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THE BLOG AT THE CROSSROADS
Article: PG Previews November 2013
Posted: August 31, 2013
As we start slipping into the autumn, November 2013 brings us still more delights including new graphic novel projects from the likes of Matteo Farinella, Charles Forsman, Howard Hardiman, Ilya, Roman Muradov and Jesse Reklaw and others, and very welcome translations of some outstanding bandes dessinées and manga and no less than two new books about Alan Moore as well as Trina Robbins’ ultimate ‘her-story’ of America’s women cartoonists and deluxe monographs on Rube Goldberg and Hergé. Now I won’t trumpet my own brand new book from Tate Publishing and Yale University Press, Comics Art, as my pick of the month, that would be a bit too self-promotional of me!
What I will choose as my November pick is Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlman and Kerascoët from Drawn & Quarterly, which I’ve been looking forward to seeing in English for ages. In 2010 I selected this as a particular favourite after it was first published by Dupuis in 2009 and nominated for an Angoulême award. Back then I wrote: “The single stand-out book I have read and re-read, that horrified and charmed me and haunts me still, is Jolies Ténèbres [its French title, literally ‘Pretty Shadows’]. This is exquisitely drawn by Kerascoët (pen-name of Marie Pommepuy and Sébastien Cosset taken from her home town) and co-written with Fabien Vehlmann. You might have come across Kerascoët’s Miss Don’t Touch Me with writer Hubert in English from NBM. Good though that is, Jolies Ténèbres is exceptional.
“This is such a unique, unsettling amorality tale, from its opening sequence in which charming Aurore and her friends find their tea unfortunately interrupted as the large dollops of red gloop start falling onto them. A mass exodus follows, and it is only then that we we see them pour out onto the forest floor, leaving behind them the decomposing body of a little girl. The fantasy realm of Richard Dadd’s feverish fairy paintings collides here with the murder mystery puzzle of who killed this child and will they get away with it. Your moral compass goes all over the place and loses you, as you look for some guidance to the actions and motives of these mercurial, cute yet cruel little woodland creatures. Lizzie Spratt from Walker Books shared my enthusiasm: ‘This has to be one of the most compelling works of moral philiosophy. I want to discuss! I want others to discuss! It’s so cleverly conceived and put together - the mixture of beautiful watercolours and realism combined with these charming cartoon characters with their bulging innocent eyes, but with all their self-concern, their hunger and the grimmest view of what makes nice and what makes nasty.’ Or as I put it, ‘Shadows have never been prettier, or darker’.”
Read the rest of my Previews here…
Gareth Brookes’ London Exhibition & Brighton Event
Posted: August 31, 2013
I reviewed it as “exquisite, excruciating and exceptional”. Gareth Brookes’ debut graphic novel The Black Project from Myriad Editions launches this coming week with an exhibition of his lino cut prints and embroideries and more at the London Print Studio, 25 Harrow Road, London W10 4RE from September 4th to 7th.
Gareth also join eleven other cartoonist and graphic novelists at Quick Strips in The Latest Bar, Manchester Street, Brighton on September 5th, each artist demonstrating their techniques and tricks of the trade live before the public for a maximum of six minutes! Organised by Myriad with Cartoon County as part of the Brighton Digital Festival.
Comics Art from Tate in November & Yale next February
Posted: August 30, 2013
Here’s a sneak peak at the front cover by Joost Swarte of my next book about comics, the 144-page hardback Comics Art, designed by Peter Stanbury and coming out this November from Tate Publishing in the UK and February 2014 from Yale University Press in the USA. We’ll have a few advance copies hopefully in time for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival in Kendal on October 18th-20th, where I’ll be in discussion with Joe Sacco, Posy Simmonds, Bryan Talbot, writer Rachel Cooke from The Observer and Jonathan Cape publisher Dan Franklin among others. Lots more info and previews of Comics Art and launch events to come!
Guardian Masterclass: How to write a graphic novel
Posted: August 30, 2013
I will be introducing the first Guardian Masterclass: How to write a graphic novel on Saturday September 7th, organised by publishers SelfMadeHero. I’ll be joining Karrie Fransman, Andrzej Klimowski (image above), Pat Mills and Audrey Niffenegger for a packed seminar at the Royal Society of Medicine, 1 Wimpole Street London W1G 0AE. To book a place costs £119. The day runs from 9.30am-5pm, check in begins 9.00am. Come and be inspired!
