Monday, March 4, 2013

So Val Goes Questing Across Wide Seas . . .



. . . because of a lovely face he saw but once in a vision.




Art and text: Hal Foster (from installment #246, October 26, 1941).
Source: Prince Valiant (Vol. 3): 1941-1942 – Hal Foster (Fantagraphics Books, 2011).

2 comments:

  1. I've been reading Volumes 4 and 5... the story of Val & Aleta is great. It's even better because it continues uninterrupted to this very day.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hoo-boy, my wife happened to see this particular portrait while I was reading that volume. . . and she never fails to give me grief over it. Yes, Val's still a teenager, I believe, but Foster for an awfully long time erred on the side of making Val "pretty"-- which adds an unintentionally awkward element to a picture like this. This could easily be portrait of Joan Crawford thinking dreamily of Claudette Colbert. . .

    I mean no disrespect, mind you-- it just took awhile for him to establish and solidify a consistently "adult" Val look. Yikes!

    I've also noticed how Aleta's face went through a couple of evolutions even in those first years of her appearances. Boy, love her to death, though-!

    HB

    ReplyDelete