The Story Behind Our Campaign
 

Welcome to our third P. Craig Russell original art restoration campaign! We have previously run successful campaigns to restore and preserve the original art for Ariane and Bluebeard and The Dreaming City. We hope that our previous backers will continue to support this ongoing restoration of Craig's beautiful work and that we will also reach new supporters with this campaign.

"While the Gods Laugh" is a graphic adaptation of the Elric story and it was created by Roy Thomas and P. Craig Russell. It originally appeared in Epic Illustrated #14, released by Marvel on October 1, 1982.

P. Craig Russell hand-colored his original art. These original art pages are not lettered (the lettering was done on separate sheets of paper) so they are clutter-free and glorious to look at. The pages have been kept in a climate-controlled environment at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum in Columbus, Ohio and they are in great shape. The colors are beautifully vivid—even more so than in previously printed versions.

Comparison of the first printed version with the same panel from the original art. The restored version will be much truer to the original.
 

We are attempting to restore this great work by making high-resolution scans of the original unlettered, hand-colored art. For posterity's sake, we also need to scan each and every corresponding page of lettering so that it can be combined with the color art for any future presentations of this material.

A few of the pages were not stored at the Cartoon Library and Museum and the colors have faded and shifted considerable. These pages will have to be gone over by P. Craig Russell and recolored by hand so that they are closer to their original beauty.On top of the scanning and restoration, we also have to cover the cost of multiple all-day road trips down to Columbus, Ohio to retrieve and return the original art elements. These, along with many other expenses, ultimately add up to an unfortunately sizable amount.

This campaign will allow us to cover all of the costs of this expensive restoration and will also enable us to provide our valued pledge partners with a number of unique perks to thank them for making it all possible.

Finally, a successful campaign will enable us to provide the restored files to Titan Comics for use in an upcoming new hardcover edition . . . so this amazing masterwork of comic art can be enjoyed by a whole new generation!