We all know the big names Superman, Captain America, and Black Panther, thanks to comic books.
The genre has seen a resurgence in the last two decades, but in reality comic books have been around in some form for decades. It first became hugely popular in the 1920s to 1930s. In those days, comics were mostly created by men who have been mostly forgotten, especially the black artists.
However, for Live In The D’s Black History Month celebration, Tati Amare spoke to local author Ken Quattro who is shining a light on those invisible men with his book “The Invisible Men: The Trailblazing Black Artists of Comic Books.”
The book profiles 18 black artists from the 1920′s and 1930′s. Many of them did not set out to be comic book artists but were actually classically trained artists who needed a steady paycheck or were hired when white comic book artists were drafted into World War II. Quattro is a lifelong comic book fan, who stumbled onto the topic while researching an artist named Matt Baker, someone no one knew much about. From there, Quattro unmasked a world of “invisible men.”
Watch the video to learn more about the book at the story Quattro shares about these artists.