One Lost Story After Another.
By Dylan Williams with Andrea GibertiWriting about North American comic artists of the 1950s can seem like it would be formulaic. There is a standard of a sort: the dream of being an artist, becoming a comic artist, having some hobbies and then quitting to make more money or keep on struggling.
Admittedly, that is a simplification, but most of the time that is what it comes down to. Then, there are the ones who never fit into the mold. Like Ben Oda, the Japanese-American letterer who had his whole family keeping mainstream comic books lettered throughout the majority of its history. Or Fred Guardineer and Stan Kaye who quit comics to get jobs in the Postal Service and "manufacturing" respectively.
And then there is Bruno Premiani. An Italian Anti-fascist with a passion for history, who made his way across the world to Argentina and the United states where he worked on government produced pamphlets in the 50s as well as co-creating one of the most enduringly surreal comic books I’ve ever seen.
In Premaini’s case, writing about the artist becomes a giant paper chase, dependant on the efforts of those who came before, chief among them is Andrea Gilberti, an Italian lawyer. Getting to know about Premiani’s life one piece of paper at a time and through people he worked with in the US is the only way I have been able to find most of what is presented here. Andrea has managed to interview a number of Premiani’s friends and, most importantly, Premiani’s younger brother. Premiani’s life was long a mystery to admirers in the US, who saw his subtle draftsmanship as a welcome relief to the bombastic superhero drawings that have come to represent comic books. His drawing is refined. It is surreal. The kind of surrealism that only occurs when the drawings are so damn sharp. But, like I’ve learned we didn’t know the half of it, Premiani spent a life doing tireless drawing, not surrealism, that was just a happy byproduct that popped up during a five year period while he was doing comics in the US. And in the end so much of what is in print about Premiani is confused like that. Andrea and I can only present what we have found.
The confusion seems to begin at the beginning, with his birth date. Most sources in the United States list Bruno Premiani’s birth year as 1924. He may have born 13 years earlier than that, in 1911 in Trieste, in what would become Italy, at least according to an Argentine article done after and interview with the artist. And then there are the Italian police records, which sight his birthday as January 4, 1907. The police records would seem to be the most correct. These are records from the same government that made Italy’s train run on time, after all. And they are confirmed by a passport Premiani himself applied for in 1929.
Giordano Bruno Premiani was born to Francesco Premiani and Antonia Sambo. His father was a 36 year old Imperial Railway employee at the time of Premiani’s birth and a Slovenian. His mother was a 23 year old, Italian. Francesco’s birth name was Premrou but changed it to seem Italian. Trieste, at the time of Premiani’s birth, was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Francesco Premaini was also an anarchist/socialist. In honor of an Italian monk burnt at the stake by the 15th Century Inquisition. Francesco didn’t want Premiani baptized, but Antonia managed to do so without his knowledge.
The years from 1905 to 1915 were good to the Premaini family. In 1909, two years after Bruno’s birth, Premiani’s only brother Egidio was born. Francesco has a steady job with the railway. He would bring home long sheets of paper that young Bruno would draw on. During the First World War, Trieste was practically on the front. In 1918, the region was given to Italy after the dissolution of the Empire. In the new Italian Trieste, Slavs were persecuted and this may have had something to do with the use of the Premiani name, Italians were second in social status only to Germans. The people of the once rich city soon learned poverty and misery under the new government. On August 4th, 1919 the 12 year old Premiani was brought to a Socialist rally by his father. After a dinner on the green and fun day, some people began to riot and 400 of them were arrested by the Italian Police. Francesco was one of the arrested, it is assumed that his family weren’t. After his release Francesco was on the black list. In 1920 Slavic schools , stores and public houses were set fire by enraged Italians. Mussolini’s March on Rome took place two years later, in 1922 and Fascism in Italy began.
