1. CRUMB. GRIFFITH. SHELTON. THESE (AND other “sequential artists“) were the visual architects of my immediate post-adolescent universe; whose spare-but-dense works were strewn reverently on the couches and mattresses of my very late teens and very early 20s; whose fractured catchphrases (“Yow! Are we having fun yet?” “Hey kids, while you’re out smashing the state keep a smile on your lips and a song in your hearts!” “Dope will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no dope!”) worked their way into the conversations of my fellow-freakly peers. Continue reading “5 Thoughts: Comix with an X”
Tag: comix
The “x” is for “independent.” (Messrs. Crumb and Griffith, please take a recognitive bow.)
ORL Interview: Ivan Stang
INTERVIEWING ONE’S CULTURAL HEROES IS one of the greatest thrills of a career in journalism — even of amateur journalism. Such was the position in which I found myself while working for Obscure Research Labs in the early-to-mid-1990s. It gave me an insider’s excuse to pester thinker and novelist Robert Anton Wilson, and granted equal access to Church of the SubGenius co-founder Ivan Stang. Herewith this interview, conducted through the mail and slightly edited for clarity and length, which first appeared in Far Corner v1n7, c. 1993. Kick back, slack off and enjoy this longest-by-far of The Metaphorager’s 800+ posts. Continue reading “ORL Interview: Ivan Stang”
First Graf: Understanding Comics
THIS BOOK WILL CHANGE THE way you think about (as author Scott McCloud concisely defines it) “sequential art.”
McCloud takes us inside the art form to explain how and why comics/graphic novels work. He tracks the 3,000-year history of Sequential Art from its Egyptian origins to the present day (well, the book’s 1993 publication anyway), breaking down the elements of composition, line, color, symbols, time, and the use of words; he even has a chapter on the unspoken relationship between panels and the space between them. Let’s let the chapter titles speak for themselves: Continue reading “First Graf: Understanding Comics”
Click A Laugh A Day
“COMIX” IS TO “COMICS” AS Zippy the Pinhead is to Snoopy, or Robert Crumb is to Jack Kirby: irreverent satire rather than bemuscled superheroes. The Internet has made it easier for would-be comix artists to reach an audience, and the following examples never fail to provoke in me either laughter or deep thought (or both). It’s easy to get lost clicking through “back issues;” you have been warned.
1. XKCD. Stick figures with brains and a heart. Probably the most accessible high-intellect and -soul pieces I’ve seen since the original Howard the Duck. Most of the math jokes are over my head, but it’s a tribute to the artist that they’re still funny.
2. PeanuTweeter. Random tweets replace the Peanuts gang’s word-balloon speech for an effect that’s ironic and wistful in a Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead sort of way.
3. Garfield Minus Garfield. As it says — a Garfieldectomy leaving the other characters intact. What’s left resembles one young man’s solipsistic fever dream, horrid and wonderful and cutely disturbing.
New Superhero!
DELIGHTEDMAN! HIS SUPERPOWERS ARE HIS 100% Infectious Enthusiasm! the Smile of Impenetrability! and the deadly Triple Exclamation Point!!!