Giordano Bruno Premiani (; January 4, 1907 – August 17, 1984) was an Italian illustrator known for his work for several American comic book publishers, particularly DC Comics. With writer Arnold Drake, he co-created DC's superhero team the Doom Patrol, then with writer Bob Haney, he co-created DC's superhero team the Teen Titans.
Biography
Early life and career
Bruno Premiani was born in Trieste, in what was then Austria-Hungary. It became part of Italy by the time Premiani studied at the city's arts and crafts high school from 1921 to 1925.
DC Comics
Moving to the United States, where he lived from 1948 to 1952,
For DC, Premiani penciled and generally also inked his own work for such features as "Johnny Peril" in All-Star Comics #52 (May 1950), and "Pow-Wow Smith, Indian Lawman" in Detective Comics #163 (Sept. 1950). He then became regular artist for the American Revolution-era frontiersman hero Tomahawk after that character's feature in Star-Spangled Comics was awarded its own title, beginning with Tomahawk #1 (Oct. 1950). Premiani published two more stories in Prize Comics' horror title Black Magic before devoting himself almost exclusively to Tomahawk, drawing the hero's six- to eight-page stories in all but two issues (#27, #30) in a run through issue #36 (Nov. 1955). He also drew Tomahawk stories in World's Finest Comics #73-75 & 79 (Dec. 1954 - April 1955 & Dec. 1955). with text written by his wife, Beatriz.
With writer France Herron, Premiani co-created Cave Carson, a spelunker/geologist adventurer, in The Brave and the Bold #31 (Sept. 1960). both series being cult favorites that have survived in one form or another, if sporadically, since their original creation for the DC Comics universe. In the case of the former superhero team, editor Murray Boltinoff had asked writer Arnold Drake to develop a feature to run in the anthology series My Greatest Adventure. Given the assignment on a Friday with a script due that Tuesday, Drake conceived what would become the Doom Patrol, and turned to another DC writer, Bob Haney, to co-plot and co-script the first adventure. Premiani and Boltinoff appeared as themselves in that final story, discussing the impending demise of the team.
In 2001, Drake wrote of the search for a Doom Patrol illustrator, saying that Boltinoff's regular artists<blockquote>...were all busy. That meant the DP would get some backup artist. So 'pessimism' was the password when Murray brought in a very lean, eagle-beaked, lantern-jawed guy with eyeglass lenses even thicker than mine: Bruno Premiani. But his superb draftsmanship, anatomy and design work turned my prejudice to dust. Still, could he give the DP the unique quality it needed — a quality I couldn't define myself? Bruno's first penciled pages told me we had truly lucked out. What he had recognized was that these super-heroes must be as human as possible. He captured that spirit from page one and sustained it for 42 issues: fabulous powers and fantastic enemies notwithstanding, The Chief, Rita, Larry and Cliff remained real people.
Later career and death
Premiani's last known original comics story was the three-and-a-half-page "Please Let Me Die", written by Dave Wood, in The Unexpected #126 (Aug. 1971).