Francesco Premaini lost his railway job and took a lesser job at a drug store. From 1921 to 1925 Bruno Premiani went to school at the "Scuola di Arte e Mestieri di Trieste", the high school of arts and crafts. Premiani studied drawing during his childhood, at the Industrial Institute of Trieste. Premiani was a good student. The family couldn’t afford to send both brothers to school so Egido began working at a bread factory at the age of 14. The whole family was really proud of the first son but money was short. In 1925 Premiani was expected to go to Venice to finish his studies at the Academy of Arts. His family couldn’t afford to send him.
In the Summer of 1925, a teacher from the Industrial Institute and painter named Carlo Wostry took Premiani under his wing. He was asked to help paint the San Vincenzo del Paoli Church in Trieste. Wostry was most influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites. Wostry did the figure work and Premiani, the backgrounds. The mural was a representation of the Life of Christ. The church could only afford one painting, though they had originally commissioned 20. Andrea Giberti describes the painting as "An allegorical representation of the faith of a young girl with two ancillary female figures ("penitence" and "chastity"). In the painting the three girls are encircled by white pigeons: all the pegions were done by the young Bruno." When the painting was done Wostry left for New York city.
The suddenly unemployed Premiani found work painting walls. But his skills hadn’t gone unnoticed and he was hired to work at a local publicity shop. His brother Egidio, remembered seeing Bruno at the top of a wall, at the mercy of the wind, painting a public advisory notice.

On November 12th, 1929 Premiani received a passport from the Royal Italian Police Headquarters. Premiani was at odds with the Fascism that had taken over Italy.
In January, 1930 he sailed from Italy to Argentina. At first, Premaini was put up in the new country by an uncle. Though his brother in an interview done by Andrea Giberti, Premiani’s brother says it was an Aunt on his mother’s side that Premiani first lived with. Most likely an Aunt and Uncle. Soon after arriving in the country he obtained Argentine citizenship.
He began drawing for a "publicity shop", Agencia Wisner. His work began appearing in the daily newspaper "Crítica" in September of 1930. Giberti describes Premiani’s hiring at Crítica, "One day in Buenos Aires he observed a guerilla action and, at home, drew images of the fight. A friend gave those images to Mr. Helvio I. Botana, owner of Crítica. Premiani seems to have enjoyed working with Botana (elsewhere described as the paper’s editor). The daily paper would be where his first comic work appeared. The comic was a "Believe it or Not" style one panel called "Seen and Heard" which ran from 1932 to 1940. Premiani helped with the research for the strips historical stories, and may have been the one to come up with the initial concept after reading about a sailor in the Espasa-Calpe Encyclopedia. It seems he may have written the strip but that is unclear. Years later in an interview done in the 1970s Premiani would say, "Unfortunately, today the comic strip is not used for educational purposes." This theme ran throughout his life’s work in published art. He worked on a number of comic strips for "Crítica" but seems to have never done any color work for the publication, preferring to work in black and white. Giberti describes this as "…a great period in his life. He traveled across Latin America, drawing, mailing in his works to the paper. He came to be known as ‘El poeta del lapi.’ The pencil poet.
The Italian government kept meticulous records on all of its citizens at home and abroad. Premiani’s anti-fascist activities continued and the Italian Royal Embassy sent back reports on him between 1933 and 1938. There may have been more but that is all that were in Premiani’s police files. "A speech was given by the committee’s president, Premiani Bruno.." says the June 30th report from the Italian Ambassador about the formation of a "Committee in favor of the unemployed Italian political refugees." This is obviously the fascist governments take on the organization. It continues "A postcard illustrated by Premiani was on sale, and flyers were handed out with the anti-fascist hymm "Free Italy" written by the notorious Edgardo Borel." A photo of Premiani was included and perhaps the funniest part of these sad reports is the passage that describes the ambassador’s fear of Premiani’s family seeing the photo.
"In case your Royal Ministry should pursue the usual inquiries in regard to Premiani, through the Royal Police in Trieste, I pray [you] to please make sure that the ensuing investigation will be pursued with the utmost discretion; especially if extended to Premiani’s family, whom it would be best not to exhibit for identification the photo I have enclosed.
