RIP Alex Toth 1928 -2006

Scott Ruggels

I just learned today that Alex Toth had passed away. I never wrote to the man, but I would refer to book collections of his work fairly often. He was active in comics, movies and television animation, and my exposure to that late 60's Adventure animation was probably the biggest influence in my art, even to this day. Richard Bartrop noticed it, in the way I economize on linework, and keep designs simple and clear. Alex Toth's lasting contributions have been in the designs he did for the adventure cartoons that were done by Hanna Barbera in the late 60's, I would watch those, and because of those, my preference for animation has been for "adventure" rather than "funny" in cartoons. He started,assisting Doug Wildey on "Johnny Quest", and because of his fast pencil, he also did work through the years with an on again, off again relationsship with Bill (Hanna), and Joe (Barbera). He married the studio's receptionist. His contributionf for all ofthe Hanna barbera adventure shows were numerous, because often it was Bill, Joe, and Alex in a conference room, hashing out ideas, where upon Alex would go hom and over the weekend produce all the art and character designs for the pitch packet, and have it ready for the HB Salesman to board the Jet to New York to sellthe cartoon to the networks. However he eventually had a falling out with them as the studio was producing work for all three networls and the quality plumetted, and the Evil A.C.T boycott threats ended the golden era of TV Adventure cartoons. he came back later to do "Superfriends" in the 70's, but when his Wife died, his output declined sharply for a few years. Eventually he returned to doing comics occasionally and designwork for animation, such as "The Bionic Six".

He died at his drawing table.

http://www.auadpublishing.com/Toth.htm
http://www.tothfans.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1028
http://www.twomorrows.com/comicbookartist/articles/11toth.html
Some of his Art:
http://www.collectingfool.com/published/toth-adventure496p05.jpg
http://www.oklahoma.net/~silvrdal/question.gif
http://www.comicartville.com/tothstoryboard1.jpg
http://www.comicartville.com/tothsamsonmodel.gif
http://www.animationmeat.com/modelsheets/herculoids/files/page25-1010-full.jpg
http://www.animationmeat.com/modelsheets/herculoids/files/page25-1006-full.jpg
http://www.collectingfool.com/published/toth-sealabmodelsheet.jpg
http://www.collectingfool.com/published/toth-sealabcarrier.jpg
http://www.collectingfool.com/published/toth-sealabboatmodelsheet.jpg

I owe a lot tohis work, and my Respects to his family.

Scott

blankslatejoe

oh no! Toth was incredible! This is sad news indeed...

Joshua Stubbles

Sad to see a good artist go, but I never heard of him before.

CheapAlert

Shit

sad news indeed

oXYnary

Its sad, but what a cool way to die. What commitment. Instead of retiring to the beach and fading away he literally kept doing artwork right up to the end.

Thats the way to go.

ebagg

[ QUOTE ]
Its sad, but what a cool way to die. What commitment. Instead of retiring to the beach and fading away he literally kept doing artwork right up to the end.

Thats the way to go.

[/ QUOTE ]

Very True. The art community has definitely been delt a blow losing this great artist.

Snowfly

Bionic 6 was one of my favorite shows. All said, that's a nice way to go, doing what you do best.

harhar.. just read oxy's reply. i'm an echo!