Tom Kraft

19 March 20232 July 2023

See the museum at these upcoming Spring 2023 events

The Kirby Museum has the full schedule of comic cons and shows we plan to attend this year. Some booth setups will offer our full or partial line of merchandise sale – items in our gift shop plus more, while others are a small setup with our professional scanners to scan and archive pages to our Jack Kirby Digital Archive.

We hope many Kirby fans, collectors and Museum members will visit us at these events:

MoCCA Arts Festival
moccafest.org
Saturday and Sunday, April 1-2 – 11 am-7 pm Saturday; 11 am – 6 pm Sunday

Metropolitan Pavilion
125 W 18th St, New York, NY 10011
New York, NY

Our attendance
We will have our full line of merchandise and special show items for sale. Trustee Rand Hoppe will attend and manage the Kirby booth.

About the Show
he MoCCA Arts Fest is a 2-day multimedia event, Manhattan’s largest independent comics and cartoon festival. With over 500 exhibiting artists displaying their work, award-winning honorees speaking about their careers and artistic processes and other featured artists conducting workshops, lectures and film screenings, the Fest and our artists exemplify the limitless aesthetic and social power of comics and cartooning.

“Old School” Comic Show
oldschoolcomicshow.com
Saturday April 15th – 10 am-5 pm

Douglas N. Everett Arena
15 Loudon Rd
Concord, NH 03301

Our attendance
We will have our full line of merchandise and special show items for sale. Trustee Tom Kraft will attend and manage the Kirby booth next to Mike Royer. He will not scan art but can take requests to have collector’s Kirby art archived.

About the Show
This show has an arena full of a stupendous array of comics from dollar books to rare issues that you may only have this one chance to see in front of your eyes, plus dealers coming in from as far as California and Las Vegas with new, fresh stock!

Wicked Comic Con Boston
wickedcomiccon .com
Saturday and Sunday, April 22-23 – 10 am-6 pm both days

Hynes Convention Center
900 Boylston St, Boston, MA 02115

Our attendance
We will have our full line of merchandise and special show items for sale. Trustee Tom Kraft will attend and manage the Kirby booth. He will not scan art but can take requests to have collector’s Kirby art archived.

About the Show
The Boston Comic Con Founders present Wicked Comic Con! It’s all about comic books, comic book creators, comic book art, and cosplay!

Los Angeles Pure Comic Art Show
lacomicartshow.com .com
Sunday, June 4th – 10 am-4 pm

Hilton Garden Inn Los Angeles/Redondo Beach
2410 Marine Avenue
Redondo Beach, California 90278

Our attendance
We will have all our t-shirts for sale. Trustee Tom Kraft will attend and manage the Kirby booth. We will be scanning and archiving art for the Kirby Digital Archive at the table! If you are plan to attend the con and have Kirby art, please bring it to the con to have it archived.

About the Show
The LA Comic Art Show is dedicated to selling original comic art. The show includes Art dealers and collectors from around the country featuring thousands of pages of original comic art from the 40s to present – No comics, just art!

14 March 202213 August 2022

In Memoriam of Barry Ira Geller

Science Fiction Land and Lord of Light producer/co-designer, Barry Ira Geller passed away on February 22, 2022. Barry was a longtime supporter and advocate for the Kirby Museum. A regular on our live streaming interviews, Barry also organized Kirby-themed panel presentations and lectures at several west coast comic conventions and festivals. His excitement about future projects, passion for the work and legacy of Jack Kirby, and his vision of Lord of Light as a means of elevating consciousness will be missed.

Barry shows his 1978 appointment book indicating his first meetings with Jack Kirby during our live stream event, “3 Days for 103” with Kirby Museum Trustees on August 29, 2020.

Geller and Kirby

In 1978 Barry purchased the rights to Lord of Light, a sci-fi novel by Roger Zelazny about colonists from another planet who conquer Earth and become the legendary Hindu gods until they turn against each other for control of the world. Concepts of advanced technology, magic, enhanced consciousness, and spirituality resonated with Barry and formed the foundation of his ambitious projects to create and build a mega, Disney-sized science fiction theme park called Science Fiction Land® and a related movie, Lord of Light. Barry set out to recruit some of the top technical and creative minds to build and conceive his cutting edge Science Fiction Land.

