Will Eisner

Recently visited the Will Eisner exhibit at the BSC in Brussels.

My companion during the visit was the always nice Steven De Rie, who was warned by some fellow cartoonist not to expect much from the exhibition, since most of the samples  came from a single private collection.

I ignore what kind of show this other cartoonist expected, but the exhibit was really well done.

Sure there was a relatively little from The Spirit to see (only a handful of splash-pages) but the selections form the master's later works such as Dropsie Avenue, The Name of the Game or A Contract with God were substantial and diverse (not to mention practically the complete The Dreamer, a book that holds a very special place in my heart).

The pieces were accompanied by large panels of commentaries from the curators and some printed magazines froma all over the world.

If any criticism can be made about the exhibition is the scarcity of prep material such as sketches and/or scripts (it would have been interesting to see how the Spirit stories were plotted, scripted and then realized, especially beacuse the process involved other artists or writers).

Some more photographs may have helped too and it would have been great to have a screen or two playing excerpts from the various Eisner docs that DO exist.

Anyway, this should not be missed by any comic book lover who has the chance to visit Brussels or its surroundings.

The exhibition lasts until March the 2nd 2014. Entrance fee is 8 euros, but it buys the access to the whole museum (which is always worth the price)

PS: very very very nice chit-chat with Steven De Rie after the visit about all things comics. 

DareDevil documentary

9-parter about "The Man Without Fear" with some of his major writers and artists, including Stan Lee, John Romita, Gene Colan Frank Miller and Michael Bendis.

Alex Toth links

Alex Toth is not only a giant in Comic Book history, but also one of the most intriguing and hard-to-fathom personalities to ever work in the medium.

He is at par with Jack Kirby and Will Eisner: much like them he accompanied the american "Comic book" format from infancy to adulthood and left a lasting legacy in the field.

Many call Toth "the artist's artist". But his name deserves to known beyond the elitist community of of collectors, reviewers, cartoonists, editors and publishers.

Let"s face it: cartoonists are no movie stars. They do not even approach the level of popularity that, let's say, some big-name novelists sometimes enjoy.

In the past, when newspaper comic strips were flourishing, I guess names like of Alex Raymond, Al Capp, Mort Walker and Charles Schultz would have ringed a bell even to the most casual newspaper reader. (Walt Disney does not count)

But even in today's pop-culture-saturated environment, the average Joe would not recognize cartoonists’ names other than Frank Miller or Milo Manara (not to mention that the popularity is often country-bound).

I too was introcduced to Toth's work only in recent years, but I got immediately hooked: he was exceptionally talented but more importantly, he cared a lot about the medium.

Toth devoted a lot of time studying the craft it and perfecting his style; trying to come up with rules or even "laws" for visual storytelling and such perfectionism made him a very stern individual and hard to be around.
Some trace this ruggedness back to Toth's own teachers, who had been just as demanding.

But I guess it went beyond that. He's views about how comics should be (not only in terms of form, but also in terms of content) were really black-and-white and left no room for dispute.
He abhorred the darker and more mature curve comics took in the late 1980s.
And while that position is perfectly understandable (to a certain extent), I was scratching my head when reading his argumentations (basically comics are for kids and should be about positive values). 

(in a sense it reminds me of Steve Ditko who had also a very manichaeist view of things)
Many of his comments read like the outbursts of a grumpy old man.
But then again, he did not spare criticism on himself either: a lot of his annotated stuff point out weaknesses in his own works.

Some reports about his suicidal thoughts suggest personal demons we do not know of.

I'm very uncertain about how to write about him: I do not want to pass judgement when knowing very little about his life and Art.
YouTube has only a handful videos about him, and no interview whatsoever with the man itself.

(This DVD collection features a nice documentary)



But he remains incredibly fascinating to me, as do his proficiency, productivity and relentlessness.

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Cartoonists remember Alex Toth in this beautiful Special by Twomorrow Publishing (preview available here)

Alex Toth replied to a buddying Steve Rude (who wrote himlooking for advice on a short Jonny Quest story he was drawing) with anexcruciatingly long and harsh 20-page, panel-by-panel critique, where heabsolutely demolished Rude's work.

Toth's points are all valid (again, to a certain extent) and they denote a real passion for the craft, but the tone comes across as overall unbalanced.

