Fiona Staples

Fiona Staples draws the way the rest of us dream: in impossible color, with faces so expressive they carry entire pages without a single word balloon. The Calgary-based artist has been called one of the best working in comics today, and her signature achievement is Saga — the landmark space opera/fantasy series she co-created with Brian K. Vaughan for Image Comics, where every alien world, every towering monstrosity, and every baby-fingernail-sized gesture of parenthood feels hand-made. Perfect for fans of lush, emotionally alive fantasy art in the tradition of Charles Vess and Neil Gaiman’s dreamscapes.

Staples broke out in 2009 with North 40, a small-town horror epic written by Aaron Williams that earned her an Eisner nomination and a Shuster Award for Outstanding Cover Artist, and her resume quickly filled with both indie gems and Big Two showcases: Mystery Society, DV8: Gods and Monsters, T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, Jonah Hex, Northlanders, and a celebrated run of covers for Archie. But it was the March 2012 debut of Saga that made her a superstar — after writer Steve Niles recommended her (the two had just made Mystery Society together), Vaughan called her the moment he saw her pages, and Publishers Weekly noted at the 2013 Eisners that Staples won Best Painter/Multimedia Artist while sharing Best Continuing Series with Vaughan. She has since added Eisner Awards for Best Penciller/Inker and Best Cover Artist, plus Harveys, Ringos, and Shusters.

Staples has said she’s known the characters of Saga longer than she’s known her own children, and it shows — her Hazel, Alana, and Marko have become icons of modern comics, and when the series returned from its 2022 hiatus The Beat reported she had been “hard at work” banking the next arc from her Calgary studio. She lives in Canada, keeps a low profile, and lets the pages do the talking — follow her on Twitter or Instagram, and lose yourself in Saga.