Having grown up with 60s Marvel Comics, Jack Kirby was the first person Barry thought of for the ambitious project, and simply called him on the phone in 1978. Together they concepted and visualized 13 architectural drawings of key structures and points of view in the Science Fiction Land theme park. Kirby’s pencil drawings were inked and titled by long-time Kirby comic book inker, Mike Royer. According to Barry, Kirby was to be his “general” to execute visual conception and creation of the park. Later additions to Barry’s Science Fiction Land team included famed sci-fi makeup artist John Chambers, celebrated sociologist Maurice Stein, holography scientist Donald Broadbent, futurist and cultural critic Buckminster Fuller, legendary sci-fi author Ray Bradbury, Arcology architect Paolo Soleri, and others.

Science Fiction Land had a great start and was well on its way financially. The park was to be built in Aurora, Colorado. Big restaurant chains, tech companies, and retailers were interested and invested in the project. Unfortunately, the park was not to be. Illegal activity by both Barry’s business partner and the then Mayor of Aurora ended its chances. The movie, financially tied to the opening of Science Fiction Land, also fell apart even though Barry had completed a Lord of Light screenplay.

Barry holds a photo of his younger self. — Barry holds a photo of his younger self exiting prison where he was briefly held after the collapse of Science Fiction Land until legal procedures exonerated him.

Argo

In 1979, John Chambers, part of the original Science Fiction Land think tank, also worked for the CIA. Unbeknownst to Barry, Chambers presented the Lord of Light screenplay and Kirby’s architectural drawings to his boss, CIA technical operations officer Tony Mendez. Chambers and Mendez formulated a plan to use a desert-based sci-fi movie produced by their fictional production company Studio Six as the basis to secretly get six American diplomats out of Iran. This operation was portrayed in the 2012 movie Argo. Unlike the movie, Kirby never produced storyboards for Mendez’s operation; they used the existing Kirby-drawn architectural drawings meant for the defunct Science Fiction Land theme park. On January 27, 1980, the six diplomats made it through passport control at the Mehrabad Airport in Tehran, boarded a Swissair flight to Zürich, and escaped Iran.

Later Years

In the years that followed, Barry went into security software development, producing early encryption software needed in the growing computer technology industry. But Lord of Light was never far from his mind, to the point where in the early 2010s he was ready to restart old projects and create new ones. He frequented many comic conventions lecturing on the history of Lord of Light, his work with Jack Kirby and furthering his concepts with the original think tank of using futuristic technologies to change the consciousness of humanity.

In 2012 Barry started work with Jack Kirby Museum trustee Tom Kraft to digitally restore and enhance the Science Fiction Land drawings into giclée prints to bring more attention to Kirby and Royer’s work. Later, Barry licensed the drawings to Heavy Metal who colored and redesigned them into new versions for black-light posters.

Barry with Kirby Museum Trustee, Tom Kraft holding one of the newly restored Science Fiction Land prints 2013 Wondercon.

Barry continued new projects working with artist and colorist Anne Marie “Wally” Wharton who colored the 3D model of Kali, a character from the Lord of Light novel. The Kali figure was designed by Barry and sculpture Jacob Atienza. Wally worked on other projects such as coloring several of the Kirby Science Fiction Land drawings for use in future projects.

*Artist and colorist Anne Marie “Wally” Wharton with a model of Kali colored by her*.

Barry collaborated with artist Mike Royer to take the god figures from one of the drawings, Terminal of the Gods, and add Kirby-inspired squiggles overlayed on 3D models. Mike and Barry continued new projects working with artist and colorist Anne Marie “Wally” Wharton who colored the 3D model of Kali, a character from the Lord of Light novel. The Kali figure was designed by Barry and sculptor Jacob Atienza. Wally worked on other projects such as building a color palette used as a basis to color several of the Kirby Science Fiction Land drawings and for use in future projects.

Mike Royer with Barry at a panel discussion “Barry Geller & Mike Royer 2017 ComicCon SDCC” at the 2017 San Diego Comic-Con.

Comic artists/creators Mike Royer and Mike Thibodeaux with Barry doing a Kirby pose at the San Diego Comic-Con 2017.

There were other contributors and artists to Barry’s renewed focus on Lord of Light, such as sculptor Robert Maya, painter Mike Reagan, digital artist David Coons, videographer James Daugherty and digital designer and sculptor Jacob Atienza. Decades after Science Fiction Land first became his passion project, Barry was rebuilding his think tank.

Our sincere hope that this vision will continue after our loss.

12 November 2021

TIME UPDATE: 3:00 pm ET – Lord of Light with Barry Geller and Mike Royer

Today, Friday November 12th the Lord of Light event has moved from 6pm ET to 3pm ET. Please note the new time and join us this afternoon.

