...or are they all just skilled illustrators?
Discuss :-)
Oh I'd say there was loads of comic book artists about. The only artist on AD who ever strikes me as anything other is Arthur Ransome (didn't he write swallows and amazons) who seems to be an illustrator doing comic book work.
That's not to say they don't do work on the side.
Or did you mean aristic as opposed to pedestrian, ooh don't get me started...
The *only* artist? Would you describe the illustration for the current Sin/Dex art? What about Kev Walker's work on Sin City?
Offhand, there are only a few artists who've worked for 2000AD over the years who I think of as anything more than superb illustrators - Mike McMahon, for example.
This isn't to denigrate the work of guys like Kevin Walker or Glenn Fabry - I have nothing but respect for their output, current & past - but I just don't get the spark from them that makes me think of their renderings of Dredd or Slaine as anything but superlative comic illustration.
To be honest, I don't understand the distinction I make myself, so this topic is as much me trying to figure it out as anything else.
Yeah it is open to interpretation. As usual I have no real idea of what I'm talking about. Yeah Glenn fabry's stuff could be seen as illustration, it worked pretty well on Slaine, the last great artistic episode on the strip.
Kev Walkers stuff looks like comic book to me.
So how does a chancer like Roy Lichtenstein fit into the equation?
Dunno - to be honest, I loathe his work, along with most of the Pop Art movement. I certainly wouldn't describe him as a comic artist, despite his appropriation of comic images.
Though borrowing riffs from other artists is a fairly common - and often healthy - occurence, I'm still uncomfortable with people who simply lift wholesale. Sticking an "ironic" caption on might be amusing, but I can't see it as much more.
>So how does a chancer like Roy Lichtenstein fit into the equation?
with the profound influence that he has exerted upon brett ewin's work post 1990.
i've wet my knickers!
steven l'enfant terrible
I thinnk his art on Sin City is poor compared to his usual standard (compared to his "fast food" JD tale). It looks like it has been done in a hurry.
I thought the fully painted stuff he did on the ABC Warriors was some of the best that I've seen.
I thinnk his art on Sin City is poor compared to his usual standard (compared to his "fast food" JD tale). It looks like it has been done in a hurry.
I thought the fully painted stuff he did on the ABC Warriors was some of the best that I've seen.
I love Roy Lichtenstein's stuff, me.
But how the hell do you distinguish between an artist in 2000ad and an illustrator? Do you mean by an artist someone who works in a more abstract way? Believe me, this arguement may run and run but will never yield satisfactory results.
Moebius, for one.
*J*
>Offhand, there are only a few artists who've worked for 2000AD over the years who I think of as anything more than superb illustrators - Mike McMahon, for example.
yep, mike mcmahon & definitely brendan mccarthy too.
turning the question upside down then veering off at a slight tangent, does anyone else feel that alex ross is an extremely gifted portrait artist (very much the normal rockwell of comics) but not quite as successful as a comics storyteller.
his covers & his work for those annual treasury sized dc books written by paul dini (single page illustrations & double page splashes with dini text printed prose style on the page) are superlative, but to me his sequential work (or what i've seen of it) lacks a certain spark; the individual panels are beautifully rendered but there's no actual flow between them.
i've wet my knickers!
steven l'enfant terrible
Dave MacKean and Bill Skien@#"wicks(you know who i mean) immediately spring to mind, but like Moebious(arrgh spelling!) there are a lot of european artists who work outside comics as well,
who could be classified as 'proper' artists
Brendan Mac Carthy too, Rian Hughes, theres a video director too(Chris Halls?)
OI! just cos we draw in comics doesn't mean the term "artist" can't apply to us.
i mean, shit, if to be classed as an Artist i have to work outside comics then i'll paint a few bleedin portraits and cut a few bugs in half and nail em to the houses of parliament. but it'll be a pale shadow of the comics stuff.
comics are art, we are artists. even Paul j Holden, tho we are stretching it a bit there.
Next topic: "are thereany true comic WRITERS out there, or are they all just skilled hacks?"
>>>OI! just cos we draw in comics doesn't mean the term "artist" can't apply to us<<<
I agree completely - I just don't think it applies to all of the people working for Tooth right now, or in the past.
There have been some superb illustrators, some not-so-good illustrators & some awful hacks - there have only been a handful who I'd call real comicbook artists, people who've gone beyond technical expertise & have brought something else to the table.
It's difficult for me to explain exactly what I mean. It's said about pornography that you can't define it but you know it when you see it, and for me art - in this case comic art - is like that.
I can't tell you exactly why I separate Mike McMahon from Chris Sprouse, but I regard Mike as an artist & Chris as a superb illustrator. To further confuse things, the people I regard as comic artists are often less technically-proficient than the guys I think of as illustrators.
I hope that made some sense ;-)
>It's difficult for me to explain exactly what I mean. It's said about pornography that you can't define it but you know it when you see it, and for me art - in this case comic art - is like that.
perhaps true comic art can be separated from skilled illustration by the response it invokes in the trouser department, blackblood?
i've wet my knickers!
steven l'enfant terrible
"theres a video director too(Chris Halls?)"
...aka Chris Cunningham, director of The Aphex Twin's "Come to Daddy" and "Windowlicker". Changed his name after a brief stint on 2000AD (incl. a part of 'Judgement Day').
"Rian Hughes"
...is a brilliant designer, like Chris Ware, but as an artist? I dunno...
*J*
>>>perhaps true comic art can be separated from skilled illustration by the response it invokes in the trouser department, blackblood?<<<
Tell you what, I'll just nip off to the loo for a few minutes with a copy of Tooth... ;-)
"are thereany true comic WRITERS out there, or are they all just skilled hacks?"
Oi!
I looks like this is just another game of stupid definitions. Its like the whole stupid "Is Star Wars truely Science Fiction" debate, in that at the end of the day its all analy retentive nit picking.
>...aka Chris Cunningham, director of The Aphex Twin's "Come to Daddy" and "Windowlicker". Changed his name after a brief stint on 2000AD (incl. a part of 'Judgement Day').
& drawer of rude pictures of kylie minougue!
>"Rian Hughes" ...is a brilliant designer, like Chris Ware, but as an artist? I dunno...
yep, it sure is a conundrum, jamieb.
i.ve wet my knickers!
steven l'enfant terrible
(who recently paid oz$5.50 each for a swag of greeting cards which he's not going to ever use because they were touched by the hand of rian)
hmm, perhap's that should read:--
(who recently paid oz$5.50 each for a swag of greeting cards that he's never going to ever use but intends to keep for himself because they were touched by the hand of rian)
whew!
steven l'enfant terrible
Dear Frazer,
In France, the comics are called 'the ninth art'. Only in United Kingdom is less status for artists of the comics.
C
True "artists"...Hmmm....Well, Siku is an "artist", I'd say.
I mean, look at the layouts and panoramas in his work.
Personally, I thought "Pan African Judges" was a pile of tripe, script-wise, but the artwork was gorgeous. And Siku's work on "Witch World" (which I've just started reading) is also beautiful.
As for "writers", rather than "hacks", well there are some hacks who seem to consider themselves "writers" (Alan Moore, post-Halo Jones, for instance), but for gifted "writers" I'd have to plump for Alan Grant (on the basis of his Anderson stuff alone).
John Wagner has sparks of brilliance, as do Pat Mills and Dan Abnett, though.
Perhaps someone should define the terms "proper artist" and "proper writer"?