Peter Schwenger writes on "Abstract Comics and the Decomposition of Horror" in the most recent issue of Horror Studies (vol. 2 no. 2, 2011), in which he discusses my and Alexey Sokolin's pieces in the Ab Cmx Anthology, as well as Henrik Rehr's Rejkjavik, part of which was also published in the anthology. The magazine's website is here, but I see they haven't yet updated to the new issue. In case you're an academic, I should warn you the journal is unfortunately not on JSTOR (unless I'm completely clueless at searching), but you may want to see if your school library is subscribed to it. (Or, you know, contact me...)
Schwenger's article adds to the growing mass of articles on our favorite subject here. In the last few months (and I don't really know which came first!) there have also been Jan Baetens' article in Substance, a chapter on abstract comics (not to mention further discussion throughout the book) in Thierry Groensteen's new book, and my own article on abstract comics and Ditko's Spider-Man in Randy Duncan and Matt Smith's new collection, Critical Approaches to Comics. I agree with some more than others (ahem...), but I love Schwenger's approach and his conclusions. I'll try to blog about them in more detail soon.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Friday, February 24, 2012
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Moebius, from "Chaos," 1991
Drawn/painted 1989. Described in the back matter as a "non-figurative" story.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
David Greenberger Tuesday (color-coordinated album edition)
"Real Gone"
"Big Time"
"To Bring You My Love"See if you can figure out the letter code!
Monday, February 20, 2012
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Aquamorphoses, by Christophe Macquet
Hello,
Not really comics, not really abstract, but tending in both directions. Christophe Macquet has a book named Aquamorphoses consisting of a sequence of photographs of a water fountain, more precisely of the water itself taking quite amazing forms that only a camera can make aparent, since the falling water moves too quickly for the naked human eye. The book can be ordered and previewed here:
http://fr.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/2410987
Being print on demand, the price is unfortunately very high, but it is worth a look.
Not really comics, not really abstract, but tending in both directions. Christophe Macquet has a book named Aquamorphoses consisting of a sequence of photographs of a water fountain, more precisely of the water itself taking quite amazing forms that only a camera can make aparent, since the falling water moves too quickly for the naked human eye. The book can be ordered and previewed here:
http://fr.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/2410987
Being print on demand, the price is unfortunately very high, but it is worth a look.
Saturday, February 18, 2012
AC Film Festival: voyage into the Mandelbrot set
Many of you are familiar with the Mandelbrot set, I imagine. For those who are not, though, a couple of words: the set is the plotting of an iterative equation that results in a graph with the quality of self-similarity at different levels of magnification. What this means is that, no matter how close you get to it, no matter how small a portion of the plane you choose to study, it will maintain the same level of complexity. What this means is that, essentially, you can "zoom in" on it forever, and it will never resolve into simple homogenous areas. This video claims to be the deepest "zoom" into it yet.
I recommend viewing it in full screen mode (and preferably with the sound off, because, really, the chosen soundtrack adds nothing to the experience), getting really close to your screen so that it occupies all or most of your field of vision, and staring fixedly at the center of it for the duration of the clip. Trippy!
(found via Jim Woodring's Facebook page)
PS--also found via Jim, this neat, though more "representational" (of what?) variation:
Thursday, February 16, 2012
The Intercorstal Page 58
Here's Page 58 of The Intercorstal. I was having a really hard time deciding where to add ink to next -- after a while I realsied that I was having a hard time because it was pretty much finished (adding the borders to the panels highlighted a couple of extra areas which needed work, but not much).
The idea of repeating a shape each panel was inspired by a page from The Sandman: The Kindly Ones.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
David Greenberger Tuesday ($10 poster edition)
David has arranged some of his drawings into posters, which end up looking like abstract meta-comics--the layout in each original drawing becoming the abstract design in each panel here. David has identified the drawings as follows. In the first poster:
ROW 1: Adequate Desire, Ain’t My Lookout, All Shook Down, All Summer Long, Armed Forces, Astral Weeks. ROW 2: Bandstand, Beautiful Thing, Blast of Silence, Blazing Away, Blue, Braver Newer World. ROW 3: Bristlehead, Brutal Youth, Buzzle Bee, Carney, Clear Spot, Cold and Bouncy. ROW 4: Common One, Cuckooland, Distillation, Dondestan, El Rayo-X, Eleven Eleven. ROW 5: Essex Hideaway, Eventually, Face to Face, Factory Showroom, Fearless, Field Day. ROW 6: Glum, The Great Destroyer, Harmony Row, Hotel Vast Horizon, I Could Be Your Guide, In the Air. ROW 7: Into the Purple Valley, Invincible Summer, It’s Like This, Jazz in Silhouette, Jewels For Sophia, Join the Crowd. ROW 8: Just About Everything, Key Lime Pie, Kiko, Larks Tongue in Aspic, Let’s Have a Pancake!, Like This. ©2011 D. Greenberger
In the second poster:
ROW 1: Little Fugitive, Little Red Record, Luxor, Message From the Country, Modern Times, More Adventurous.. ROW 2: Music From Big Pink, The Neighborhood, The Next Hundred Years, Night-Glo, Noon Chill, Oar. ROW 3: Oranges and Lemons, Out of Our Idiot, Pet Sounds, Poses, The Prize, Red. ROW 4: Rock Bottom, The Rose of England, Scraps, Shake and Push, Shine On Brightly, Shleep. ROW 5: Social Studies, Something Else, Song Cycle, Stands For Decibels, Stereo Sound Blast, Summer Sun. ROW 6: Sweetnighter, Swordfishtrombones, Tadpoles. Talk Is Cheap, Temple of Low Men, Terrible. ROW 7: Things We Lost in the Fire, Time Out of Mind, To Run More Smoothly, Tomorrow Sound Now For Yes Music People, Tramps in Bloom, Trouble in Paradise. ROW 8: Underground, Underwater Moonlight, Unhalfbricking, West of Rome, West of the West, What Makes It Go? ©2011 D. Greenberger
A third poster by David was the first piece of his we posted here. You can get all three (each one 4-color offset printed on 100 lb gloss cover stock, 12.25" x 17.25") for $25. I'm telling you, it pays to friend him on FB!
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Sol Lewitt, wall drawings 681, 746, 842, 1993-1997
Plus bonus--wall drawing in lobby of SFMOMA, for which I don't know the number or year:
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
David Greenberger Tuesday (Fab Four edition)
"Ed Sullivan Introduced The Beatles to His Viewing Audience, They Played a Couple Songs, and Then He Spoke With Them Briefly"
"During the Fractious "Let It Be" Sessions George Quit, Later to Return"
"Quartet Mortality Status: Bonanza, Beatles, My 3 Sons, Mamas & Papas, Firesign Theater"Might as well be abstract: Spider-Man traversing air and water
From Amazing Spider-Man issues 26, 29 and 33, respectively (1965-66). Thank you, Mr. Ditko!
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Brice Marden
First three, 1985-1986; last four, from Workbook--Hydra, Tampere, N.Y.C., Bucks Co., 1987-1988
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
David Greenberger (belated) Tuesday! (Hippies vs. Squares edition)
"While Some of My Youthful Compatriots Were Practicing Guitar, Others Were Securing the Banishment of Every Trace of Humanity From Their Character"
"They're Hippies When They Want Something From You, Accountants When You Want Something From Them"
"The Aging Hippie National Anthem"
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