X-Men T-Shirt

This image was produced for what may have been the first X-Men t-shirt, which was offered for sale in X-Men #12.  The image itself was not published until it was used as a pin-up in X-Men #74.  Writer (and former Kirby assistant) Mark Evanier was kind enough to confirm that the art was by Jack Kirby and Chic Stone.  Check out his blog for tons of Jack Kirby stories, and tons of great articles in general! http://www.newsfromme.com/?s=jack+kirby 

Jack Kirby Week

Not only is this unused cover for X-Men #10 the oldest unpublished cover featured on this blog, but it is also the earliest X-Men cover still in existence.  We've also got a version colored by a friend of Unpublished X-Men, Professor H!

http://professorhswaybackmachine.blogspot.com/

X-Men Reunion

This is the best quality image I could find of this Joe Quesada poster, featuring everyone who had been a member of the X-Men at the time of publication.

Fanfare

The cover of Marvel Fanfare 45 featured the original X-Men as well as the New Mutants on the back, and some of the new X-Men on the front.

Carlos Pacheco Week

This Carlos Pacheco cover for X-Men 63 featuring Sebastian Shaw and Jean Grey was never published.

Outback

A sketch by Jay Anacleto, featuring the Australian based X-Men.

John Romita Jr. Week

I don't want to speculate as to what this image was produced for.  I don't even know that it's unpublished - but it's a very nice rendition of the X-Men.  This may be the only time I've seen John Romita Jr. ink his own work, and there's something about his shading here that I like.

X-Men #4 cover sketch

From Mike Mayhew's gallery at comicartfans.com:
"Even though this was a cool shot, it was pretty hard to figure out that they were vampires, so it wasn't used."

X-Men WildC.A.T.s

This promo image for the X-Men WildC.A.T.s crossover is among Jim Lee's last official X-Men work.

He drew some covers for the crossover, and he drew issue #2, which featured the Neal Adams era X-Men.

Jim Lee and Scott Williams

We're getting a late start on this year's Jim Lee week - but I think this image more than makes up for it.  The original art (seen below) remained unfinished for some years until Scott Williams was commissioned to ink it.

Note Jean Grey's unused costume design - the original art was produced during the time when the X-Men #1 team roster and costume designs had not yet been finalized.  This could have originally been intended as a promo piece for the new series.

George Perez - Pacesetter

This George Perez image comes from Pacesetter - The George Perez Magazine issue nine.

What If Magneto Formed The X-Men?

While still working on Uncanny X-Men Chris Claremont and John Byrne came up with an idea for a new story:  What if Magneto Had Formed The Original X-Men?  While this issue was never produced, several pages of character sketches exist.  However, John Byrne has just completed a commission of what the cover might have looked like!

The first page of the issue, a tribute to X-Men #1, was completed.

Jean Grey's codename was Psyke.  Dani Moonstar of the New Mutants originally had the codename Psyche.

While Cyclops is unchanged here, other sketches have different versions of the visor.  Jean Grey's costume is also slightly different here.

Beast had arm gauntlets with retractable claws, and Archangel was to have a flaming sword.  Angel's name would be changed to Archangel later in X-Factor.

 Both Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver were to be part of this team.

The Photoshopped  image below was going to be the cover piece for this article until John Byrne came to the rescue with the excellent commission at the top of the page.

For more information about this story, check out John Byrne's Forum:

http://www.byrnerobotics.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=43669&PN=1&totPosts=103

Gold Team

The X-Men Gold Team circa 1991 by Art Thibert, who not only inked Whilce Portacio on Uncanny X-Men, but followed Jim Lee as penciller of X-Men for a few issues.

Marie Severin

From The Marvel Age of Comics, Marie Severin's original sketch for X-Men #69, with Sal Buscema's final art.

http://themarvelageofcomics.tumblr.com/post/39249029185/heres-marie-severins-cover-sketch-for-x-men-69

Right click to view the full size image.

Happy Anniversary!!!

I just realized that January 24th marks one year of blogging about Unpublished, Rare, and Commissioned X-Men art.  For those new to the blog, we tend to feature unused art on Mondays, rare but published art on Wednesdays, and Commissions or Sketches on Fridays.  Here are a few highlights of the first year:

To show my commitment to unpublished X-Men art I hit the ground running, and reached into my personal stash to bring you a rare scan of an unused page from X-Men Special Edition by Dave Cockrum:

http://unpublishedxmen.blogspot.com/2012/01/all-new-all-different-revisited.html

I restored the artwork from Uncanny X-Men annual #3, to correct a major oversight in the printed version:

http://unpublishedxmen.blogspot.com/2012/03/uncanny-restoration.html

And with much help from Professor H., a classic piece of unpublished art by Barry Windsor-Smith was reimagined as if it had been published.  Roy Thomas himself was thrilled to see this artwork!

http://unpublishedxmen.blogspot.com/2012/06/barry-windsor-smiths-first-cover.html

Stay tuned, because we've got a lot more rare and unpublished artwork coming in the next year!

Update!! Team Line-Ups

The X-Men Research Facility is normally closed on weekends, but I had to give an update on a previous post.  Last month I had asked for help identifying several pieces of artwork.  Several astute readers including Phil recognized the art from The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Master Edition.  Most of the artwork in the book was done by Keith Pollard, but these pieces are credited to Ron Frenz and Pat Olliffe.  Ron's credit was omitted from the First Line-Up printed in issue 23, but was printed as a correction in the next issue.  We will bring you more team line-ups in the coming months!

My original post:
http://unpublishedxmen.blogspot.com/2013/01/help-wanted.html
As always, you can click on the images for larger versions.

Nexus

Here's the X-Men with Nexus, by his co-creator Steve Rude:

Help Wanted! -- Update!!

Update:  Praise be to the keen eyes of Phil and Anonymous!  Check out this post for the solution to our mystery:

http://unpublishedxmen.blogspot.com/2013/02/update-team-line-ups.html

If anyone knows where these images were originally published, where I can find larger scans, or who the original artist was please let me know.  High praise could be yours!

Dusty Abell and Drew Geraci -Updated!

This unused cover for X-Men 75 by Dusty Abell and Drew Geraci comes to us courtesy of Drew's website. Drew writes: "For whatever reason, this was pencilled, inked, colored, then rejected, used instead in a reduced format for Diamond distributor's solicitations catalogue for X-Men #75. Maggot and Marrow, the ones with the smoking potato bugs and bones respectively, have a special place in history as the LEAST popular X-men members ever. It was fun seeing Dusty audaciously sign his name in the style of the X-men logo."

Drew's site can be found here:

http://www.drewgeraci.com/rarepin.html

For the record, I thought it was a refreshing change of pace to see new X-Men introduced after years of the same cast.  However, Marvel seems quick to dismiss new characters and rehash the ideas of Stan and Jack. On the other side of the coin, these days the X-Men change cast members at least every time they change writers.  Which is to say a lot. //End rant

Update!

I finally located the color version that Drew spoke about!  The image appeared in Marvel Vision, their monthly catalog, and the right side was unfortunately chopped off.

Todd McFarlane X-Men

Todd Mcfarlane didn't produce much X-Men artwork, but he did do a few covers for the reprint series Marvel Tales.

Issue 233 reprints X-Men #35.

Issue 235 reprints material from Marvel Team-Up Annual #1.