Carlos Meglia, 1957-2008



The talented Argentinian illustrator Carlos Meglia passed away early Friday from aortic complications that put him in the hospital on the 12th and were perhaps related to ongoing heart problems including a previous surgery. He was 50 years old.

Meglia was born in 1957 in Quilmes, about 10 miles outside of Buenos Aires. He entered into the school of Fine Arts because of a proclivity for drawing. He began work at an early age as well, assisting the artist Oswal beginning in 1974. In 1976 his own byline was established on illustrations for the magazine El Pendulo and some book cover work. He pursued book illustration work in the remainder of that decade, expanding to magazine illustration in the '80s from a variety of platforms. According to an interview he gave in 1994, he also taught at the school where he himself was trained.

His comics work began in 1983 when he contributed a few short stories to an already existing client, the publisher Record. He moved into animation in the middle part of that decade, working on properties such as The Smurfs, Super-Friends, The Jetsons and Scooby Doo.

In 1987 he teamed with Carlos Trillo on the series Irish Coffee. The pair launched the wild fantasy series Cybersix four years later; that series may have been Meglia's best-known and most highly-regarded work. In that 1994 interview he described his relationship with Trillo as a special one. The interview also suggests that Meglia may have been producing somewhere between 100 and 250 pages per month with a team of eight on Cybersix, which would be astonishing. By the mid-'90s, that work found purchase in the European market.

Also in the 1990s, Meglia moved to Spain and began to work for the North American comics market, primarily for Dark Horse and DC. He worked on the Star Wars, Elektra, Spyboy and Superman franchises, and worked on the DC/Dark Horse crossover Superman/Tarzan: Sons of the Jungle. He received an award described as the Caran D'Ache in 1995 in Rome. He was an influence on several illustrators working in a comics style reminiscent of animation, including Humberto Ramos, who remembers his friend in this blog posting.

In recent years his work had been published through Soleil, including the series Canari with collaborator Crisse. His last published work was a first issue of Red Song with Trillo. Upon his passing, friends and collaborators mentioned his lively personality and sense of humor, the palpable life force they were astonished to discover had been extinguished. Testimonials have flooded the the blog kept in his name. It is believed he is survived by a wife and at least one child, a son.

please note: a few sources, including Ramos, have Meglia passing away on August 14 rather than August 15


 
posted 8:20 am PST | Permalink
 

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