Kinda cool, but when I first read the title I imagined something even cooler--like a Bach chorale prelude on the Batman theme. Here they're largely juxtaposed but don't really mesh...
The first and most comprehensive source of abstract comics on the web, tracing the history and surveying the contemporary landscape of abstract sequential art.
On Abstract Comics: The Anthology (Currently SOLD OUT):
The artists assembled by Andrei Molotiu for his anthology ABSTRACT COMICS (Fantagraphics, $39.99) push “cartooning” to its limits... It’s a fascinating book to stare at, and as with other kinds of abstract art, half the fun is observing your own reactions: anyone who’s used to reading more conventional sorts of comics is likely to reflexively impose narrative on these abstractions, to figure out just what each panel has to do with the next.
--Douglas Wolk, New York Times Book Review, Holiday Books edition, December 6, 2009 The collection has a wealth of rewarding material... it is a significant historical document that may jump-start an actual new genre.
--Doug Harvey, LA Weekly It becomes a treat to take a page of art - or a simple panel - and consider how the shapes, texture, depth, and color interact with one another; to reflect on how, when one takes the time, the enjoyment one ordinarily finds in reading a purely textually-oriented, narrative-driven written story can - with the graphic form - be translated into something completely different.
--Adam Waterreus, Politics and Prose, "Favorite Graphic Literature of the Year."
...this arresting book is like a scoop of primordial narrative, representational mud. Which is to say, it has vitaminic powers.
--Design Observer
For years, comics (at least American ones) have doggedly refused for one reason or another, to consider other schools of art and beyond mere representation. It's only now we see artists attempting to branch out and try to push at the edge's of the medium's definition. As such I found Abstract Comics to be a revealing, thought-provoking and genuinely lovely book that I'll be sure to be rereading in the months to come.
Have you ever heard "Mr. Bach Meets Batman" by The Explorer?
ReplyDeleteI hadn't, but I just did, here:
ReplyDeletehttp://ubu.artmob.ca/sound/365/12/365-Days-Project-12-09-explorer-mr-bach-meets-batman-1967.mp3
Kinda cool, but when I first read the title I imagined something even cooler--like a Bach chorale prelude on the Batman theme. Here they're largely juxtaposed but don't really mesh...
Yeah, I like the idea more than the execution, although I still get a laugh out of it.
ReplyDeleteAs I remember, it was same kind of thing with the John Zorn version (but without the humor.)
There really should be a great musical exploration of the Batman theme song out there somewhere. Anybody know of any others?
If not, maybe I'll make a proposal to Funyeti.
http://www.discretefunk.com/2009/06/sterling-smith-david-mazzucchelli.html
ReplyDeleteThere you go, Jason. I think you'd better post it on the Walrus site.
ReplyDelete