Dan Dare art offered for sale by 2000AD’s Chris Weston

By John Freeman on December 22, 2023

Comic artist and illustrator Chris Weston has a fantastic Dan Dare artwork up for sale, painted in classic Frank Hampson-style.

Painted in gouache on thick watercolour board, the item measures 42.3 x 29 cm, roughly A3 in size.

If you like this painting, you can bid on the original art over here on eBay

Regular downthetubes readers will recall Chris previously provided variant covers for Titan Comics Dan Dare limited series.

Chris Weston has been a professional comic strip artist since 1988. After studying for a year with Don Lawrence (artist of “Storm” and “The Trigan Empire”), he secured his first paid job for 2000AD drawing Judge Dredd, a character he regularly returned to right up to the present day. His many credits also include The Invisibles, Starman, Lucifer, The Authority and Time Breakers.

He also co-produced two critically acclaimed creator-owned series: The Filth and Ministry of Space. The former was a mind-bending paranoid thriller written by Grant Morrison; the latter a limited series written by Warren Ellis which saw Britain winning the Space Race. Chris then drew his first series for Marvel, Fantastic Four: First Family, followed by The Twelve, a twelve-issue limited series written by J. Michael Straczynski.

In 2008, Chris began to produce concept art and storyboards for films. Amongst a variety of movie productions, he worked on The Book of Eli and an unmade live action adaptation of Akira, both for director Albert Hughes. More recently, he worked as a costume designer on Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

Chris now juggles his time between drawing Judge Dredd, film work and a growing line of silkscreen print commissions.

• Check out more of Chris Weston’s work at chriswestonart.com

John Freeman

The founder of downthetubes, which he established in 1998. John works as a comics and magazine editor, writer, and on promotional work for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He is currently editor of Star Trek Explorer, published by Titan – his third tour of duty on the title originally titled Star Trek Magazine.

Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine, Babylon 5 Magazine, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics. He has also edited several comic collections, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”.

He’s the writer of “Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies” for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs” with Dave Hailwood.