IDW’s Artist’s Edition Numbering 2023

IDW numbers their Artist’s Editions and has for some time. Here is a complete list of all Artist’s Editions sorted by publication date. I originally posted this in February 2017 and then updated it in 2020 but a lot has come up since then and there are more missing numbers so it seemed like a good time to revisit.

Use the arrows to sort by column. Books with no printed series number are marked with an asterisk.

Numbering began right at the beginning, with Dave Stevens’ The Rocketeer Artist’s Edition, mentioning on the “About This Edition” page that this was hopefully the first volume in an ongoing series. This continued through the next three Artist’s Editions. By the time David Mazzucchelli’s Daredevil Born Again: Artist’s Edition is published this numbering format is dropped, replaced with “part of an ongoing series”.

A standard format of numbering began with Jack Kirby New Gods Artist’s Edition, with a listing in the colophon “Artist’s Edition #19”. The numbering of the volumes in this manner starts with #18, Basil Wolverton’s Weird Worlds Artist’s Edition, but that was almost a year late so it shows up after numbers 19-24 have been published.

Looking at the list one can see a few numbers missing: 20, 31, and 60. The coveted and long-delayed Steranko Artist’s Edition Volume 2 falls right into the dates for number 31. The oft-delayed Don Rosa’s The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, Vol. 2 Artist’s Edition could be number 60. As for number 20, it’s anyone’s guess. Could be as simple as accidentally skipping a number. I don’t believe we’ll see these numbers used.

When I asked Scott Dunbier about this he joked “Hey, never said I was good at math!“.

The Artifact Editions have all been numbered, and the numbering has been consistent and accurate. This line has ended so we won’t see more than these twelve volumes.