Rob Liefeld Draws Feet

Rob Liefeld Doesn’t Draw Feet! (Except When He Does)

The history of art is lined with artists who go to any extreme to not draw a foot.  What would an artist do without pools of water, clouds of smoke, piles of rubble, close-ups, and foreground characters posed just in front of other characters’ feet?  The world will never know.

The internet believes, like so many other things, that it is only Rob Liefeld who doesn’t draw feet.  He is, after all, “the guy who can’t draw feet!”

(See “Deadpool 2”.)

To be fair, he didn’t draw any feet here:

Rob Liefeld's bad Captain America drawing. Or was it?!?

(There’s an interesting defense of that drawing here, BTW.)

But Liefeld can draw feet.  Or, at least, a foot.  The left one.  On the right leg:

Rob Liefeld draws Jubilee with a foot
Give Liefeld a break. He was probably 19 when he drew this. And Art Thibert didn’t correct it in inks. The editor didn’t catch it, either.

But if you want to say that Liefeld doesn’t draw feet?  Well —

Neither does Frank Frazetta, and his painting just went for a million bucks:

Million Dollar Frazetta Painting

Nor does Bernie Wrighton, whose “Swamp Thing” #1 cover sold for $100,000:

Wrightson Swamp Thing Cover

Nor does Mike Mignola:

Hellboy Mignola no feet

Mignola, when asked about not drawing feet and getting compared to Liefeld:

Mike Mignola comments on Rob Liefeld's feet

Yes, it’s very artistic shadowy rubble that Mignola uses.

DaVinci doesn’t like the entire lower half of the body:

Mona Lisa has no visible feet

Though, to be fair, he also did “The Last Supper,” the bottom eighth of which looks like this:

Da Vinci's Last Supper

So let’s look at Monet, Vermeer, and Van Gogh, instead:

Monet, Van Gogh, and Vermeer did not draw feet

Footless, footless, and footless.

(And we know how Vermeer did his paintings with a mirror and live-still-action reference.  Or do we?)

Jim Lee won’t even draw dog’s feet:

Jim Lee Scooby Doo has no feet

Jack Kirby didn’t draw Hitler’s feet:

Jack Kirby and Hitler's feet

As per Godwin’s Law, this article is now over.

To sum it up: Rob Liefeld doesn’t draw feet.  Except when he does:

Rob Liefeld Feet Covers

And if you want to relive those glory days, might I recommend the X-Force Omnibus?

(As an Amazon Associate I earn a small commission from qualifying purchases. You pay no extra.)


What do YOU think? (First time commenters' posts may be held for moderation.)

12 Comments

  1. John Severin hated to draw horses, he found them extremely difficult, as an artist myself feet and hands were a challenge, until…you know, I practiced Till I got them down. Cars and trucks, oddly, were a challenge for me but again…do the time.

    Liefeld needed to do time on the proportions of the human body, because as we all know, if you learn anatomy with Kirby as a source (who knew his body and proportions and exaggerated properly for comics), you are gonna get reamed in articles like this.

  2. First, I’d just like to say that you can’t call on Monet, Vermeer, and Van Gogh and utilize only one painting a piece as testament to how they “don’t draw feet” –also, Van Gogh’s is irrelevant considering there isn’t a person with which to draw feet.

    Second, Kirby’s cover is irrelevant to a point because he drew one complete foot on Captain America and another partial that extends out of the page a bit, plus one foot on the Nazi soldier in the back.

    Third, the argument shouldn’t be that Liefeld doesn’t draw feet. You might know this and as a result is why you chose this specific argument. The real argument would be that the feet he does draw are ridiculous (except that Beast cover from New Mutants 96; that was pretty good).

    Quickly I just want to say that I read that linked article comparing Liefeld’s Captain America to Lee’s Superman and the picture of Arnold. Liefeld’s Cap is nowhere near what Lee’s Superman is, it’s hardly a comparison at all, really it’s just the pose that is similar. And there is a clear discrepancy in comparing that Cap to Arnold’s picture.

    1. Hey Russell – You’re missing the comedy of the piece, first of all, if you’re going to challenge my Van Gogh painting selection.

      But, yes, there is an argument made a lot about Liefeld not drawing feet. I can dig up the Reddit threads for you easily enough. (Some of them have linked to this piece.)

      That’s the argument I’m combatting with this piece, not anatomical correctness, which I often thing is mistake for style in all artists’ work.

      I’m challenging people’s preconceived notions given merit with selective imagery with a collection of my own selective imagery. FIghting fire with fire. That’s all.

      Though, yeah, do go look through Hellboy and count the feet someday. It’s not a great number…

      1. I understand all of that, though my point was that arguing over whether he draws feet or not isn’t the good argument. It isn’t about fighting fire with fire, not when they’re playing with matches but there’s a house ablaze a block away. The real argument, in my opinion, would be that he renders some pretty terrible feet.

        What seemed to me as biased support of Liefeld’s work is what primed my response to it.

        What drew my attention to the article was Liefeld’s retweeting it; what I perceived as almost waving a flag attributing to the, in his mind, illigitimate criticism that he’s faced for however long.

        And I’m sure you saw that Civil War II cover he did with Spider-Man? That was all kinds of ridiculous.

  3. yeah that was a humour piece 🙂
    The point is not that Liefeld doesn’t draw feet, it’s that he shouldn’t lolNow seriously his feet are not worse than some of Kirby’s or Colan’s. Cut him some slack FFS;

  4. are you serious frank frazetta? and your comparing it to who? ROB LIEFELD??? first of all you only showed one painting second of all if frazetta can paint feet he most certainly can draw them

    1. Yes, and also that Van Gogh hack. Hackity hack. Man can’t draw to save his life so he smears paint all over it to try to look good. It’s all in your head. Don’t get me started on DaVinci. If it weren’t for his code, nobody would care about his hackery anymore, either.

  5. I have noticed the problem even in my art own artwork. Its not the artists fault (LOL!) its the paper! The paper is not long enough to accommodate the entire form of the character being drawn, so I let the feet stick out of the frame of the sheet. Better that than forcing incorrect anatomy into a finite space. Of all the wrongs I would attribute to Liefelds art not drawing feet isn’t one of them.

    1. Exactly! You wouldn’t want him to cut off their heads, would you? No, cut off their feet! The Queen of Hearts might not like it, but we’re a modern and more civilized society. =)

  6. This was a joke piece but if you want a serious discussion Liefelds work is highly stylized not photorealistic