before it was cool
just in case there are more than 2 people total reading this blog, i will provide a little background. i am enrolled in the school of the art institute of chicago (SAIC) and finishing of my master's degree in art therapy. in order to actually graduate, i must write a thesis. this thesis pursues the notion that sequential art may be utilized as a therapeutic intervention. sequential art, without the scholarly-sounding affectation, is comics. as i began to explore this topic, i began to realize that i am not the only person looking at comics in a scholarly way. there are quite a few books that examine comics with the same degree of investment as other more "legitimate" forms of literature.
As to the legitimate.-Fine word, “legitimate”!-
Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed
And my invention thrive, Edmund the base
Shall top th’ legitimate. I grow, I prosper.
Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
--King Lear, Act I, Scene ii, lines 18-22
(sorry about the needless reference to shakespeare, but i feel like in summerizes my feelings nicely!)
back to the topic at hand. not only did i check out piles of books on the topic, but i found twice as many articles. i witnessed storylines to guilty-pleasure television shows that aggressively referenced comic. and what really tipped the hipster scales was the recent "all-comics issue" of SAIC's student newspaper (http://www.fnewsmagazine.com/). so as i stared at my computer, i thought about how i was riding a wave of enthusiasm for the medium of comics. i also thought about how i would be watching this all from afar if i had not been previously primed to comprehend what was going on. you see, i was a teenage marvel zombie. i read comics for the art, but never the story. so after i began to investigate high art, Art with a capital "A," i lost interest in reading comics. it wasn't until after i had already graduated from college and began pursuing graduate school that i learned about what was happening with comics beyond the glossy pages of x-men and spawn.
i knew about maus. everyone knows about maus. but i didn't know about "palestine" or "watchmen" or "american splendor." i hadn't read "channel zero" and i probaly never would have opened up a copy of "kabuki." i began to see how the juxtoposition of text and image told a different kind of story: a rich and multi-layered narrative. one in which the viewer actually witnesses a dialog going on between words and images. it's a type a synergy that i had never really understood until i saw the work of people who really knew how to use it.
so while everyone else around me is taken by surprise, i have begun my own investigation. this is something i would not have been able to do if it wasn't for a good friend who made me take a closer look and comics. his name is mike peterson. one day, he will get his book published and you will know all about him. but i knew him first.
and he knew about comics first. he investigated them as an art form, as a literary form. he was brought up in the alternative family of the 80's: raised by comics while everyone else was raised by television. he saw something that most people didn't. he was not obsessed with spider-man, or spiegelman; he was obsessed with potential. you see, even though sequential art has been around for thousands of years (yes it has!) it is one of the few mediums that humans have not investigated to death. it's the late-blooming younger brother that creates an empire after his siblings have already settled down. and if it wasn't for mike's faith in comics, i may never have realized this potential. you see, i'm using sequential art in my practice as an art therapist. and i'm helping people work on changing their whole lives. and sure, if i wasn't using sequential art with them, i'd find something else. but would it be as good? maybe not. so when you sit in the movie theater and watch the latest blockbuster based on a comic, or you read the review in the new york times about how the latest graphic novel is changing how people view literature, just remember who was there first. props to you mike. hope everything works out real soon.
As to the legitimate.-Fine word, “legitimate”!-
Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed
And my invention thrive, Edmund the base
Shall top th’ legitimate. I grow, I prosper.
Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
--King Lear, Act I, Scene ii, lines 18-22
(sorry about the needless reference to shakespeare, but i feel like in summerizes my feelings nicely!)
back to the topic at hand. not only did i check out piles of books on the topic, but i found twice as many articles. i witnessed storylines to guilty-pleasure television shows that aggressively referenced comic. and what really tipped the hipster scales was the recent "all-comics issue" of SAIC's student newspaper (http://www.fnewsmagazine.com/). so as i stared at my computer, i thought about how i was riding a wave of enthusiasm for the medium of comics. i also thought about how i would be watching this all from afar if i had not been previously primed to comprehend what was going on. you see, i was a teenage marvel zombie. i read comics for the art, but never the story. so after i began to investigate high art, Art with a capital "A," i lost interest in reading comics. it wasn't until after i had already graduated from college and began pursuing graduate school that i learned about what was happening with comics beyond the glossy pages of x-men and spawn.
i knew about maus. everyone knows about maus. but i didn't know about "palestine" or "watchmen" or "american splendor." i hadn't read "channel zero" and i probaly never would have opened up a copy of "kabuki." i began to see how the juxtoposition of text and image told a different kind of story: a rich and multi-layered narrative. one in which the viewer actually witnesses a dialog going on between words and images. it's a type a synergy that i had never really understood until i saw the work of people who really knew how to use it.
so while everyone else around me is taken by surprise, i have begun my own investigation. this is something i would not have been able to do if it wasn't for a good friend who made me take a closer look and comics. his name is mike peterson. one day, he will get his book published and you will know all about him. but i knew him first.
and he knew about comics first. he investigated them as an art form, as a literary form. he was brought up in the alternative family of the 80's: raised by comics while everyone else was raised by television. he saw something that most people didn't. he was not obsessed with spider-man, or spiegelman; he was obsessed with potential. you see, even though sequential art has been around for thousands of years (yes it has!) it is one of the few mediums that humans have not investigated to death. it's the late-blooming younger brother that creates an empire after his siblings have already settled down. and if it wasn't for mike's faith in comics, i may never have realized this potential. you see, i'm using sequential art in my practice as an art therapist. and i'm helping people work on changing their whole lives. and sure, if i wasn't using sequential art with them, i'd find something else. but would it be as good? maybe not. so when you sit in the movie theater and watch the latest blockbuster based on a comic, or you read the review in the new york times about how the latest graphic novel is changing how people view literature, just remember who was there first. props to you mike. hope everything works out real soon.