Article: Graphic Justice - Interview with Thom Giddens
Posted: August 27, 2013
Comics and the Law might seem like unlikely bedfellows but once you start thinking about them, they are more closely entangled than you might expect. Within legal academia there is growing interest in these overlapping fields, for example in Justice Framed: Law in Comics and Graphic Novels in Vol 16 of Law Text Culture from the University of Wollongong, Australia, available open access here. And next month in London, Dr Thomas Giddens, Lecturer in Law at St Mary’s University College, is organising Graphic Justice, a one-day symposium on the intersection of comics and graphic fiction with the concerns of law and justice on Wednesday September 11th 2013. Demand has been high and this free conference is already fully booked, but you can follow the related Graphic Justice Blog. I will be chairing one of the opening panel sessions and decided to interview Thom to find out more about this innovative conference. Read my new Article here…
Article: 1001 Comics - Going Global
Posted: August 19, 2013
This coming Friday August 23rd, I will be talking about 1001 Comics You Must Read Before You Die at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, from 5-6pm, as part of their Stripped programme of events - you can book tickets here! You might not realise this, but the internationally translated and hugely successful series of 1001 guides, covering everything from beers and battles to golf courses, does not necessarily stay the same from country to country, or language to language. That’s right, there is no worldwide consensus on the best of anything! In the case of 1001 Comics, while the interior images cannot be changed due to everyone printing from the same master files, so those entries with illustrations have to be included wherever it is published, other text-only entries without a picture can be replaced by great comics from the past or present on each new edition’s home turf, as long as they slot into the chronology of the year of first publication, of course. Read the rest of my report here…
Support Corban Wilkin’s Graphic Novel Breaker’s End!
Posted: August 16, 2013
I’ve just read an advance copy of Corban Wilkin’s forthcoming graphic Novel Breaker’s End and been truly impressed and moved by it. He’s telling the story of a fragile, ageing couple who in their youth rejected the system and society, the pressures to conform, get married, get a job, mortgage, kids, and have opted instead to live life their own way, on the margins, off the official records, off the map, in a pocket of woodland called Breaker’s End. But the threat is nearing of property developers set to build on ‘their’ land. It’s surprising, touching and revealing about the sort of ‘invisible people’ (to reference Will Eisner, one of Corban’s big influences) who are mostly ignored by other media.
Corban won last year’s Observer/Cape/Comica Graphic Short Story Prize with ‘But I Can’t’ and deservedly so. Now he’s self-publishing a special edition of Breaker’s End and you can help him do it by supporting his Kickstarter campaign. To get a flavour of Breaker’s End he’s posted a video and the first chapter online. He’s offering all sorts of levels of support and extras like a lovely two-colour print (below). Great British graphic novels like this don’t come along that often. You can help make this one happen!
Family Secrets: Rutu Modan Exclusive London Event August 21!
Posted: August 14, 2013
One of the stellar international guest graphic novelists in the Stripped programme at this year’s 30th Edinburgh International Book Festival is the award-winning Israeli author of Exit Wounds, Rutu Modan. The Property is her first full-length graphic novel and this summer’s most exciting event in literary comics.
One week from today, on Wednesday August 21st, Comica Festival in association with Foyles Bookshop and Jonathan Cape brings you the rare opportunity to hear Rutu Modan in her exclusive speaking engagement in London, in a lively Comica Conversation entitled ‘Family Secrets’ with Hannah Berry.
Drawing on Rutu’s family roots, The Property tells the story of Regina Segal, an old woman who travels with her granddaughter Mica to Poland to reclaim a family property lost during the Second World War. Thrust into the unfamiliar surroundings of modern Warsaw, difficult memories begin to surface, and family skeletons emerge from their closets, in front of a cast of complex, absurd and nuanced characters – all finely and subtly drawn, in every sense. Witty, stylish, romantic and moving, Modan’s latest book is a triumph of storytelling, fine lines and exquisite colours in a 220-page hardback.
Hannah Berry is also published by Jonathan Cape and her graphic novels Britten & Brülightly and Adamtine have been widely acclaimed. Don’t miss this very special encounter between two of today’s most gifted international graphic storytellers.
Where: Foyles Gallery, 3rd Floor, Foyles Bookshop, 113-119 Charing Cross Rd, London WC2H 0EB.
When: Wednesday August 21st, doors open 6.15pm for 6.30pm start and 8.30pm finish.
Tickets: £6 from WeGotTickets.
Dead Cats: Christian Ward Exhibition at Orbital Comics!
Posted: August 14, 2013
Tomorrow Thursday August 15th, Orbital Comics Gallery near Leicester Square, London, open their latest exhibition of original comics art with ‘Dead Cats’ by Christian Ward, featuring both his art from Infinite Vacation from Image comics (co-created by Christian and Nick Spencer), and new pieces exploring the possibilities of parallel universes and quantum mechanics. Don’t miss this show, on till September 2nd.
Article: Interview with Gareth Brookes on The Black Project
Posted: August 12, 2013
“One of my preoccupations is how to represent childhood realistically. There’s a great collective amnesia towards childhood, adults often regard it as a lost utopia when in fact it’s often brutal and cruel.” In his graphic novel debut The Black Project, out from Myriad Editions this September, Gareth Brookes unflinchingly anatomises one prepubescent boy’s secret obsessive crafting of artificial girlfriends from found objects. Set in a suburban Surrey of headlines like ‘Mammoth Marrow Madness’, Richard’s unself-conscious narration is part memoir, D.I.Y. guide and sex education manual, weaving his joined-up handwriting between embroidered frames and images and linocut vignettes. Read the rest of my new Article, a Web Exclusive Interview and his new 2-page Strip for ArtReview Magazine here…
