An anthology from the folks at Fantagraphics Books, the madmen who brought us Hans Rickheit's brilliantly surreal The Squirrel Machine.
What we have here is the work of 43 artists who've combined the abstraction of visual art with the panel continuity of comics. R. Crumbs' Abstract Expressionist Ultra Super Modernistic Comics starts it off with a visual smorgasbord. Even I (no Crumb lover) can appreciate the abstractions he creates. Bill Shut's water color work in Time Lapse Growth is very impressive in its originality. Another stand-out is Mark Staff Brandl's work in Tur Dreh and Shuster in Madrid, which is more painterly. Some of the best work, in my opinion, is Derik Badman's pen & ink-inspired digital panels and Grant Thomas' Splatter Reductos pieces, in which he uses the comic panel to create a zoom effect on various splatter patterns.
This is a great book for the comics enthusiast and visual artist alike.
(Click here to order Abstract Comics: The Anthology)
3 comments:
Thanks for the compliment.
Actually, my pieces are completely digital. No ink at all!
Derik,
No problem. Great work. I changed it to read 'pen & ink-inspired digital panels'. I think people will be able to visualize that and it's accurate, right?
You fooled me!
D. J.
Hey D.J.! I'd like to thank you too! My works are indeed paintings. The big double-page spread there is actually a whole wall about 30 feet long and 14 feet high with the panels each as paintings on canvas and the black surrounding stuff directly painted on the wall. I'm happy you find it painterly! Best wishes,
Mark
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