"Said document was received in entirely confidential and reserved manner from the local Police [in Buenos Aires], whose valuable support is used daily by the fiduciary information service of this Office: any indiscretion, which Premiani would certainly be informed of by his relatives, would give fuel to the notorious journal "Crítica" to unleash a fierce sensationalist campaign against this Royal Embassy and the local Police."
The November 15th, 1933 report from the Italian Embassy describes Crítica as an "anti-fascist daily" and Premiani as a "caricaturist" responsible for "..all those drawings and cartoons offensive to Fascism and its Hierarchy, which in these latest months have been fanning the defamatory campaign systematically pursued by the libelous paper against the National Government." In a summary report from the Police Prefect of Trieste to the Minister of the Interior dated January, 18th 1934 on Premiani we find that he is "to be arrested" comes into Italy again. The note is accompanied by his passport photo and a physical description as well as the note that he has "been marked for inscription in the boarder logs and in the Investigative Bulletin." He is included in the "Subversives Suppliment" of the Investigative Bulletin sent out to Italian police departments.
In November of 1934 Bruno Premiani is listed as an Architect in the membership list of the New Dante Society.

Need source for Argentine and Italian History from this period.
During the 1940s Premiani’s career as a working illustrator blossomed. He did work for a number of large clients including the "Italo-Argentinean Electric Company" and Ginebra Bols. It is unclear, years later, what this work would have been. "Altántida Editrial" hired him to do a series of illustrations for "Billiken", Argentina’s first magazine aimed at children, which seems to have been of a more personal nature for the artist. "Editorial Sopena" hired Premiani to draw illustrations for "Leoplán" magazine which published work by other well know artists such as Roberto Bernabó and his brother who signed his work Caribé. The magazine’s editor, a Mr. Oliva, ran Premiani’s illustrations in ink or watercolor under the pseudonym "P.Monte". It seems this work was the adaptation of classic novels both of the world including "The 500 Hundred Million of the Belgium" by Jules Verne, "the Cossacks" and "the Sebastopol Sketches" by Leo Tolstoy, "Genio y Figura" ("Genius and Figure") by Juan Valera, "Las Desencantadas" ("the Disinchanted") by Pierre Loti, and "A Sangre y Fuego" ("Blood and Fire") by Enrique Sienkiewicz.
In 1943 the Argentine constitutional government was overthrown by Peron
Premiani’s most lasting and well know Argentine publication began in 1947. He suggested the idea of a series of great literature adapted to comics to Dante Quinterno, editor of "Patoruzito" a weekly publication during the ‘40s golden age of Argentine comics. "Patoruzito Classics", as the series was dubbed, began in issue number 110, dated November 13, 1947 with "Coriolanus" by William Shakespere. He would continue with work by Moliére, Victor Hugo, Jack London, Alexandre Dumas and so on. Leonardo Wadel would adapt the stories and Premiani would illustrate them. By the 1950s the adaptations were drawn out over several months. Until the 1951 it was a two page a week deal but beginning in March 1951 it became one page a week. Until 1955 the strip ran as text under pictures but then after a few month of a hiatus word balloons were introduced.
The last Patoruzito Classics would run in July of 1960. In the later years it had gone from adaptations of the classics to the stories of national heroes. by then the feature had become a straight comic strip and Premiani’s style had changed from an earlier chiaroscuro approach to a more clean line style. From what I’ve seen of the change the later approach would seem to fit more with Preamiani’s theories on education through the comic strip. His later style sacrifices technique for clarity. But it may also have been a byproduct of working more in color. The earlier style is more popular amongst some Argentine fans such as Esteban Laruccia in an amazing article for Crash #3 in April 1980, "In any case, we prefer the vigorous drawings from the first period and the type of expression that was able to move us."
