Marie Severin
Marie Severin (/məˈriː ˈsɛvərɪn/;[1] August 21, 1929[2] – August 29, 2018)[3][4][5] was an American comics artist and colorist best known for her work for Marvel Comics and the 1950s' EC Comics. She is an inductee of the Will Eisner Comics Hall of Fame[3] and the Harvey Awards Hall of Fame.[6]
Marie Severin
August 21, 1929
East Rockaway, New York, U.S.
August 29, 2018 (aged 89)
Massapequa, New York, U.S.
American
1974 Shazam Award: Best Penciller (Humor Division); Will Eisner Comics Hall of Fame, 2001
2019 Inkwell Awards Stacey Aragon Special Recognition Award
Bronze Age[edit]
In 1976, Severin co-created Spider-Woman, designing her original costume.[27] She co-created Howard the Duck villain Doctor Bong in 1977.[28] Two years later she provided the art for the Spider-Man and the Hulk toilet paper.[29][30]
In the 1980s, she was assigned to Marvel's Special Projects division, which handled non-comic book licensing. She helped design toy maquettes and film and television tie-ins products, and worked on the short-lived Marvel Books imprint of children's coloring books and sticker books.[31] During this time she also drew the Fraggle Rock and Muppet Babies comics for Marvel's Star Comics imprint.[32]
During the following decade, Severin penciled the "Impossible Tale" of the "Li'l Soulsearchers" in issue #31 (Aug. 1998) of Claypool Comics' superhero-humor comic Soulsearchers and Company, inked by fellow Silver Age veteran Jim Mooney; and she inked Dave Cockrum's penciling in issue #43 (July 2000). She also inked Richard Howell's pencils on the story "Favor of the Month" in Elvira #144 (April 2005).
Retirement and Death[edit]
Severin retired but continued into the mid-2000s to make occasional contributions, such as recoloring many of the comics stories reprinted in the EC-era retrospective books B. Krigstein and B. Krigstein Comics. The former won both the Harvey and Eisner comic-industry awards in 2003.
On October 11, 2007, Severin suffered a stroke, and was taken to Huntington Hospital, in Huntington on Long Island, to recover and recuperate.[33]
She died in 2018 at the age of 89.
Awards and honors[edit]
Severin won the Best Penciller (Humor Division) Shazam Award in 1974.[35] The following year, she was nominated for both Best Inker (Humor Division) and Best Colorist.
Severin spoke at a 1974 New York Comic Art Convention panel on the role of women in comics, alongside Flo Steinberg, Jean Thomas (sometime-collaborator with then-husband Roy Thomas), Linda Fite (writer of The Claws of the Cat) and fan representative Irene Vartanoff.[36] She also participated in the Women of Comics Symposium at the 2006 Paradise Comics Toronto Comicon.
Severin won an Inkpot Award at the San Diego Comic Con in 1988.[37]
She was the first inductee into the Friends of Lulu Women Cartoonists Hall of Fame in 1997.[38] She was inducted into the Will Eisner Comics Hall of Fame in 2001; she and Brenda Starr creator Dale Messick were the first women to be so inducted.[39]
Severin's work was among those included in the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art exhibition of women comic-book artists, "She Draws Comics", July to November 2006.[40]
In consideration of her contributions to comics, ComicsAlliance listed Severin as one of twelve women cartoonists deserving of lifetime achievement recognition.[41] She received Comic-Con International's Icon Award in 2017.[42]
In 2019, Severin was posthumously awarded the Inkwell Awards Stacey Aragon Special Recognition Award for her lifetime of inking artwork.[43] Severin was also inducted into the Harvey Awards Hall of Fame alongside her brother John, and fellow Mad contributors Will Elder, Jack Davis, and Ben Oda.[44]