Comic artist Louis Small Jr. passed away on November 18, 2025, of a stroke that followed a years-long battle with cancer. Small was a penciler who is best known for his work on Harris’s Vampirella comics and as the co-creator of the Vertigo series Codename: Knockout.
Small was born in Tinton, New Jersey. Like many future creators, he was an avid comics reader as a child, and he later credited his comics habit for boosting his vocabulary and helping him become an A student. He served for seven years in the U.S. Army, and his comics career began in a tent in Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Storm. “We were so bored,” he said in a 1993 interview with the Asbury Park Press, “that we put out an underground newspaper just for fun.” Small drew comic strips for the paper. “I was getting better and better,” he said. “I thought to myself, ‘I can do this. I can be a comic book artist.’”
When he got out of the army, at age 27, Small decided to pursue a career as an artist, despite having no formal training; “I didn’t have time for college,” he said, “and I couldn’t afford it anyway.” Instead, he got two art instruction books, How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way, by Stan Lee and John Buscema, and How to Draw and Sell Comic Strips, by Alan McKenzie. After four months of practice, he felt he was ready to go pro. Rather than mail his work to publishers, he chose a more direct route: “I just looked into the Comic Buyers Guide to find out when the New York conventions would be.”
So in June 1992, accompanied by two friends, he brought some penciled pages to a convention in New York. One of his portfolio reviews was with legendary artist Neal Adams, and as he waited on line, Small heard Adams dishing out some harsh critiques to those ahead of him. “Everybody was getting told off,” Small said. “When my turn finally came, I was just about to turn around. Then, Neal Adams said to me ‘Do I intimidate you?’ I said ‘No, I was in the Army long enough.’” After looking over Small’s portfolio, Adams said, “I look forward to working with you.”
Adams wasn’t the only one to recognize Small’s talent; he came home from the convention with a stack of business cards and soon started getting offers. His first work was penciling “The Dracula War, Part One: Storm Clouds Gathering,” written by Kurt Busiek, in Vampirella #1, published by Harris after the company acquired the character from Warren Publishing (see “Dynamite Gets Vampirella”). “Harris was first, so I signed with them,” Small said. “I needed the money, and I’ve always loved Vampirella.”
More gigs followed. He stayed with Vampirella throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, working on stories including “Holy War” and “Hell on Earth.” He penciled a character profile of Kendra Saunders/Hawkgirl for Justice Society of America: Secret Files and Origins #1 (the character’s first appearance was in a story in the same issue), drew the Batman story “Chapter Five: Bloodthirsty Thursday” for Batman 80-Page Giant #3 and co-created the Vertigo series Codename: Knockout with Robert Rodi, serving as penciler for the first five issues. He also drew the Ka-Zar story “Earth Mother” (scripted by Mark Waid) and had stints on Witchblade and Ninjak, as well as one-off stories for Ms. Mystic Deathwatch 2000 for Continuity (penciling a story plotted by Adams), Dark Dominion for Defiant (penciling a Jim Shooter story), and Carnal Comics: Hyapatia Lee, a bio-comic of the adult film actress, for Carnal Comics. Most recently, he drew webcomics for Udderly Ridiculous Productions.
He also appeared at comics conventions and participated in group shows, including the 1995 show “Sequential Art: The Next Step,” part of the Festival of Cartoon Art at what is now the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum, and “Sequential Art: The Next Step 2,” a 1997 exhibit at the Museum of the National Center of Afro-American Artists in Boston. He taught at the Kubert School and was the model liaison for the Inkwell Awards.
In addition to his comics work, Small was an artist for DC Universe cards and did promotional artwork for Cannibal Rage, an immersive theatrical show set in a zombie apocalypse.
Small moved to Wilson, North Carolina, in 2002 to care for his aging parents and was an active member of the community there, giving talks, participating in shows, and making appearances at his local comic shops, Arkham Comix in Wilson and Nostalgia Newsstand in Greenville.
As news spread of his passing, Small’s friends and fellow artists posted numerous tributes to his enthusiasm for the medium and his support for young creators. On Facebook, Tiffany Gibbons, formerly of Arkham Comix, remembered him this way: “Louis certainly had an incredible past in comics, working for several publishers throughout his career (Harris Comics, Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Valiant Entertainment, Image Comics, Dark Horse Comics, and so many others) and that’s what so many are posting in remembrance. But if you knew him, that wasn’t what you remembered. You remembered his smile and kindness. I am grateful and honored to have known and called him a friend.”
Source: ICv2
