Genius Isolated The Life And Art Of Alex Toth has been released!
This is the first book of a set of three the third to be released with a slipcase.
My only way to try and describe the beauty of this book is that it is a senses sensation.
The red and black cover appeals to the eye, the raised image to the fingers… as soon as you open it you get hit with the scent of fresh print, the sound of the heavy weight paper as you turn the pages is smooth and crisp!
It is a delightful experience which was worth every single penny.
This is the first book of its kind to be released about Alex Toth and has had the full support from his family and friends.
In Vol 1 we get 12 chapters starting from when Alex was born and began drawing aged 3. We learn the history of his family moving from Hungary and beginning life in New York and what his relationship was like with his parents.
The picture soon suggests from an early age how Alex preferred to be a loner and found socialising at school hard, he was happiest ‘doodling’.
We get to read interviews with Alex about his school career and his fondness for one of his teachers who would reward correct behaviour by purchasing out of her own money comic books and another who allowed him time away from class to create murals…
From a very early age you see the legendary Toth temper when criticised and the drive and ambition he held to prove those people wrong.
Something which undoubtedly held him back as well as helped him as an artist.
There is a chapter dedicated to his inspirations, Milton Caniff and European poster artists and we see how his styled changed and developed into the Toth we know and love.
Throughout the book there a lavish paintings, drawings, illustrations from completed stories, to pages and art never been seen before brought together by Toth fans from all over the world.
We get a glimpse of his famed Jon Fury stories which he wrote whilst he was in the army.
I believe later this year these stories will have their own books published.
Jon Fury In Japan.
You learn how he looked and saw things in squares... and in the intro the editor says how he sat and watched a reluctant Alex start with an inner ear for drawing him a gangster...
Though I know Alex Toth did not think overly much about Alex Ross and his work... this was one of things I noticed about Ross, when asked to draw Dr Midnite.
He started with his nose, which at the time astounded me; so I loved this story about the inner ear!!
Of course we get a helping of his glorious 1950s Zorro work, some of my favourites; this volume takes us up to his work in the early 1960s.
I really enjoyed the Romance comics..., brave handsome soldiers returning from war to whisk a young lady off her feet… etc. a girl can dream... right!? but they still had the gritty realism of soldiers returning with missing limbs...
And the more noir styled The Crushed Gardenia.
But the one story which did stand out to me was Alice In Terrorland, published in 1952, this is genuinely creepy as well as the Phantom ship, with sailors being rats…
This book is definitely biographical full of family photographs and stories as well as interviews from Irwin Hasen and the like and is crammed full of sweet Toth goodness to bursting!
I had to order it specially to get it over here so it came in at just under £50, though it was expensive and an absolute beauty! with time, this book is going to be so well thumbed and loved...
You can’t help but pick it up and touch and flick through it even when you have read every single page, it is something you keep coming back to.
If you love the man this is a must have.
Now where is my Vol 2??!!