As early as 1949 Premiani’s work seems to have been appearing in four color comics published in the United States. He lived in the US from 1948 and 1952. Arnold Drake, a later Premiani collaborator said, "Bruno spoke at least 3 languages, probably 5. According to his brother, Beatriz was Hungarian and they communicated in French. So he had all the Romance languages ( including Portugese, I assume)." His work continued to run in Patoruzito while living a continent away. HOW DID HE GET IN CONTACT WITH US MARKET AND DO COMICS? The first company he worked for in the US would be the one he was associate most with throughout his career drawing North American comics, National/DC comics. He began on the historical adventure character Tomahawk, a rugged Daniel Boone type of frontiersman, written by Ed Herron. Premiani’s touch, as always, brought a sense of class and historical accuracy to the character though sharing the character with Fred Ray, history buff artist without par, meant he would be in good company. For some reason the prudent editors Jack Schiff or Murray Boltinoff saw a need to put the best historical comic artists working on that book. Premiani would also end up producing episodes of Pow-Wow Smith Indian Detective for Detective Comics in 1950-51, a strip begun by Carmine Infantino and continued by Leonard Starr before Premiani.
Crestwood, the Joe Simon/Jack Kirby run studio, then brought Premiani on board. There he left an impression on a young Marvin Stein, "Bruno was a nice guy. I didn’t know him very well, but whenever he came to Crestwood we would chat about the comic book field. He loved the medium but couldn’t afford to stay in it. [He] couldn’t make the big bucks." Premiani was a generation ahead of most of the artists working at the studio," Bruno would do occasional work for Crestwood. Fantastic artist (realistic). Taught me how to rule straight lines with a brush. It certainly made the work go a lot faster! Bruno was an Argentine professor. I guess he taught art in some college down there.
One of the strangest asides about Premiani’s work in North America is his work for the State Department. He was hired to draw a series of short biographies of US historical figures George Washington, Walt Whitman, Andrew Carnegie and George W. Carver. These were sent to South America and even made it into French editions. I have only seen the Fench edition, which also has the art of Bill Draut (a Crestwood coworker) seemingly inked by Premiani. The interior art is all in detailed black and white. Again it is unclear how a politically active immigrant would have been engaged to draw propaganda for the American government in the repressive political environment of the 1950s. These pieces may have been collected in a book called "A Picture Story of the United States" but the version I have, in French, is called Eight Great Americans, distributed by the American Information Services with no date.

Bruno Premiani had met his wife Beatriz in Brazil during the 1930s, where he had done some work for the ‘Editorial Brasil América. They were married in Rio de Janeiro but moved back to Buenos Aires. Beatriz is described as of Hungarian descent. Together they’d create a well know Spanish language book on horses called simply: El Caballo (the Horse). They worked on the book for years, creating 160 giant pages of thorough reference on every aspect of the animal. Sadly, the book was published in 1957 after four years after Beatriz had died. Bruno had worked on it solidly until its publication. According to a friend of his…it was his tribute to his wife. It is unclear how much of the book’s was created by either of them but the hundreds of detailed drawings are unmistakably his work, mixed with some photos. From history to anatomy to costumes, the book’s reprinting as late as 1978 would attest to its importance. It seems that it only exists in Spanish. It is unclear when in 1953 or where Beatriz died but Premiani left the United states in 1952 one year before her death. I am at a loss to even tell if she had come to the US with him. The introduction to The Horse, by Helvio I. Botana, ends with, "Bruno and Beatriz Premiani began it as an homage to beauty and an homage to liberty, that liberty which is located far from the limitless prisons that are the cities where we are condemned to live." They had no children and Premiani never remarried.
Premiani only returned to Italy once in his life after his 1930 departure. In the early 1950s he returned to bury his mother. This would be the last time Egidio would see his globetrotting older brother. He left his brother with some drawings for a "Life of Christ" that Pemaini was working on, Egidio describes it as "A beautiful story." It is unclear if this work was ever printed, or if he was drawing it for himself. Preminai himself seems to have been an atheist. Premiani did stay in contact with his brother over the years.
