blotcomics

Sketchbook drawings, November 13-December 3

2011-12-05T19:13:00.006-05:00

A selection from almost 200 drawings I've made recently in an 8 1/2 x 11 sketchbook. I took the pictures with my phone as I made them, which accounts for the variation in lighting, contrast, background, etc.

"Expedition to the Interior" on Ubuweb

2011-08-27T18:04:00.001-04:00

My piece "Expedition to the Interior" is now part of the Ubuweb visual poetry archive, and available for download as a Ubu editions pdf, at a much higher resolution than it was previously here. (It's number 010 under "Various Books, Manuscripts, Poems & Ephemera.")

(page 3)

Here is the direct link to the pdf, but really you should explore the entire archive, beautifully curated by Derek Beaulieu. Thanks, Derek!

(cross-posted with Abstract Comics)

Drawings, May-August 2011

2011-08-15T18:10:00.015-04:00

In chronological order:

30" x 22"

30" x 22"

17" x 14"

30" x 22"

17" x 14"

24" x 19"

24" x 19"

And three more sketchbook drawings from the same period:

A sequence

2011-05-28T14:41:00.006-04:00

On Monday I posted this four-page piece on Abstract Comics. I then meant to post the original art for it here, but we had a bad storm, tornado warnings, and a tree that fell on a power line, causing us to lose electricity for a day and a half. We've had a couple more blackouts since--I think the power company's infrastructure took quite a beating--but now the juice is back up and--cross my fingers--looks like it is so for good (or at least until the next thunderstorm).

Anyway, here is the art. In a Japanese (but made in China) spiral sketchbook, 162 x 225mm. I had sixteen blank pages left in it, and so I decided I would draw a sixteen-page sequence, each image building up on or somehow following on the previous ones. So it was basically an abstract comic drawn straight, with no pre-planning whatsoever, something I haven't done in a good long time. My other "constraint" was that I had to draw four pages a day, every day--which is what I did, from May 12 to May 15. A few days later I went through the whole book, adding small elements here and there to make it flow better, and I added a cover drawing. I also tore out all the unrelated pages (it was only a 20-page notebook to begin with), so now it's kind of like a little artist's book, I guess.

More sketchbook drawings, March-May 2011

2011-05-20T03:59:00.005-04:00

French laid paper sketchbook, about 296 x 209 mm.

Sometimes you just feel like hatching, part II

2011-05-11T04:23:00.005-04:00

This one's from January (but I was too busy to upload it then). 14" x 17".

Sketchbook pages, Oct. 2010-April 2011

2011-05-06T04:36:00.017-04:00

In chronological order; selected from two sketchbooks, 11" x 14" each. I could only post the ink drawings; snapshots of all the pencil drawings did not come out very well. I'll have to scan those and do another post.

My work in the "Party Crashers" show at the Arlington Arts Center

2010-12-12T17:06:00.008-05:00

Moving Stripes and TTID Fugue (for Bruce Conner) (digital animations, 2010 and 2009, respectively):

Original art from my Ruins project (ink on paper, 2008, 2010):

"Two of the Missing Pages from The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym" (ink on paper, 2008):

For more info on the show, see here.

You are invited...

2010-09-05T22:29:00.001-04:00

More specifically, this is at Franklin College, in Franklin, IN, just outside of Indianapolis.

(cross-posted with Abstract Comics)

One more sketchbook page

2010-08-17T04:57:00.003-04:00

...because sometimes you just feel like hatching.

Monsterland Revisited

2010-08-11T00:31:00.002-04:00

Sketchbook pages, July-August 2010

2010-08-10T00:58:00.005-04:00

In chronological order, July 18-August 5:

Each page 11" x 14". Many of them were drawn in pencil and I had to darken then somewhat in photoshop so as to make them readable on the web.

Sketchbook drawing, 8/6/2010

2010-08-09T05:00:00.000-04:00

Erase strip

2010-06-23T02:31:00.001-04:00

Asemics

2010-06-22T04:31:00.004-04:00

I've been posting a number of my asemic works of the last few years on Satu Kaikonen's blog foffof. Some of these you may have seen before, but I think they look better in these versions.

(Actually, I'm not sure the top two images qualify as "asemic" at all. But they seemed to fit in with the general groove at foffof.)

For the full-size images, go here.

Toward a new "24 x 24"

2010-06-17T22:51:00.008-04:00

As I mentioned in my last post, I seem to be continuing to work in the "24 x 24" format. Here, gathered together, are the strips I have so far that might go into a "24 x 24" part II. In order:
"You Shall Become a Part of Your New Moon," "Explosion"
"Just So Story," "Betty's Walk"
"Amoebas 2," "Imbroglio"
"Greenhouse" 1 and 2
"Fossil Flood" 1 and 2
I'm only showing them side by side to get a sense of the work so far; in the final version most of them will be probably paired with other pieces. By the way, I'm not planning to work on this in a concerted manner currently--I am focusing on other projects, but I know this format so well that every once in a while I just find myself making one of these pages. I think I'll let it grow organically, rather than push it.

"Betty's Walk," above, is of course the black and white portion of the color "Betty's Walk." Also in similar format, but impossible to convert to black and white, is "Blue Growth 2":

Fossil flood

2010-06-17T16:58:00.001-04:00

I thought I was done with the format of "24 x 24" after I published "Nautilus," but obviously I'm building up toward a second series...

Party down!

2010-05-12T04:55:00.003-04:00

A couple of nights ago, I drew this doodle:

As I was drawing it, I realized that some of the marks were looking representational, so I kind of began to emphasize that, while trying to keep it basically abstract--to represent the spirit of, umm, "partying down" without showing any actual recognizable shapes.

