started in a small press adult humour comic called Electric Soup. Some of the other guys working for it were making up funny names for themselves, an idea which suited me because I didn't think my parents would have approved of the comic's content. Frank Quitely is a spoonerism of 'quite frankly', which, ironically, means 'honestly' - the name itself was intended to be a joke.
You studied at the Glasgow School of Art. How do you feel this education helped shape your artistic style?
I find it really difficult to quantify these things. I learned a lot at GSA, partly from the tutors, partly from my peers, and partly because I was creating work all day every day, and I was constantly being challenged to justify everything that I was doing - it makes you really think about what it is you're doing and why, and after a while you end up habitually and automatically applying a kind of practical, problem-solving approach to creating artwork of any kind.
