Yes, Rob Liefeld's art is lame and dumb

Dang... I mean, I get why people don't like his art, but I've noticed many peeople online can be quite mean about it (especially if you go someplace like CBR or bleeding cool). Maybe its because I like cartoony art, but I'm a fan of Rob Liefeld. It's over the top, a little silly and and always feels XTREEM to the max. Do I think all comics should look like that? No. But hey, if I'm reading one of his books, thats the kinda art I wanna see with the story. It's fun. Sorta like Humberto Ramos on Spiderman... I know a lot of people give him a hard time for making Spiderman cartoony.... but I think his art fits Spidey perfectly!

In any case, I'll take Rob Liefeld over Greg Land anyday. Now thats some art that makes my eyes bleed. Its like someone photoshoped a bunch of magazine cutouts and porn stills.

No.

How I feel, my opinion, has no bearing on the fact that Liefeld's behavior is that of one who does not care about the quality of his product or the impact that lack of quality can have on the industry as a whole. Like Deathmate. He was only a part of that fiasco, but the largest, most glaring part.

An artist is, by nature, informed by their work as much as it is informed by them. This results in growth and change within their work and themselves. Liefeld makes the same choices continually, and it is not for the sake of style or artistic license, but a gross laziness. In 25 years, anyone can learn to draw a foot.

No. That's still entirely subjective. By that exact "objective" reason, Pablo Picasso is a bad artist. Now that's all fine if you want to believe that, but it's not a statement that can come close to being able to be passed off as fact.

For the record, I wasn't talking about him.

Apparently at one point LIefeld started got tired of people mocking him for not being able to draw feet (i.e. they point inwards) so he started drawing things in front of everyone's legs, random items on the floor, rocks, plants, etc.

Liefeld ATA: Any character recognized as a Liefeld character treats clear terrain as hindering terrain for movement. Any character can also use Blades/Claws/Fangs but it is called knees/elbows/toes

Yeah, you're still not convincing me that this is anything other than opinion.

Pablo Picasso didn't work in a medium that revolved around human anatomy. Cubism is not nearly the same as comic book art.

Rob Liefeld is a bad comic book artist. I'm not saying anyone is wrong for liking it, but you can't deny his art is bad.

OK.

Art, especially comic art, works because you (the viewer) believe it. Look at someone like Rob Schrab or Ashley Wood. They don't draw an "ideal" figure by any means. Except for Sussudio, but I digress. The viewer believes it. Liefeld's work is too naive to be refined, and too refined to be naive, completely unbelievable. It comes off as looking like a lot of mistakes and shortcuts.

Ever watch Aeon Flux? The animated version, not the live action starring the ever-delectable Charlize Theron. Anatomy out of a funhouse hall of mirrors. But, it is believable. The viewer buys it. Yeah, that's how they want this to look.

Picasso painted that way on purpose. Not because he wanted to skimp out on a background or not draw feet. He may have been a bugger with delivery dates, though. I can't say.

And yet the lists are still incomplete, as they lack "that" Captain America cover and a truly excremental "fight" scene from #3 of the same series.

He had a kind of low-rent Arthur Adams appeal back in 1987 (see his Hawk & Dove debut) that wasn't...terrible. All the same issues are present in that work, but somehow not as bad as they'd get. Who knew that'd be his artistic peak...?

I was in tears laughing by the end, trying desperately not to wake up my sleeping family.

You can't speak for the majority when the majority votes against you.

I'm in this camp.

Also, I cannot believe that people are objectively defending the dude's art, even as an exercise in being contrary.

Like, I HATE Joe Mad's style. Ditto Humberto Ramos. Like, cannot read a book drawn by them without being totally distracted by the art. That said, I get why people dig it. I get that it isn't my thing, but it still requires a ton of skill to pull off.

Liefeld? I cannot say that I have objectively enjoyed his art on any level. The proportions are ridiculous, he draws extremities like they're either sticks or tree trunks, and he doesn't do a damn thing that another artist doesn't already do better than he does.

He's a poor man's Jim Lee, IMO.

Actually, it isn't like that, it IS that.

My personal opinion:

If you are objectively looking at art you're full of #### and shouldn't be allowed to look at or comment on art. In internet terms: you're doing it wrong.