Then I decided to see how an actual representational drawing using the same composition would look, so I basically re-traced the shapes by turning them into cartoony images, then colored it:

Imbroglio--a sketch

2010-05-04T04:05:00.003-04:00

2010-05-04T03:43:00.001-04:00

Southern cross

2010-05-03T06:37:00.002-04:00

Here

A rearrangement of this earlier post.

In case you're wondering, inadvertentproject.blogspot.com is an old blog I had used for a brief project, which I have revamped into a bare-bones site in order to show some of these animations with no interference. It is essentially an adjunct of this blog, which is why you can't leave comments there. I'm just using it to get as blank and neutral a setting as possible.

Flashing Albers Squares

2010-05-02T15:23:00.000-04:00

Again, see it here.

(Try focusing on one square at a time, and see how your experience of the work changes based on the square you choose. And, again, strobe warning.)

Gray on gray

2010-05-02T07:47:00.005-04:00

Umm, I wasn't crazy about how this post looked on this blog, so see here.

(If the image is too big for your monitor, you can zoom out, under "view" in your browser--if you use Firefox, at least.)

2010-04-16T04:15:00.008-04:00

I figured that, since this blog is called Blotcomics, I should finally get back to doing something with blots, or blobs.

2010-04-16T02:08:00.002-04:00

2010-04-11T23:53:00.007-04:00

2010-04-11T05:53:00.001-04:00

Greenhouse

2010-04-06T05:06:00.001-04:00

Original art for "Expedition to the Interior" in NeoIntegrity show at MoCCA

2010-03-22T23:58:00.001-04:00

(cross-posted, more or less, with Abstract Comics)

I just got back from spring break in NYC, where I went to see the newly opened NeoIntegrity show (specifically, "NeoIntegrity: The Comics Edition"), curated by Keith Mayerson, at MoCCA. Despite MoCCA's tight confines, the show is huge, including 250 or so artists from Winsor McCay, Harvey Kurtzman and Jack Kirby to, well, me! Designed to foreground the closeness and areas of overlap between comics and the gallery art world, the show also includes sequential and cartoon work from artists such as Peter Halley, Carol Dunham, H.C. Westermann, and many others. (Here is a review of the first NeoIntegrity show, from 2007, which gives you a flavor of the curatorial approach.)

Here is the original art for my 2005 piece "Expedition to the Interior," right under Kirby!

In the second picture you can also see, in the same row as the two top Kirbys, a Dr. Seuss cartoon; and, oh yeah, in the case next to them, those are puppets by Tim Burton for "Corpse Bride." Around the corner are a piece by Gary Panter and, above it, some drawings of Wild Things by Maurice Sendak. Nice company to be in!

Colorization!

2010-03-12T23:56:00.000-05:00

So I found myself sitting with a copy of my book Nautilus and a box of markers. This is what happened...

frontispiece:

first page of 24 x 24:

front endpaper:

Back cover--you will notice this isn't quite finished. The cover is quite glossy, and the marker ink is not so much setting in as hardening into sticky goo... I may have to rethink this:

Amoebas 2 and Blue Growth

2010-02-19T13:52:00.000-05:00

Cave wall

2010-01-14T16:51:00.001-05:00

Interiors (with Jerrold Shiroma) animated

2010-01-12T17:31:00.000-05:00

A panel-by-panel version of a page I did about 2 1/2 years ago, to explore its rythms. The words are from a poem by Jerrold Shiroma. Each panel is set to 1.5 seconds. See here.

Sketchbook pages, August 2009-January 2010

2010-01-03T00:26:00.000-05:00

I have recently found myself keeping a regular sketchbook for the first time in years, if not decades. This probably was related to all the running around I had to do this past year in connection with the anthology, "Nautilus," and the show, and to the need to just doodle (more or less) mindlessly, or at least to be able to draw in a more relaxed manner, without all the stringent planning and care required in the making of an abstract comic. Here, then, for your delectation, are some pages from my sketchbooks, drawn between late August and just the other day.

That last page, by the way, was drawn for my son Alex, in the wee small hours of the morning after his fifth birthday.

Guest Artist Alex Molotiu, part 2

2009-12-22T03:02:00.001-05:00

Alex will turn 5 on New Year's Eve.

19 December 2009

Early November 2009

Late October 2009

2009-12-21T07:12:00.000-05:00

Untitled Object

2009-12-20T01:33:00.000-05:00

Ka-boom!

2009-12-17T05:08:00.000-05:00

Corsica

2009-10-28T16:33:00.000-04:00

I suggest listening to this while watching the above. Just turn it on then scroll back up:

Alternate soundtrack:

Alternate alternate soundtrack:

(Feel free to mix and match--the last two work particularly well together.)

Oh, wait. Alternate alternate alternate soundtrack:

I could keep going...

Vloom

2009-10-10T05:31:00.001-04:00

For Bruce Conner

2009-09-19T06:54:00.000-04:00

For E.B. (and A.S.)

2009-09-17T04:07:00.001-04:00

"Flow" by Paul Pereira

2009-09-08T00:43:00.001-04:00

I received from Paul Pereira, who has recently been doing some pretty abstract comics, a poem based on my piece, "Flow":

Here it is:

Flow

The faces crawled down the wall
like an echo of the first sludge
yawning, constricted
primal lava memory

ocean tension
channeling the together
rushing forth into a human cycle
the first signs of anima

the skeletons picked and chose
the seers watch from the first of eyes

and they saw the holes in the faces
of caves in the skull of the mount

then the crevices of the gods opened
like the abysmal jaw extending
inviting
pulling into black hole

into the heart of the great egg
the seed of first lifeform

the point of no return
phoenix rising like the first moon

and with it
the monolith rose

the sleeping dragon stirred

guardians, toads, beetle, claws
archetypal activation

bringing forth the moth from flames

to greet the first man, whom they saw as fluid, serpentine gods.

