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Gil Kane is most often associated with the Green Lantern as well as other DC titles and yet, during his long career, he managed to put his signature on virtually every watershed character or comic enterprise that has ever mattered. For example, his landmark Spiderman series of stories gathered together now in one volume but usually referred to as 'The Death of Gwen Stacey" series can be seen as the single most important literary and artistic influence on the monumental Sam Raimi film, Spider-Man (2002).
The major difference being Gwen, Spidey's 1st love, was written out entirely and party girl, Mary Jane, his second love, assumed some of Gwen's grace, vulnerability and innocence as well as her place in the Spiderman Mythos. Gil Kane did that series at the dawn of the 1970s.
Not satisfied with Super-Heroes, Kane also produced an outstanding Graphic novel based on Wagner's Ring Cycle with writer Roy Thomas that mingled respect for old world literature and myth into the art and broke out of the monthly format. This was not new ground for him as he had put out a very bold venture, Blackmark, a novel in Graphic form about 20 years earlier.
Kane battled cancer twice in his later years but up until the last year of his life he was a regular and gracious guest at large conventions. He has received so many awards it would be impossible to list them all. He was a dearly and fiercely loved figure in Comics and Animation. His death sent spasms of grief rippling through the Entertainment Industry because not only was he a great artist, but he was truly a GREAT man.
His influence is everywhere from Comics to Films. However, unlike the insular world of Horror movies & publishing where every director or writer working knows that Forry Ackerman's Famous Monsters of Filmland Magazine put them on the road to their careers, the influence of the three great American Comic Book Artists is less tangible because we absorbed as children, not knowing the difference until adulthood between a penciler and an inker.
Gil Kane's sweeping and graceful arcs of action across the page as well as the sweet and elegant lines to his figures has influenced directors, artists, and others in much the same way as Jack Kirby's chunky, formidable, kinetic energy did. It is a little sad to know that greats such a Kane will not be names upon the lips of everyone who absorbed his legacy, but it is a comfort to know that his legacy is so wide and so far reaching, it has touched the way Animation is conceived now and dare we say, even Art itself.
Kane fought in the Pacific Theater in WWII, drew both comics and some syndicated strips at times, worked for both Marvel and DC, used to carpool with Julius Schwartz, editor at DC Comics from time to time and who was one of his dearest friends. Kane is survived by his wife of over 30 years, Elaine, his three children and two grandchildren. He is buried in Florida where he retired with Elaine in the very late 90s. By David Pollison and Lisa Feerick Pollison, with love.