A more insightful testimony comes from illustrator Bill Stout:

http://www.williamstout.com/news/journal/?p=2483
http://www.williamstout.com/news/journal/?p=2488
http://www.williamstout.com/news/journal/?p=2494

http://www.williamstout.com/news/journal/?p=2501
http://www.williamstout.com/news/journal/?p=2510

An interesting post with a very funny (and revealing) account of a meeting between Jack Kirby and Alex Toth

Must-have for anyone who wants to get to know toth is this trilogy of books.

Alberto Breccia

Alberto Breccia is one of the undisputed masters of Argentinian comics.

I must confess that if it weren’t for writer and friend Alessandro Ferrari, who suggested me to give a better look to the last Mort Cinder story (printed in an anthology collection that I lent to him!) I may have continued to consider him “one of the Argentinians”.

Breccia was a master of lighting and mood. Even if based on a very solid and “classical” drawing stile, his characters and backgrounds have a strong expressionistic look. He must also be remembered for experimenting a lot with mixed media techniques, comprising of photo collages, watercolors and zip-a-tones to create unique textures.

He has probably been a big influence on Frank Miller, both for themes (the final Mort Cinder story is a retelling of the battles of Thermopylae) and for the use of stark black and white contrasts.

An important collaboration in his life was with writer Héctor Oesterheld:  the duo collaborated on a number of series, besides Mort Cinder, and on the comic-book biography of Ernesto Che Guevara (co-illustrated by Breccia’s son, Enrique) which is generally considered the reason of Oesterheld’s disappearance in 1976.

No Excuses

Mi pareva che ci fosse una canzone che si chiamava così.
E in effetti c'è;, ma è degli Alice in Chains e dubito di conoscerla. Probabilmente la canzone che ho in mente io è un'altra che contiene la stessa espressione.

Il titolo del post siannovera nella categoria "buoni propositi/auto-redarguizioni".

Le scuse che non mi è permesso di usare sono la mancanza di tempo e di sapzio.

Bisogna scrivere e disegnare ogni giorno. Perché lo dice(va) Ray Bradbury:

"You have to write!" he would tell people. "You have to write every day! I still write every day!"

La citazione viene da un articolo di Nail Gaiman, che in numerosissime altre occasioni ha ribadito lo stesso concetto a tutti gli aspiranti scrittori.

Io non voglio essere uno scrittore, ma un fumettista, il che non mi esime dalla pratica quotidiana dello scrivere. Al contrario: mi impegna doppiamente a scrivere e a disegnare ogni giorno.

Nel libro/conversazione tra Eisner e Miller (autore quest'ultimo con sui ho dei probelmi ma che non si puó non amare proprio per questa bellissima pubblicazione), il vecchio Frank cita l'importanza dell'acquisizione di una disciplina: disegnare un certo numero di ore, sempre uguale, tutti i giorni.

Ancora questa mattina riflettevo sul perché ho sempre desiderato dare l'illustratore/fumettista. Non perché è un lavoro "figo" o "facile" (Dio sa se è difficile), ma perché se voglio anche poter vivere, avere relazioni umane significative, poter andare dal barbiere, fare la spesa, giocare coi miei figli, andare al barbecue dei vicini  e ogni tanto persino svagarmi, ecco allora devo poter disegnare durante le ore di lavoro.

Non solo: gli unici problemi  che mi sento a mio agio nel risolvere sono quelli del disegno
Qualunque altro lavoro presuppone un insieme di competenze che posso solo fingere di avere.
Davvero. La responsabilità di fare bene il mio lavoro è resa più pesante dalla paura che qualcuno prima o poi scopra che sto fingendo, che non sono un vero tecnico di computer, così come non ero un "vero cameriere", o un "vero camionista". Ci sono capitato in questi ruoli e ho cercato di recitare la parte al meglio.

Fino a quando non sarò un disegnatore professionista, dovró fare tempo per la pratica quotidiana e questo comporterà dei sacrifici.

Questi post sono un aiuto in tal senso. Mi sono accorto che scrivo male e ho il sospetto di parlare male e di conseguenza di pensare male.
Utilizzo troppo facilmente locuzioni o espressioni d'uso comune. Esagero nel tentare di creare un tono colloquiale nella mia prosa infarcendo i periodi di "dunque", "quindi", "poi" seguiti da virgole o punti di sospensione (bleah)

Che il blog diventi una palestra affinché io possa raggiungere uno stile chiaro e scorrevole e una mente agile e acuta.