Thanks, Paul!!

Animation dump

2009-09-07T23:54:00.000-04:00

As you can tell, I've been toying with animation lately. Here are a few silly exercises I've done in the last few days, that I may or may not get back to in the future to expand.

Trying to figure out what an animated abstract comic would be like. This is not it. But you can call it "The Cheetos Dance" if you wish.

Animated version of my remix of a page by Jukka-Pekka Kervinen.

Oh, look, it goes round and round! I probably should have timed this to the beat of a trance track, then it would make more sense.

2009-09-06T01:04:00.000-04:00

2009-09-05T01:10:00.001-04:00

Flow

2009-09-04T18:38:00.001-04:00

Here is a non-animated version of same:

In case anyone is interested...

2009-07-25T20:48:00.000-04:00

... in what I have to say about art, rather than the art I make, I have found myself writing more than I have in months in the comments to this post by Geoff Grogan (one of the Abstract Comics anthology contributors) one the new blog started by him and Kevin Mutch. It's about art history and comics' place within it, about modernism and postmodernism and radical critique and all that fun stuff...

Some "Nautilus" dedication doodles

2009-07-17T00:39:00.001-04:00

I thought it might be fun to show some of the doodles I draw in copies of "Nautilus." (FYI, I have digitally removed the names of the dedicatees and my signatures.)

Creepy crawlies

2009-07-15T04:59:00.000-04:00

Underwhirl, final version (for now)

2009-07-15T04:58:00.000-04:00

and a couple of details:

The road to "Underwhirl"

2009-07-10T05:37:00.000-04:00

A couple of nights ago, Mike Getsiv posted this strip, "Whirlover," at the Abstract Comics blog.

I felt like playing around with it, so I downloaded it, then freely traced it, drawing each panel in one continuous line:

I then proceeded to draw over this, turning the abstract shapes into more concrete forms:

Then I redrew it all over again, regularizing the panel borders and playing around with two colors:

Finally, since I wasn't sure it actually read like a comic, I thought I'd add words that might prompt the reader to see some connection from panel to panel and an overall arc to the story:

And I may still not be done with it...

Thanks to Mike for allowing me to muck around with his drawing!

Patriotic superheroes!!

2009-07-03T15:55:00.000-04:00

Ok, this has NOTHING to do with abstract comics, but I contributed two superheroes to Chris Duffy's Fourth of July project--one that I created all by myself, and another created by my wife, and which I just drew.

Enjoy!!

L.A. suburban (abstract) strip

2009-06-28T05:22:00.000-04:00

A continuation of the "The world is an abstract comic" pieces I did last summer. Have I mentioned lately that I love L.A.?

"You shall become a part of your wild moon!"

2009-06-18T05:59:00.000-04:00

If you picked up my tiny giveaway at MoCCA, this was titled differently, but that line from the new Fletcher Hanks book is too perfect not to use.

This was one of the pieces I began, but never finished, for 24 x 24. So I decided to finally finish it.

In case you missed it, in a recent interview (toward the end), I discussed the process I used to make the pages for 24 x 24. In this new spirit of openness, here is the original source drawing for "Wild Moon":

Drawn in the spring of 1987, when I was 19. Charcoal on paper, about 5 ft x 4 ft. Since I began working on "Wild Moon" in 2007, and only completed it a few weeks ago, this must be the longest-gestating piece I've ever made.

Admittedly, in this case I violated my own self-imposed rules (as stated in the interview) by keeping the central hexagon more or less together.

Where to find my comics (in printed form)

2009-06-13T01:13:00.000-04:00

Well, as I mentioned, Nautilus is out now:

If you're in Europe, you can order it directly from the publisher, Fahrenheit, or via whatever online bookstore they have in Denmark (though I understand it will not be officially out until June 29 there). If you're in the States, I have a limited number of copies, so contact me directly. (48 pages, b & w, 12.5" x 8" hardcover)

Some of my comics (8 pages in color, to be precise), are of course also in Abstract Comics: The Anthology:

--which is coming out very very soon.

Then there is:

Divide et Impera, 2009, edited by Pedro Moura and Warren Craghead. 10 pages of my stuff (including one in color), as well as 10 pages each by six other artists. Plus bios, critical essay, etc. Includes a six page preview of my next project, "Ruins."

Blurred Vision 4. 2008. Contains my eight pager, "Expedition to the Interior" (now collected in Nautilus) plus an artist's statement trying to explain what I was trying to do in it.

The Out of Sequence catalogue, for the Out of Sequence traveling museum show (which is still traveling--it will be at Keene State College in NH next). This one's a bit tricky: it intersperses entire pages and individual panels from "Expedition" and from my piece, "The Panic" (now in the Abstract Comics anthology) with pages and panels by other artists in the show, so that the catalogue itself becomes like a long, collage-y comic. (If you go see the show, by the way, it contains all eight pages of the original art to "Expedition," and a large print of "The Panic.")

Asemic 5, 2008, edited by Tim Gaze. Contains 6 1/3 pages of abstract comics and asemic writing by me, mostly unavailable anywhere else. Also contains a brilliant abstract comics strip by my son, Alex, which he drew at the ripe old age of 2 years and 2 months.

Bile Noire 16, published by Atrabile, Switzerland, 2007. Contains, in the abstract comics section edited by Ibn al Rabin, three pages of my comics, of which one is collected in Nautilus.

Then there are my minis, which are mostly sold out (indeed, one of them, "An Abstract Life," I couldn't even find a single copy to scan, so I had to scan it from the paste-ups):

"Extemporanea," vol. 1 (!), 2003. 12 pages of bizarre, but mostly pre-abstract, comics. Giveway for the St. Louis Comic Fest.