Esteban Laruccia in his 1981 article for Crash, based on an interview with the artist, that Premiani returned to live in the United States again in 1960. The Crash article can be seen as more factually substantial, in that it was based on an interview done with Preminai. Arnold Drake says, "He was fiercely anti-fascist and left Argentina largely because of Peron. It may have been a career move as well. The USA invented comics and was the center of that art form." During this period he would make a lasting impact on the comics of the foreign country. But again, he would work for the government, producing a booklet about inflation called "What’s happening to your money?" done for the U.S. Treasury Department. Larucca’s article also says the artist worked on illustrations that were used in classroom educational films.
Argentine politics
Premiani first work in comics, after the return to the US, would be a few pieces for Classics Illustrated (Published by Gilberton World-Wide publishing). They again raise questions as the first one I’ve found has a publication date of December 1959. This would indacte that the 1960 date of return is wrong or that Premiani was working by post with US Publishers. He would do chapters for various issues of World Around Us, a theme series, including The Crusades (12/59), Festivals (1/60), Scientists (2/60), Communications (4/60), Whaling (12/60) and Vikings (1/61). He also contributed chapters to the Classics Illustrated Special issues on the Atomic Age (6/60) and the United Nations (No Date). All of his chapters in these titles demonstrate a masterful understanding of the subject matter that indicates an unusual amount of research. His work on these series can only be compared to the level of ability and research that went into a page of Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant. Premiani only drew one issue of the actual Classics Illustrated, book #156, The Conquest of Mexico by Bernal Diaz Del Castillo (May 1960). But, this one book is a shining jewel of a comic. It is, like most of Premiani’s historical work, meticulous in its detail. It also has an unusual painted cover by Premiani, the only one I’ve found done for the U.S. market. The book is a work of refined craftsmanship on every level. I would have thought, of course, that the book it was based on, a Mexican history as seen from the point of view of a Spanish Conquistador would have scored low on the historian’s chart. And yet a little more research indicates that Diaz’s book is actually considered of some historical importance in that it is a key first hand experience of the invasion of Mexico. It brings to light the point that not all the native middle Americans were on the side of the Aztecs.
At first look, Premiani may have also worked as an inker for a number of comic artists including Jack Kirby, Stan Drake and Curt Swan among others. This may have been his first work before the Classics but the exact date of the production of the art can only be guessed at. His work on the Jack Kirby Challengers of the Unknown is commonly accepted as that published in Showcase #11 and maybe 12. But, it seems to me that much of the inking attributed to Preminiani is not his. First and foremost is a Supeboy story from Adventure Comics #208, "The Rip Van Winkle of Smallville". It is drawn by Curt Swan and was published in January, 1955 while Premiani was living in Argentina. That isn’t to say that he couldn’t have done work for DC comics while living a continent away in the days prior to Fedex. He may have even returned to the US for a short trip or had the work done prior to his departure. "Rip Van Winkle…" is interesting in that it is most commonly sighted as an example of Premiani’s inking. It is quite possibly his work but I’ve found no solid evidence to indicate that it would have been by him. The inking style itself seems uncharacteristically heavy and like a wood cut. Premiani did work in a heavier style at points but this doesn’t resemble that style. The Jerry Bails Who’s Who of Comics, does list Premiani as having worked on Superboy in 1955 and the Superman fan site (www.supermanartists.comics.org ) lists the "Rip Van Winkle…" story as their example of Premiani’s inking. I don’t have a large collection of Superboy work to compare but I have found work that looks more like the inking on "Rip Van Winkle…" which in various places is credited to Creig Flessel, John Sikela, George Papp or (most convincingly) Ed Dabrotka. I am not familiar with their work enough to make any calls. The real story of that inking mixup may never really be known but it might be as simple a confusion credits in the May 1972 issue of Superboy that reprints both "Rip Van Winkle…" and the clearly (and credited )Premiani work from the Teen Titans.
