Becky Cloonan is an American comics artist and writer known for her recent unique take on Conan the Barbarian with writer Brian Wood, as well as her own self-published titles and other work for Dark Horse, Vertigo, Marvel and other publishers.

Cloonan started out self-publishing her own mini comics and then moved into more mainstream work for various publishers, but still continues to write her own titles.

She has a direct, open style, conveyed in brush and ink linework, that one might easily associate with the more personal approach of independent comics, but she has utilized it to wonderful effect in her mainstream titles.

In spite of her atmospheric and forceful work on projects like WOLVES and her take on the classic Dracula story, most people (myself included) would not have associated her relatively spare style with a title like Conan, but the result is brilliant and perfect, giving the book a streamlined storytelling power and a nice visual feel in line with European comics albums (images above, top two).

There is an 8 page preview of Conan #1 on the Dark Horse site.

Cloonan is also noted for her work on titles like Demo and American Virgin, as well as her contributions to the Flight anthologies. She has also become in demand as a cover artist.

In addition to her website and blog, she also maintains a Tumblr blog and a deviantART gallery.

Heartbreak Comics, to promote their new “graphic novel” (by which I think they mean “anthology”) has placed Cloonan’s contribution, a story titled 1989, online in its entirety (images above, third down). The story can also be downloaded as a PDF.

Cloonan has just made her newest mini comic, The Mire, available for pre-order. This is essentially a self-contained short story and a follow-up to her well received WOLVES.