"Yam Seal Land," 2003, 24 pages plus covers. Also mostly pre-abstract. A trippy trip through imaginary landscapes.

"Blots," 2003, 28 pages plus covers. Probably my earliest proper abstract comic, mostly a panel a page.

"Alcoholalia," 2004. As the label explains, a 24-page (plus covers) remix of a single "Maakies" strip by Tony Millionaire.

"An Abstract Life," 2004, 24 pages plus covers. Abstract and semi-abstract comics.

"The Panic expedition," 32 pages plus covers. This is by far the rarest of them all. I made this expensively printed, mostly color mini as an SPX 2006 giveaway to people I hoped would publish me. It contains "The Panic" (now in the anthology), "Expedition," (now in Nautilus), "Caves," (now in the anthology), a couple of pages that appeared later in Bile Noire 16 and Asemic 5, plus a few still uncollected comics.

Additionally, I made minis of "Expedition" in 2006, and an untitled mini in 2008, which have now both been collected in Nautilus.

One more thing: I had pieces in Shiot Crock between 2003 and 2006--specifically in issues 6, 7, 8 and 10 (the last one of which I also edited). Good luck finding copies!

"Blots, Blobs & Splashes," University of Louisville, 2005

2009-06-12T06:31:00.000-04:00

I don't think I ever linked to the essay on my work that was written on the occasion of my 2005 show at the Belknap Gallery, University of Louisville.

Here is the text of the essay, by U of L art history professor Jay Kloner:

AN APPRECIATION

Andrei Molotiu writes imagery in the visual language of Hokusai, Pollock, Adobe Photoshop and comics. He brings together high and low, tradition and deconstruction, Zen and analysis, mapping and chaos by erasing their differences in multi-dimensional frames of time, space and form. As a result he takes us on a voyage where we can see facets and emblems of adaptive energy flows in Animism and science.

He has profound respect for excellence of graphic marking, which can be viewed as primal writing. His handling of ink ranges from Zen immediacy to deliberate care in remaking cold computer contours into breathing lines. He employs Pollock's expressive currents and chance inventions of computer transformations.

His interest in Hokusai is part of his broader appreciation of Asian art and its deeply held beliefs about the preeminence of nature. The life force in Hokusai's renderings of energy in all things, among other sources, moves him to value new techniques for recreating experience. These are techniques developed in Chinese and Japanese art over centuries of time. Frames are not frames but margins, leading to other margins. Objects are points of reference in a continuum of references. This is a cinematic recital in books, which ultimately evolves into forms of film and video.

He is fascinated in differing perspectives with the entire spectrum of comics, which he collects and integrates, consciously and unconsciously, with his own art. It is not an accident that most Japanese prints were perceived in their own country, in their own day, as roughly comparable to our view of comics or advertising today. It is also not accidental that he is drawn to original renderings of comic strips where the incredible, and unappreciated, control of pen and brush is sophisticated.

Andrei Molotiu has developed an aesthetic theory where beauty is inherent in the process of deconstruction. New perceptions grow out of absences, and beauty informs becoming. Art outside the canon can open observations in previous voids. An example of this is the way comics disclose new changing spaces across frames. Different continuities of space and form, across neighboring frames, create multiple dimensions and simultaneities of space-time. These contradict normal experiences of narrative, expanding perception.

These increased dimensions reflect a realm of fluid time akin to elisions in Mallarmé's poetry or Bergson's sense of duration. They also reflect Chinese and Japanese landscape rendering where absence is more important and presence, and possibilities are more significant than definitions. Zen enters these streams of becoming, which Andrei Molotiu inflects with all the new process theories of interconnectedness in experience and the world.

Jay Kloner
October 2005

It's alive!!! (Part 1)

2009-06-10T04:53:00.000-04:00

Alive and on my porch table, leaning against a preview copy of the Abstract Comics anthology:

How Jog describes it: Plus, he had a new solo book for sale... from Danish publisher Fahrenheit, an oversized album format hardcover collecting three pieces: Expedition to the Interior (from Blurred Vision Vol. 4); 24 x 24: A Vague Epic (a fittingly titled suite of 24 titled one-pagers subdivided into 24 panels each); and [otherwise untitled]. A compact, attractive introduction to the artist's work.

I have a limited number of copies of "Nautilus" (straight off the boat from Copenhagen) that I will sell, for $20 plus postage. Email me if you're interested (address is in my profile).

Gary Panter dixit

2009-06-10T01:11:00.000-04:00

...during his panel at MoCCA (at about 00:24:28):

"And Andrei Molotiu is here with his abstract comic-book today, if you catch him around on the floor, he has like a very slick abstract comics. And there are people who wonder if there’s a reason for that. Wonder! It’s good to wonder. It’s good to argue. We don’t all need to have the same opinion, do we? Luckily my opinion’s right."

Oh, if only the panel hadn't been at the end of the second day. Maybe I would have sold more books...

Thanks, Gary!

Interview about the anthology and Nautilus

2009-06-09T16:21:00.001-04:00

by Shaun Manning, at Comic Book Resources, right here.

