Comix: Three Takes On The Art Of Comics
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"Whaty"
Barry Doupé, "Whaty," 2012, hand-drawn animation using Amiga computer, 30-second loop.
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“Comics as a Medium for Self Expression?“
Art Spiegelman, “Comics as a Medium for Self Expression?“ Cover, PRINT Magazine. Ink and watercolor on paper. May-June 1981.
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"Illustration for the central panel no. 6 of In the Shadow of No Towers"
Art Spiegelman, "Illustration for the central panel no. 6 of In the Shadow of No Towers," ink on paper, 2002.
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"Study for the Cover of RAW no. 7, The Torn-Again Graphic Mag"
Art Spiegelman, "Study for the Cover of RAW no. 7, The Torn-Again Graphic Mag," mixed media, ca. 1985.
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"Short Order Comix no. 1"
Art Spiegelman, "Short Order Comix no. 1," cover, 1973.
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"Illustration for Joseph Moncure March’s 'The Wild Party' (1928)"
Art Spiegelman, "Illustration for Joseph Moncure March’s 'The Wild Party' (1928)," 1994.
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"The Collector"
Art Spiegelman, "The Collector," lithograph, 1979.
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"Self-Portrait with Maus Mask. Cover for The Village Voice"
Art Spiegelman, "Self-Portrait with Maus Mask. Cover for The Village Voice," June 6, 1989. From: "Spiegelman,’behind the mirror’" - portfolio of Galerie Martel, Paris 2009.
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“Valentine’s Day”
Art Spiegelman, “Valentine’s Day,” gouache. Sketch for the Cover of The New Yorker. February 15, 1993.
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"RAW No. 1"
Art Spiegelman, "RAW No. 1," Cover, with tipped-on color plate, 1980.
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"Sketch for the Front Cover of the first american edition of MAUS 2. And Here My Troubles Began"
Art Spiegelman, "Sketch for the Front Cover of the first american edition of MAUS 2. And Here My Troubles Began." Ca. 1991.
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"Whaty"
Barry Doupé, "Whaty," 2012, hand-drawn animation using Amiga computer, 30-second loop.
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"Whaty"
Barry Doupé, "Whaty," 2012, hand-drawn animation using Amiga computer, 30-second loop.
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"Whaty"
Barry Doupé, "Whaty," 2012, hand-drawn animation using Amiga computer, 30-second loop.
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"Whaty"
Barry Doupé, "Whaty," 2012, hand-drawn animation using Amiga computer, 30-second loop.
COMIX: Three takes on the art of comics
By Beverly Cramp
Although the popularity of comics as art – or comix, as the legendary Art Spiegelman and his underground colleagues call their oeuvre – has risen and fallen over the years, it’s now on an upswing. “We’re living in an amazing time, the most amazing moment since the birth of comics in 1895,” says Spiegelman, whose exhibition, Co-Mix: A Retrospective of Comics, Graphics and Scraps, continues to June 9 at the Vancouver Art Gallery. “It’s a renaissance.”
Spiegelman, an American who transcended pulp print to enter the art world, sees the blending of comics and high art as natural. “Comics have always been there as part of the modernist mix,” he says. “Picasso was basically a sculpture cartoonist.” He also points to comics that have borrowed from art, like his 1973 one-pager, Don’t Get Around Much Anymore. “Stylistically, it was a direct outgrowth from an immersion in Cubism. The notion that one could break up space as an aspect of moving through time was quite fresh to me.”
But younger artists in Western Canada whose work seems influenced by comics – people like Vancouver’s Barry Doupé and Winnipeg-based Leslie Supnet – have a more nuanced relationship to the genre. Doupé, a graduate of the Emily Carr University of Art and Design is known for computer-generated animations that have been shown in galleries as prominent as London’s Tate Modern. He recently completed a 30-second animated loop, Whaty, that depicts a human face morphing into random shapes of fleshy brown, pink and yellow.
For the project, Doupé used an Amiga computer, a precursor to the Apple that was known as the artist’s computer because its programs were designed for art. Doupé worked frame by frame, erasing a few pixels in one and adding a few to the next, over seven months. He was influenced by Anglo-American animation pioneer, J. Stuart Blackton, who did chalk animations called Humorous Phases of Funny Faces. Blackton worked with cartoonist Winsor McCay, known for the comic strip, Little Nemo, which Doupé has read.
Still, Doupé says comic books are not a major influence, although he enjoyed cartoon cards as a boy. “I’ve taken notice of some comics, but it’s not central to my work. It was drawing that I was always interested in.”
Similarly, Supnet is reluctant to credit commercial comics, saying her inspiration comes from life and she mostly hangs out with experimental filmmakers. But she’s enthusiastic about her exposure to comics as a child. “I taught myself how to draw using Archie comics as a reference,” she says, describing how she mimicked the smooth lines of creator Bob Montana. “So comics have a direct influence on my drawing style.”
Supnet, who has created animated films since 2007, usually starts a new project with a title. “I really love a good title. I think of titles first for both my drawing and animation work, and develop the work around it. For animation, I storyboard, which is basically a comic of the film, to help visualize the narrative or concept.”
For Spiegelman, comics are central not only to his work but to his worldview. “Everything I know, I learned from comic books,” he says. “I learned to read from looking at Batman when I was really young and trying to figure out if he was a good guy or a bad guy ... Everything I know about sex, I learned contemplating Betty and Veronica. On the other hand, everything I learned about feminism, that’s from Little Lulu. Economics, I learned from Uncle Scrooge ... philosophy, from Peanuts. Politics, from Pogo ... aesthetics, ethics and everything else, from Mad magazine.”
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