About the Event

3:00 pm – Lord of Light with Barry Geller and Mike Royer (free ticketed event)

click here to reserve your ticket

Producer and art director Barry Geller and inker/letterer extraordinaire Mike Royer join us for a livestreamed virtual event! Kirby’s Lord of Light works are some of his most inspired mythological visuals, and we’re thrilled to be able to talk about it with Barry and Mike.

21 May 201718 June 2018

100 Days of Jack Kirby begins now!

The Jack Kirby Museum and Research Center is proud to announce the 100 Days of Kirby in honor of Jack’s approaching 100th birthday on August 28. Our Kirby centenary efforts will consist of live events, talks, parties, and a few surprises along the way. We’ll be working with friends, members, and donors both in the United States and the international community to make Jack’s 100th birthday a global event.

As part of our Kirby 100 effort, we’re offering some exciting new donation rewards and membership options. Your donation will allow us to honor Jack Kirby the way he deserves, and help us to scale future efforts, both to celebrate Jack’s centenary and beyond. Your donations help support our ongoing efforts to scan, collect, and preserve Jack’s work for future generations. You’ll be able to see more of our scans and preservation efforts than ever before, as we open up our digital archives for viewing on social media over the next 100 days. Be sure to follow us on Twitter and Instagram, like us on Facebook, and keep an eye on the front page of kirbymuseum.org for daily journeys into the life and work of one of the greatest artists of any medium the 20th Century produced.

To thank you for your support, we’re offering…

$1 = A set of Kirby 100 stickers

$5 = A set of Kirby 100 stickers and a set of Psychedelic Flyer postcards

$10 = A set of Kirby 100 stickers a set of Psychedelic Flyer postcards, and one mini-comic (choose Street Code or Private Kirby)

$25 = A set of Kirby 100 stickers, a set of Psychedelic Flyer postcards, and both mini-comics.

MEMBERSHIP LEVELS
As a member of the Jack Kirby Museum, you’ll receive a 10% discount on all items in the Museum store and preferred access to upcoming Kirby Museum events for the duration of your membership. (and if you are a current member, be on the lookout for a package of goodies from the Museum Shop.)

$50 = At the $50 membership level, you’ll receive all of the items in the $25 donation package, and you can choose from one of the following prints or posters (while supplies last):

Erik Larsen’s Savage Kirby Dragon (12″ x 18″), Lord of Light: The Streets of Heaven and Comics Combatives Foxhole Event Poster (11″ x 17″)

$100 = At the $100 membership level, you’ll get everything in the $50 level plus choose one of the following t-shirts.

Kirby T-Shirts

Top: V-neck T-shirt (Ladies Sizes only), King Miracle T-Shirt (Men and Ladies Sizes), and Galactic Black T-shirt (Men and Ladies Sizes) – Bottom: Electrocute T-shirt (Men Sizes only) and Dark Psychedelic Flier long sleeve T-shirt (Men Sizes only)

$150 = At the $150 membership level, you’ll everything in the $100 level, plus choose one of the following vintage posters (while supplies last). Please note that these vintage posters are not in mint condition. Expect imperfections.

Kirby Vintage Prints

Top: Captain America (23″ x 29″), 1941 Captain America (14″ x 23″) and Kirby Marvel (14″ x 23″) – Bottom: Incan Visitation (24″ x 18″) and Galactic Head (18″ x 20″)

$200 = Your $200 membership gets you all of the merchandise outlined above, plus as a limited-edition, signed-and-numbered prints of Tom Morehouse’s “The Power-Packed Marvel Art of Jack Kirby” collage (while supplies last).

“The Power-Packed Marvel Art of Jack Kirby” Collage (24″ x 39″)

$500 = Your $500 membership gets you all of the merchandise outlined above, plus a full set of limited edition Tribes Trilogy prints.

TribesTrilogy

Tribes Trilogy: Kabuto, Lizard and Woman (18″ x 24″)

$750 = Your $750 membership includes all of the above, plus a full set of Kirby Museum t-shirts (order may be slightly delayed because of sizing supply).

$1,000 = Your $1,000 membership includes everything outlined above, including every vintage poster. So this includes:

All three posters
All five t-shirts
“The Power-Packed Marvel Art of Jack Kirby” Collage
All three Tribes Trilogy limited Prints

Additional naming and sponsorship opportunities will be offered as some of our events and exhibits crystallize. We still have opportunities to host and sponsor events, so please contact kirby100@kirbymuseum.org.