Nautilus--the title page

2009-06-03T20:24:00.000-04:00

Some horn-tooting (if I may)

2009-06-03T04:01:00.000-04:00

(cross posted with the abstract comics blog)

I mentioned in my earlier post my book Nautilus that is debuting at MoCCA:

The red strip with the title is actually a band around the hardcover. On the back of the band are these two blurbs:

"Andrei Molotiu's comics are absolute marvels: hotbeds of evolving ambiguity where one never knows what disturbing or witty interaction between abstraction of objects and objects of abstraction is about to take place. Each time I've opened them I've been utterly absorbed, that is, drawn into places where I had no power other than to become what I was looking at. What he does is superb."
--Harry Mathews

"I love artists that break the rules and Andrei Molotiu breaks them all, with mind-bending and beautiful results."
--Scott McCloud

MoCCA and art show reception

2009-06-02T00:01:00.000-04:00

(crossposted with abstract comics blog)

If you're in the NYC area, please come to the closing reception for my show, "24 x 24: A Vague Epic," at ArtLexis Gallery in Brooklyn, this Thursday:

The reception will also serve as a book party of sorts for my brand new book, "Nautilus":

Anthology contributor and fellow ArtLexis artist, Henrik Rehr, will also be on hand with his brand new book "Rejkjavik" (published by Fahrenheit Editions, Copenhagen, as a twin to "Nautilus"). So it'll be a book part of sorts for his book too!!

If you come to MoCCA on Saturday or Sunday, "Nautilus" and "Rejkjavik" (each hardcover, 12.5" X 8", 48 pages) will be available at the Fahrenheit table.

Also at MoCCA, if you stop by the Fanta table, you can see preview copies of:

Also, PODGallery/Blurred Books is putting out a portfolio of my prints, and I [i]think[/i] they'll have a preview copy of it with them. Here is a view of some of the prints as currently on exhibit at ArtLexis:

And, if you're at MoCCA, stop and say hi! I will be at one of those three tables, or else they'll be able to tell you when I'm coming back...

"24 x 24: A Vague Epic" is now up at ArtLexis

2009-04-10T16:20:00.000-04:00

click the image for more pics

TTID

2009-04-08T04:59:00.000-04:00

A "remix" of Bruce Conner's "Totem Time in Dreamland":

Here is a first version, which I first posted here, with a bit of explanation:

Take a rock and make it complicated

2009-04-03T06:24:00.000-04:00

or, fifteen minutes in Photoshop. Based on a suggestion on a message board by a fellow whose name I now forget (the entirety of his suggestion is in the title of this post), who also provided the picture of the rock.

New blog and show

2009-04-03T06:13:00.001-04:00

To celebrate the imminent arrival of "Abstract Comics: The Anthology" I've started a new group blog dedicated to all things abstract comics. Please check it out: abstractcomics.blogspot.com.

There I posted the ensemble view of my colored versions of the 24 x 24 pages, which will be exhibited at ArtLexis beginning Monday. I'll post it here too:

And if you want to see the color choices without the distraction of all those pesky panels and shapes, here they are:

Keep in mind that on the wall they will be all in one row, and if I ever publish them in color in book form you would only get to see two colors at a time, or maybe even just one.

Announcing... a show

2009-03-17T18:18:00.001-04:00

I just got the proof for the invite, which you see here.

More info later.

A quick thought

2009-03-17T05:00:00.000-04:00

I spent almost five hours tonight working on a certain design feature for the Abstract Comics anthology (the great Jacob Covey of Fantagraphics is designing it, but I'm advising/vetting/assisting). Until you hold it in your hands, you'll have no idea how amazingly cool this book will be.

Just sayin'.

"Brief introduction to the abstract strip"

2009-03-13T02:57:00.000-04:00

So imagine my surprise when I found a piece of mine featured as the cover illustration for an article on abstract comics by Sebastien Conard, in the Belgian "Plots" magazine:

(I found it here.)

Surprise especially since I wasn't asked permission to use it--permission which I would have immediately given, btw, and also would have provided a better file for the piece than the one that I suppose they downloaded from this very blog (since it hasn't been published anywhere else yet).

Now, I can't speak Flemish (or is that Dutch? The journal's website has as the two language options "Nederlands" and English) to save my life, but I found online an article by the same author, on the same subject--and all evidence leads me to believe it is the very same piece. So, without further ado, I provide you with a terrible computer translation of it (On the other hand, if you imagine it as a stylistic descendant of Finnegans Wake, it might even have a certain charm, and be oddly appropriate):

Strips, allegedly still an art but if a loud, public mud. The fancier word story moffelt trouble with the uncomfortable throat sound way. Abstract strips than a topic for people with too much time? No doubt, but where was any art direction without its own (sensible) avant-garde? Consider this special exponents of the experimental story and dare you to this brief introduction to the STRIP ABSTRACT.

By Sebastien Conard

As the film is a form of popular entertainment as a child none of press rolls and newsprint, long remained a comic strip for the under inartistic people, morons, children and the illiterate. The wrikt is however independent of this image and after the revolution of the 60s there is a mature story. In the mature work after May'68 (the "graphic novel" included) is however what substance until the French 'nouvelle vague' from early 90s the new medium inblaast. On the menu are somewhat less weightiness and a no-nonsense approach to both young and old. Rising star was' L'Association, including David B., Blain, Blutch, Sfar and Lewis Trondheim ubiquitous. An introduction to abstract visual can without embarrassment 'to this centipede begin. The man has for years had an eye for everything in the strip of grass moving and ventured to many. Moreover, he was a central figure of the 'oubapo (ouvroir the bande dessinée potentielle) as the experimental counterpart of the' oulipo (ouvroir the littérature potentielle): all kinds of creative Spielerei based on shape restrictions.

Bleu (Trondheim)

In 2003, Trondheim steal a small blue booklet: 'Bleu'. This apparent sequence from one another takeover, repellent and split income amoebas applies now as a classic in the genre of abstract strip. The genre is so far distant origin in a funny eenpaginagag Maurice Rosy in stripblad Spirou and some psychedelic SF (s) breaks master Giraud / Moebius in the magazine Chaos (1989).

El Lissitzky

On bulledair.com is itself refers to "About 2 squares, a 12-piece set of compositions constructivist El Lissitzky (1922). How could it otherwise than in the Russian avant-garde start? After 'Bleu' to Trondheim in 2006 "La nouvelle Pornographie from, another abstract, formal sex game that he, as it were from inside the female body looks.