The question of his inking is only of minor importance but it becomes more historically relevant when it involves the work of Jack Kirby. Premiani’s inking is listed on Showcase #11 (November/December,1957)at the Grand Comics Database (www.comics.org) and in DC’s Essential Showcase book as well as other source.. His inking, like his art, brings a touch of refinement to the pencils of Jack Kirby it would seem. He seems to redesign their work simply by sharpening the focus and concentrating the detail, at least I thought all that at first. Then I looked a little closer. The inking on the two Showcases in question (The 1997 Comic Book Index credits him with #12’s inking) is credited to Marvin Stein by Darkmark’s DC index (http://darkmark6.tripod.com/indexintro.html). I’d agree with that based on Stein’s inking of all of the first two and having looked at Stein’s inking of other Challengers of the Unknown stories. George Klein is credited with inking #12 by the Grand Comics Database. Premiani was still not living in the U.S. at this point and his only other work from this time period runs two years later in the Crusades issue of World Around Us. Again, this only becomes an issue in light of the soon to be published Challengers of the Unknown DC Archive book (to be published before this article) which lists Premiani in the credits. Marvin Stein learned a lot from him, obviously. Premiani has also been credited with work on the Tomahawk series two years after having left the US, work that is clearly not his, but that of Fred Ray with other inkers. I haven’t seen them all so there may be reprints or post departure publication of his work on the series from earlier. In the end inking is hard to validate who did what in a comic from 50 years ago. It is a more esoteric pursuit and I only include it here because it may be of importance to people writing about the work of Marvin Stein or others.
I have found examples of what I would say are Premiani’s inking on others work but all of this work falls within the timeline of his two stays in the U.S. and were mostly done for Crestwood where artwork would get passed around the studio. An example of a likely Premiani inking job at DC comics is the story "the Magician Who Haunted Hollywood" published in the January, 1953 issue of House of Secrets over the work of Leonard Starr, though even that is stretch.
Premiani’s most familiar work in the US was the Doom Patrol. While this work played a small role in the complete international life’s work of Premiani, in the US and England the Doom Patrol’s impact would continue to affect comic artists 40 years after its creation, most notably the likes of Brian Bolland, Grant Morrison and Mike Allred.
The Doom Patrol was obviously based on the Fantastic Four who’s influential comics debut had taken place a year and half earlier but it also bore a striking resemblance to Marvel’s X-men. The X-men debuted three months after the Doom Patrol. All that which came first junk is only of interest in that it illustrates the environment Premiani was working in. It must be taken into consideration when reading the work years later. The Doom Patrol is an important book in comics history, as it is an acknowledgment by the powers that be at DC Comics that Stan Lee’s new Marvel company was having an affect on the readers. It plays a far more important role than the "entertaining and goofy relic of the space age" label given it by Jeet Heer in the Comics Journal #248. A latter day critic, Heer obviously didn’t do much research before writing a review of a comic done for an audience of kids where everyone dies at the end. Heer is a fan of Premiani’s "sparkling art" but he attributes Premiani’s training to his time spent in Argentina, which may be more the fault of the DC Archive’s collection of the Doom Patrol than Heer’s. I would argue that the success of the series is due in equal parts to the surreal and silly writing of Arnold Drake (who also created Deadman, an equally silly and inspired concept) and Bruno Premiani’s artwork. The key thing for me though, is that in spite of a general dislike of the writing Heer recognizes the importance of the "Premiani’s skillful and engaging drawing".
He drew in a style almost unknown in the US comics of the day, work produced by a man who really didn’t fit in amongst his American comic book peers. For one thing the artist always dressed well. He did fit in with Arnold Drake. Both Drake, a veteran of the Spanish Civil War, and Premiani shared the anti-fascist mindset. Arnold Drake recognized Premiani’s skill "Bruno was technically so good that he overcame the problem of the translation. There really was a kind of Italian accent to his pen. It irked Boltinoff. But he too recognized Bruno’s consummate draftsmanship." Premiani worked from English language scripts and spoke English as well. The translation Drake speaks of has to do with his view of Premiani’s work "There was a kind of European flavor that he got into it, and I was trying to make it as American as I could." Together they created the most surreal comic book in comics history to date.
