Noel Sickles, along with his lifelong friend, Milton Caniff, changed the face of comics in the 1930s, when they invented a new form of graphic storytelling. They moved away from the simple outline approach then popular, and created a chiaroscuro style that still influences comics artists today. Having blazed a trail through the comics world, Sickles left the medium in favor of a 40-year career as one of America’s most successful magazine illustrators. A regular at Life magazine, his work also appeared in Look, Reader’s Digest, National Geographic, and The Saturday Evening Post.