La Nouvelle Pornographie (Trondheim)

Again pretty funny but not particularly exciting. Moreover, the abstract to the extent that it is minimalist and only read a certain code is required to fully understood. Something similar applies for TNT and America 'by Jochen Gerner (2002) and "Poor Indian' Tom Lambeens (2008). The first is an exercise which Gerner oubapo the pages of Hergé's Tintin and America 'fully dyed black but there uitspaarde text on the modern, violent society of the USA. The original color planes he saved only icons that relate to the already saved words. In Lambeens’ In Lambeens' Poor Indian 'can enjoy the repetitive sequences and the detailed layout uitgedokterde the full reading required here cracking a code.

Ibn al Rabin

But let us back in time: early 2000 Trondheim contributes to the visual escapades of Ibn al Rabin and konsoorten. With 'L'Association gradually depopulated by the lokroep of commercial publishers, profiles the Swiss' Atrabile' as a fresher and younger group. Since the thirteenth number (2003) of their stripblad 'Bile Noire' maintains strip minimalist Ibn al Rabin a chapter abstract strip. In addition to Trondheim and Ibn al Rabin car Frederik Peeters, Guy Delisle, Andreas Health and others at the genre. Yet they all continue to fluctuate around the same idea and they merely abstract figuration. That they are not so far from the surreal strips Silvestre, Olivier Marboeuf and others in the publishing arty Frémok. In both cases you get strips of geometric figures fulfill the role of characters and dialogue with each other (with or without text). Moreover, beyond the image of a rare follow-up series animation stills (snapshots).

Andrei Molotiu

Jessie Bi, Stéphane Girod and Mark Staff Brandl make everything work crazier but it is truly fascinating with Andrei Molotiu, an American who for some exercise on blotcomics.blogspot.com. His abstraction beyond the grid of boxes, because usually is a comic page Molotiu is an abstract composition. Similarly, the strips of Bruno Schaub (Brusche) on bdabstraite.canalblog.com. You get the story right? Then maybe you get expert 'le Carré de fait du ski Malevich, how over a white page displays ... You do not have to strip so as Malevich original.

Greg Shaw-Veuve Poignet

All these examples are rare abstraction of sequentialiteit itself. In other words, they have replaced the familiar figures within the frameworks more geometric shapes but hardly play with the actual sequence of multiple image frames on a page. See also the beautiful 'Popeye and Olive "by Richard McGuire (Cornelius, 2001): a minimalist pop art treatment of the silhouettes of the classic American comic strip couple. But again limits the abstraction to figuration. Where do we or those extracted sequentialiteit? Greg Shaw was one passage in there and let Atrabile 'Walk pictorial' (2005) after. This change gepixeleerde planes of color and in their mutual relations, while the layout of the framework evolves. (Who incidentally means of pixels must agree to practice the abstract machine strip of Health: www.darksite.ch/kundig/abstrait/automatique.php ) The Brussels'5 e Couch 'brought Greg Shaw than Veuve Poignet (2006) from another step further. It reduces the interaction between text and the sequence of images to a minimum abstract. By reading the rows color boxes to connect to a text legend, he plays with the basic codes of the story. Indeed, a series of images will only significant due to the accompanying text and vice versa. That this book an ode to masturbation and is thematically close to 'La nouvelle Pornographie' is doing some suspicion that one of Greg Shaw Trond Heim many passers-double is. (See also the online mysteries around the blogs and Frantico Jerry Tongdeum).

In addition to these formal abstractions, the visual experiments at the level of text and narrative. Even with figurative and very classic, realistic forms a strip in abstract texts and story structure. Trondheim supplied with a Menu on in that direction. 'Moins d'un quart the second pour vivre (1990) was a oubapo exercise of the first hour on the same sort of images in each sequence and to provide appropriate text. Yet the real perfect example of abstract narrative 'The Cage' (1975) by Martin Vaughn-James: a succession of perfectly readable snapshots off brokkelde and shiver ran interiors, subtitled by an independent text only atmosphere in relation to the images. The story is entirely abstract, emotional and character-based but carved in shape realistic still lifes. Here are the authors of Fremok report worthy. In their article stie kereteken strips often we find a preference for the abstract language of colors and textures back. However, the images are usually figurative and already read. The texts and storylines, however poetic, indirect or even hermetically. Today, the experimental Matière publishing the work of Yuichi Yokoyama, who with only slightly abstract images very abstract stories offers.

Yuichi Yokoyama

In 'Travaux publics' (2004),' Combat '(2004) and "Voyage" (2005) provides futuristic Yokoyama pressing and public works, conflicts and travel. The images are clear (a workman is a workman, a spaceship a spaceship, etc.) but the story leads nowhere or in other words abstract. His strips are also full of Japanese onomatopeeën, dynamic movement lines and detail shots, so he creates a timeless image of an out of modernity.

The term abstract swallowed all the same difficulties as the situations in which it is applied. Often seems an excuse for artistic charlatans and other Kramers of hot air. Because air or at least a little lightness, there is the question. Ibn al Rabin: 'C’est un truc amusant sur lequel on peut faire plein d’essais et qui en plus permet de s’offrir une contenance en cocktail en balançant des explications bourrées de mots plus grands que soi'(Bile Noire, Atrabile, 2006) that the general public it is sometimes difficult, especially when it comes to comics as a popular child is, is probably the lack of tangibility. Because if the abstraction is to extract the visible reality, the concrete and tangible, as there is still about?

That reference to "other Kramers of hot air" is priceless, isn't it? (Oh, yeah, I should mention that the things that look like intertitles are actually stand-ins for illustrations. It's too much of a pain to put those in, so you'll just have to follow the link to the original article to see them.)