Years later, in an issue of Alter Ego, Arnold Drake described Premiani, "He was tall and lean. Almost skeletal. A long curved nose looked down at his graying moustache. His eyes were already beginning to desert him and he used various magnifying devices with which to work. I’m sure he must have ended up blind, or close to it. I’m also sure that he never stopped drawing. How does a nearly-blind man draw? By being a rational ascetic: disciplined down to the last wrinkle in his DNA. And by knowing what Bruno had learned early on: that work is life."
An interesting note in the letter column for the September 1967 issue of the Doom Patrol mentions "Artist Bruno Premiani winging down to South America on his annual pilgrimage to pay his respects to family and friends."
Premiani drew every nearly every episode of the Doom Patrol from their first appearance in My Greatest Adventure #80 (June 1963) to Doom Patrol # 121 (September-October 1968). My Greatest Adventure changed its name to the Doom Patrol with issue #86 but continued the issue numbering. Premiani only drew a handful of covers for the book, most were done by Bob Brown who also drew a couple fill in stories in 1965. And yeah, the comic would become renowned for its abrupt end, with the death of the superhero team, as voted for by the books readers. Perhaps the most historically interesting part of the last issue is that Premiani was asked to redraw Arnold Drake as Murray Boltinoff in the first and last pages of the comic. According to Drake, Irwin Donenfeld, co-publisher of DC at the time, "ordered" Premiani to change the heads of the drawings representing the writer of the book. Drakes take on the problem ran in Alter Ego #17, "I wasn’t there, but I can tell you the dialogue: they said, ‘We need it right now.’ He’d have said, ‘I must redraw the whole thing.’ ‘No, put Murray’s head on that body.’ Bruno would have said [Drake talks with a heavy accent], ‘I weel do it, but it will be very poor.’ That’s what Bruno always said. Bruno was an ethical man about his work. But he was also practical, so if you pushed his ethics to the wall, he would say, ‘I weel do it, but it weel be very poor.’" As Marc Svensson, the Alter Ego interviewer points out, "I always thought that this was pretty interesting, because there’s this really odd shadow drawn here [underneath the heads of both Premiani and Boltinoff in the drawing], which I always assumed was an odd paste-up deal" Drake theorizes that the shadows were drawn in by "..somebody from the art department, like Sol Harrison." They are obviously another hand, sloppy and inaccurate.
You could assume Premiani’s art would be as consistent as the man’s reputation, but a cool thing about his work on the Doom Patrol is that his art changed over the course of the series. At first it is restrained and systematic but by the end it has a loose and cinematic quality. The lush ink work is still there and the quality of the drawing never wavers, yet long shots are replaced by off-kilter Dutch angles and uneven panels. This may or may not have been instigated by Premiani, since the Neal Adams and Marvel influence had hit DC comics and their editors smack in the face(give evidence). Premiani wouldn’t continue in this way after the series. But, it only serves to illustrate that as an artist, he chose to draw the way he did and wasn’t limited to it. When he need to draw in a different way, it could be achieved with a similar mastery.
During his second period in the US Premiani worked on other books, mostly prior to the Doom Patrol. While drawing the DP he worked on an issue of Sea Devils (#16 March-April 1964) as a penciler, inked by Shelly Moldoff. Brave and the Bold Teen Titans In a 1991 issue of Robin Snyder’s History of the Comics, Murray Boltinoff in talking about Tomahawk, "Where is Bruno now? He threatened to quit the comics business if DC ever let him go. Bruno was serious, disappearing into the jungles of Buenos Aires. If you still want to locate him you should locate Luis Dominguez. They were buddies of sorts. Bruno is a story in himself and I’m eager to learn his fate too. He fled Italy when Mussolini threatened to execute him for drawing anti-Facists editorial cartoons."
