if these were submitted to a journal which published visual poetry, & the word "comics" wasn't even mentioned, I think there's a good chance they'd be published.
in other words, I think they comfortably fit into both categories of abstract comics & visual poetry.
Tim, I don't think they were intended specifically as comics. David just calls them drawings. I began by posting here the most obviously comics-like (and David has published many narrative comics in the past), but then I moved to also posting the less obviously sequential ones. Maybe if we didn't have the categories of comics or visual poetry, it would be easier to do whatever we feel like doing.
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 it is a significant historical document that may jump-start an actual new genre.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.
Personally this is his best work so far. I'm not really a fan of the other works you have posted of his.
ReplyDeleteI love "how Maps Are made"
These are my favourites so far. Love the Erie/Spaghetti one.
ReplyDeleteDraw--to each his own, but I personally love many of the ones I posted earlier.
ReplyDeleteif these were submitted to a journal which published visual poetry, & the word "comics" wasn't even mentioned, I think there's a good chance they'd be published.
ReplyDeletein other words, I think they comfortably fit into both categories of abstract comics & visual poetry.
Tim, I don't think they were intended specifically as comics. David just calls them drawings. I began by posting here the most obviously comics-like (and David has published many narrative comics in the past), but then I moved to also posting the less obviously sequential ones. Maybe if we didn't have the categories of comics or visual poetry, it would be easier to do whatever we feel like doing.
ReplyDelete