The article had two comments. The first one, by "willem gay," says:

I like experimental strips. But this is something I am too far. Sometimes in a cold I think such things in my handkerchief, after the blow of my nose. No thanks, I'm for this kind experimlenten apparently not yet ready.

And here's the author's reply:

Then, best Gay, I urge you strongly to be creative to deal with your handkerchiefs. Not washing please!

Ha! Good one!

(Actually, I should say that it seems--through the fog of that translation--that Sebastien says nice things about me, and for that I thank him. But, honestly, dude, I could have provided a better, hi-res file. Come on!)

Oh yeah, one more comment: both Greg Shaw and Lewis Trondheim are in "Abstract Comics: The Anthology," I have dealt with both via email, and as far as I can tell they are definitely two distinct individuals.

Divide et Impera catalogue

2009-03-10T22:40:00.000-04:00

Pedro has posted at the "Impera et Divide" show blog a brief video of the catalogue, "Divide et Impera." Here it is--if you pay attention, you may even notice a page of "Ruins" (i.e. my interminable project) that I never posted here:

Jackson's Frankenstein Redrawn

2009-03-09T03:49:00.000-04:00

To make up for the frivolity of the previous post:

(clickable)

This one is currently in the Charlottesville show. I drew it especially for Warren C. and his family.

The one piece of "Watchmen" merchandising I couldn't resist

2009-03-08T23:10:00.000-04:00

Get it? "Blot" comics? Get it?

In other news, the anthology is currently in the capable design & production hands of Jacob Covey and Paul Baresh at Fantagraphics. It won't be long now...

Yet another show! "Impera et Divide" in Charlottesville, VA

2009-03-05T06:43:00.000-05:00

(And I'm not even done for the first half of the year--there's one more to come later this Spring.)

The group show "Impera et Divide" is opening on Friday at the Second Street Gallery, in Charlottesville, VA. The show features work by Frédéric Coché, Ae-Rim Lee, André Lemos, Ilan Manouach, Fåbio Zimbres and yours truly, and was curated by Warren Craghead and Pedro Moura. For more information, see the show blog, and the gallery's website. The opening is tomorrow from 6 to 8. Unfortunately, I can't make it to the opening, but I will be at the gallery on Thursday, March 19, discussing the show with Warren as part of the Virginia Festival of the Book. (I'm not listed as a participant, I see, but I will definitely be there, at Warren's invitation).

Here are a couple of photos of my pieces lying on the floor prior to installation, courtesy (I think) of Warren's cell phone:

(And yes, I know that the first image there I haven't yet posted on this blog. I will try to do so soon.)

Ink

2009-02-13T06:44:00.000-05:00

Madrepores

2009-02-06T03:59:00.001-05:00

"Out of Sequence" in Denver--correction!

2009-01-28T15:37:00.000-05:00

I was wrong--it turns out that "Out of Sequence" hadn't opened yet, it's only opening tonight:

http://www.belmarlab.org/ex_outofsequence.php

Do click on that link--it features a detail of one of my pieces in the show. And have I mentioned that there are some pretty cool reproductions of my work in the catalog (which is like a work of art itself)?

Also--it's 5280 Mag's "Best Art Bet."

In case you've been wondering...

2009-01-14T06:07:00.000-05:00

All the materials for my book, Nautilus, are as of tonight off to the publisher. (Well, unless he wants me to design new endpapers. Which I might do anyway.)

Now I'll turn to fixing the final details on the anthology.

So it'll still be a while till you see any new art here.

In the meantime, I'll leave you with an installation view of my pieces in the "Out of Sequence" show at the Krannert, which I don't think I ever got around to posting. The show has already moved to the Lab at Belmar, in Denver--so if you live around there, please check it out.

"Betty's Walk" in Blurred Vision show at ArtLexis

2008-12-15T17:07:00.000-05:00

The good folks at ArtLexis have put up photos of their inaugural show and of the opening reception. I'm shamelessly hotlinking to the installation photos of my very large (73" x 50") print of "Betty's Walk":

Thanks, Kevin, Alex and Melissa!

By the way, because the opening reception happened to coincide with a Nor'easter that hit NYC, there will be a "do-over and Holiday party at the gallery from 3-6pm on Saturday December 20th." I still can't be there, but would kill for some of that egg nog...

Kirby fluke

2008-12-15T01:05:00.000-05:00

So, I've been digitally inking this Kirby piece... It's going very slowly (the inking you see so far has taken me at least four hours of work). Anyway, I clicked some button by mistake and got this weird halo effect. It's kind of cool, so I thought I'd post it, especially since, given how slowly it's going, I may never actually finish inking the whole piece:

In case you're wondering, I'm inking it digitally a) to get used to my new Wacom tablet, and b) because I adore Kirby, but whenever I've tried to ink some of his work before with real ink on paper (from scans, on a lightbox), I've ended throwing up my hands in disgust. Every line has to be just perfect--I have no idea how Mike Royer did it. This way I can erase each stroke 10 times before I get it anywhere near right--and that's why it's been taking so long.

It has a bit of a "Large Glass" effect about it, don't you think?

P.S. Here it is without Kirby's pencils:

Narrative Corpse!!

