Kevin Eastman is an American comics artist and writer born in 1962 in Portland, Maine. He is best known for co-creating the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles with Peter Laird. Eastman's love for comic books started at a young age, and his favorite comic book creator was Jack Kirby. He was a comic book fan and later became an aspiring comics artist, working in restaurants to support himself.
Eastman met Peter Laird, a newspaper illustrator, while trying to get his work published by local underground newspapers. They collaborated on several comic book projects and decided to create their own comic book series, parodying elements from popular comics series at the time. The result was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which was self-published in 1984.
The first issue of TMNT was a success, and the duo went on to publish more issues, eventually quitting their day jobs to become full-time comic book creators. The comic book's popularity led to the creation of merchandise, including action figures, and the franchise expanded to include an animated series, which lasted for 10 seasons and 193 episodes.
In the late 1980s, Eastman helped draft the Creator's Bill of Rights, a document that demanded creative rights over work for hire. He also formed his own publishing company, Tundra Publishing, which published several critically acclaimed but commercially unsuccessful titles.
Eastman has been involved in various projects over the years, including the development of Heavy Metal magazine, which he owned and edited from 1992 to 2014. He has also been a collector of original artwork and established the Words & Pictures Museum, which shut down due to financial problems.
Eastman has been married twice and has a son from his second marriage. He has sold his ownership rights to the TMNT franchise and Heavy Metal magazine and remains involved in the industry as an on-and-off writer and artist.