The last work I’ve found by Premianin in the United States was for the Boltinoff edited Unexpected. In issues 107 and 117 two brief stories demonstrate the loose panel layout that his last few issues of the Doom Patrol had also shown. Premiani’s refinement seems even more strangely out of place in the new era of comics.
Returned to Argentina. Peron leaves power?
By the 1970s Premiani had sold the rights to his comics produced for Patoruzito to Alfredo Scutti, editor of "Record Editions". A publishing company. They would reprint the Patoruzito Classics. The only example I’ve found of this republication is in the magazine Tit-Bits. Premiani seems to have maintained ownership of his work though, having made an effort to always work as a freelance artist for his Argentine publishers.
For the most lengthy article on Premiani to date, published in Argentina in Crash fanzine (#3 April, 1980), Esteban Laruccia put to paper the most detailed interview with Premiani I’ve yet to find. Though brief it is incredibly revealing.
"Premiani is a draftsman that doesn’t give any importance to his work. He considers it only a means to earn a living. ‘I produced comic strips because to me it was a better business than building chairs,’ he says. ‘I never worked to make paintings for museums. I worked so I could pay the rent.’ After finishing a work, he cut the links that united him with it: ‘I do the job, I turn it in and that is it. I don’t think about it. I am not interested in it anymore’
"Regarding painting, in spite of the dominion evidenced by his color illustrations, he considered that ‘painting was a waste of time because anybody can paint without hierarchy. Critics would say that I am not an academic.’ Premiani has not painted paintings. In one of his comments, he says: ‘I don’t have any of my paintings or others’ paintings hung in my house, but I feel a lot of admiration for a painter of the past century Böcklin, and amongst the classics I prefer Paolo Ucello, a painter from the Renaissance.’
"In regards to having vices, he said: ‘I don’t have any vices because I don’t want to be on the street supported by a cane. It is merely a matter of reasoning.’
"His opinion about the movies: ‘I used to like them but they ended up boring me. It has been more than ten years since I have been to the movie theater.’ He wasn’t fond of any particular literary authors either: ‘I read a lot of books. I like them all.’ Regarding the professional ‘panorama’, he considers that ‘there used to be more opportunities for the young."Premini continued producing new comic work for the Argentine market into the 1980s. He became more reclusive near the end of his life. Andrea Giberti spoke with Alberto Heredi, a retired journalist, who said "..that he was one of the closest friends of Bruno in the late days, but in 4 years he spoke with him not more than 10 times.An obituary for Premiani from the Argentine newspaper "Piario Clarin" (the Daily Bugle) states that he died on August 17th 1984. He was buried in Chacarita cemetary, Buenos Aires at a funeral attended by his friends Léon Poch, Bianca Corvalán, Anita and Hoacio Garcia, Ana and Osvaldo Gioseffi, Adriana and Roberto Barletta. His brother is mentioned but was absent from the funeral.
In the end, the same fascist government that chased Premiani out of his home in Trieste is the most lasting and concrete source of information on the man, "Received from Buenos Aires on November 15th 1938" with the number "7065":
Last and First Names: Premiani Bruno
Father and Mother: Francesco and Antonia Sambo
Place and Date of Birth: Trieste, January 4th 1907
Occupation: Illustrator/Caricaturist
Residence: South America
Home: Trieste
Political leaning: Antifacist
Defining Charactercistics:
Height: Regular
Build: Regular
Hair color: Light Brown
Face coloring: Natural
Forehead: Tall/Dimensions:Slanted
Eyes:Blue
Nose: Straight
Ears: Normal
Beard or Mustache: Shaved
Chin: Normal
Mouth: Normal
Special Marks: Wears Glasses
Insert in the file for dangerous elements: YES-NO [Neither option is marked]Sources: Leon Poch, Robin Snyder, Arnold Drake, Joe Simon, Gerardo Zaffino, Egidio Premiani,
Translations: Leonore’s friend, Emily Nilsson, Stephano G[iadano sp?]