2008-12-12T16:07:00.001-05:00

I participated in the recently finished Narrative Corpse. Here is page 1 and page 2 of my (very atypical) contribution... And here are a couple of my other favorite contributors:

Mat Brinkman (first of his four pages)

Warren Craghead (first of his two)

and, finally, Fufu Frauenwahl's fantastic finale!! (first of four)

And keep in mind that most of the pencils and all of the inks for my contribution were done in one night... I really have to go back and re-ink that sucker.

ink drawings, ca. 1990-92, part 2

2008-12-05T12:37:00.000-05:00

As you can see, the main building bricks of my abstract vocabulary at this point were: loose, Zen inspired, flying-ink/broken-ink brushtsrokes; Rorschach blots; and blots carefully drawn to look as if spontaneous, and also similarly drawn blot-like lines around the genuinely spontaneous part of the images. I liked that dichotomy between genuinely spontaneous and only apparently spontaneous--the real blot and the fake blot--and it has stayed with me ever since. My primary influences were Jackson Pollock and Zen calligraphy but also, to be honest, the first and last pages of the sixth issue of "Watchmen." Overall, though, I would say I was trying to do a kind of Zen painting that questioned the demand for simple spontaneity that you find in traditional Zen art theory.

Edit: looking again at the images, I can't help but feel that the main influence on the first one in this post--influence remembered, subconsciously, since childhood--was Kipling's illustrations to "Just So Stories."

ink drawings, ca. 1990-92

2008-12-04T15:08:00.000-05:00

So, I've decided not to post online anymore the pages of Ruins as I make them (actually, I came to this decision a while ago, I'm just fessing up to it now), especially since once they're made they'll require some serious resequencing plus other editorial work... I just don't think the work as I'm intending it can be properly experienced in the piecemeal fashion in which I'm posting pages. So you'll just have to see it in its completed form (and on paper), a year or two from now.

This does leave me with a certain gap in material to post here, though... Fortunately, the work that Troy Lloyd has been recently posting on his blog has made me go digging through my basement for some old drawings, some of the earliest ones in which I began playing with inkblots, etc. Here are some of them, in roughly chronological order (and do keep in mind I was about 22 to 24 when making them):

And here is one done in September 1991 in collaboration with my friend Eva Struhal (I know the exact date because it's the only one signed and dated). I think she contributed some of the more landscape-y, as well as figurative, elements:

These are all 18" x 24", Sumi-e ink on paper. More to come later.

Group Show

2008-12-03T18:20:00.000-05:00

I'll have one very large piece in this show:

Unfortunately, I can't make it to the opening, but if you're in the area please go and let me know how it looks.

More info here.

Little painting with dragon script

2008-11-26T05:47:00.001-05:00

Betty's walk

2008-11-26T02:51:00.001-05:00

Dragon script

2008-11-26T00:52:00.001-05:00

Introducing guest artist Alex Molotiu!!!

2008-11-25T00:44:00.000-05:00

"Jellyfish"

Alex's work has been published in the journal "Asemic," no. 5. He will celebrate his fourth birthday in late December.

A little painting

2008-11-07T01:44:00.001-05:00

It's official! Plus, museum show.

2008-11-04T02:11:00.001-05:00

Since Amazon sez so!

Also, have I mentioned that I'm in this traveling show--Currently at the Krannert Art Museum in Urbana-Champaign, to move to Denver in January, and then other places too? Please come see it if you have a chance--you'll see all eight pages of the original art of "Exhibition to the Interior," a nice digital print of "The Panic," plus a super hi-tech 3-D version (with 3-D goggles included) of "Alcoholalia," my Maakies remix.

As to that "underrepresented" thing in the subtitle: I'm not sure experimental and gallery comics are "underrepresented" in the same way that women and minority artists were under (read: non) represented in the "Masters of American Comics" show, to which this one was conceived as a response--but hey, I'm grateful for the company, and companionship! By the way, try to get a hold of the catalogue--it's beautiful, really well designed, and there's a lot of my stuff in it. (It's not on Amazon. I know it's available from the museum, but I can't find a link, sorry.)

One more "by the way": I'll be at the Krannert this Saturday, for a panel discussion connected to the show. More info here.

"Brain Trust redrawn" details

2008-10-27T00:28:00.000-04:00

...as requested by Troy Lloyd:

or did you mean like this?

Psychedelia!

2008-10-25T05:37:00.000-04:00

The Brain Trust redrawn

2008-10-10T05:36:00.000-04:00

[click for larger image]

24" x 19", ink on paper (the margins are wider in the original)

Drawn entirely* with a Winsor & Newton Cotman no. 2 brush, which, dammit, works better than my much more expensive series 7.

*well, except for some of the larger expanses of black, where I used an older beat-up brush

compare: the digital original

see also: part of the same project and brief explanation of the process

While I'm making book announcements, I should point out that "24 x 24: A Vague Epic," on which these hand-redrawings/completions are based, will be printed in my book "Nautilus," coming this spring from Danish publisher Fahrenheit.

What passed for abstract comics back in 2001

2008-10-06T01:35:00.000-04:00

http://web.archive.org/web/20011113040600/palladio.arch.kth.se/~henke/comics/strange.html

Courtesy of the Google January 2001 index, http://www.google.com/search2001.html

If there are any readers of this blog who still don't know that the anthology of abstract comics that I've edited is set to come out from Fantagraphics Books in June 2009, well, now you know.

Incidentally, I made my first abstract comic in the fall of 2002, and published it in my mini Blots, 2003. Now it's been reprinted in Asemic no. 5.

"Pym" redrawn

2008-09-23T05:55:00.000-04:00

ink on paper, 17" x 14", 2 sheets

Two of the missing pages from "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym"

2008-09-04T02:30:00.000-04:00

After troylloyd. See here.

UPDATE: color version.

Once more onto the beach!

2008-08-20T13:30:00.000-04:00

Question: do you folks prefer it with thumbnails or with full images, as before?

Flutters (in a specimen box)

2008-08-12T03:25:00.000-04:00

A day by the ocean

2008-08-02T01:17:00.000-04:00

Or is this version better?

I can't decide. Let me know.

Ruins pp. 7-9

2008-07-15T01:13:00.000-04:00