In a recent discussion, I remarked that by disregarding well educated elites, we lose a very important knowledge base of what art was, and more artworks are lost to time because people just forgot about them ever existing. This happens because new generations don’t listen to that music but listen to whatever they consider art at the moment. Elites are people who created lasting libraries of what came before, and while most of it is available for free on the internet, they’ve still very much shaped what we consider art or not art today. I.e. they’ve gotten ridden of crappy music for our benefit.

We can agree with them or not, it doesn’t matter. Mathematically, there was a lot of crap that wouldn’t have been saved even if the technology existed to do so in 19th century and before, just like there is a lot of crappy music in the past 120 years. Why? Because even when public tastes are democratically elected so as to allow anyone to do a rip-off or an homage to their favourite band and post it online to a ground swelling of love and support by their biggest fans, it’s the common people, who always define art subjectively, that decide who gets left out and who doesn’t. Either by voting for them on Voice or going to their concerts, viewing YouTube videos etc.

I might argue that in this world, elites have an even more important role to play in collecting and preventing artworks from being lost in a more than ever globalized world that cares only about the number of ‘likes’ something got, and not the content and message this song, movie, comic etc. transfers to the reader/listener. But I never will because we can’t begin to fathom what this internet society will be in 5, let alone 50 years.

I approve of attempts to keep things organized though. These entail a large amount of elitism themselves because for whatever reason someone may prefer New York to Shanghai music or Australian to European movies, and create separate databases of them. And then make choices within those groups what gets left out on very personal levels that mostly talk about the moment’s preferences more than actual and (never) objective reasons why one song has quality and the other doesn’t.

Does that mean that some good artworks get left out of those databases even though they are literally limitless right now? Yes, but it also means a lot of crap is left out of history. Crap that would dilute the message of the time and the moment these bands, artists, poets lived in, and the way people, their contemporaries would want to remember them.

But databases are limitless themselves; nobody’s preventing anyone from making their own databases about whatever is left out of one of the other ones, in doing so creating an alternate image of the moment one database imagines existed and should be preserved for posterity. This is, again, truer than ever before, and is again the true measure of art.

Because art isn’t just what people think it is at the moment it’s happening or popular. Art is something people are passionate about enough that they start writing about it. And writing, and writing, until the day they themselves die, or this art form/art direction loses meaning and nobody cares whether people write about it or not. But this sad conclusion to every life and every great movement in art or otherwise does not mean it’s lost forever, because the writing remains and is left for future generations to discover and re-discover. Messages get lost in translation, entire artworks and movements are lost to war, famine, general disregard for anything outside of day to day survival. But the very fact somebody felt passionate enough to write about it and people who did it, means that it will stay longer, persevere where others have perished. Makes it art.

Never thought I’d see something so abstract before World War One… Amazing animation, so much more creative than 99% of the shit that is spewn out every year from animation studios all over the world.

drawnblog:

Émile Cohl’s Fantasmagorie, from 1908, considered to be the first animated cartoon.

In other news, I defended my thesis on 10/10/2011. Not a perfect number, but it’s good.

(Source: youtube.com)

I love the redesigns but coming from a writer’s point of view… I see some problems with some of the character origins and powers in this incarnation. I hope Aaron doesn’t take this the wrong way, I love the origin and new powers of Diana and Cyborg (for example, he would make much more sense in fighting the authorities than Superman, with his mighty hacking skills)… it’s just very obvious to me what’s wrong with the threads and I thought it might be interesting to others as well.

Superman: too much power, no weakness to speak of. Morality can be challenged in the course of time, of course, but with long winding, often boring results. Adventurer has to have adventures, not just a nice cape and a good pare of boots, and by effectively removing his two  biggest weaknesses (red sunlight and green cryptonite), you effectively removed him from any potential direct danger from his enemies in the field of battle.

All of the above reasons were probably why they moved him away from his anti-authoritarian roots. It just wasn’t interesting enough going after men in suits and ties as it was fighting alien threats.

Martian Manhunter: again, someone with a better skill set than Superman to infiltrate the halls of power and make some real change in, I don’t know, Wall Street? I have more problems with the character himself than his new powers. I have no idea what he did on Earth before he lead one of the incarnations of Justice League (I suppose he was a real Manhunter back then), but Jon Jonzz to me was always a teacher character more than anything else. With that immense otherworldly knowledge and experience (as long as he knew who he was and where he was from, but I digress too much), how could he not instruct new generations of superheroes to do good?

Aaron’s incarnation leaves us just with a new, albeit alien, ninja.

Green Lantern: I love everything except - microscopic machines. Really? Generally, they would have to use some source of energy (be it the power of will or a physical green lantern), so why not just let mind control this energy instead of turning on and moving these machines that go where once she turns them off? Back into the lantern? On her chest? I don’t know, the image I have of her creating an interplanetary ship like that and then “turning it off”…

And a bit more praise at the end:

Power Girl: What I enjoyed most of all in the most recent episodes of this character (and why I hate DC for ending the title) was the identity issues she had and how she coped with it. Brilliant story telling, excellent art were always highlights of those Wednesdays when the comic shipped. I love how Aaron managed to keep, at least the potential of identity crisis even though she is not an alien anymore. In fact, this origin gives much more space of developing the character somewhere in between three worlds (army, the US establishment and the super-hero world) and fixing a lot of the mistakes that were done to Superboy (not Prime!) over the years.

The Flash: This character would be to Justice League as the Hulk is to the Avengers I guess, in the sense that they would never know when he might blow up. :D I love the added value and how nothing of the original characterization (of all three Flashes, excluding Kid Flash) doesn’t have to be lost. While, for example, Aaron’s Wonder Woman can hardly become a special agent or run a multimillion company without anyone knowing her true identity, Dr. Patil can assist the police while at the same inventing the time-tread-mill and finding a cure for his condition.

All in all, excellent ideas that I as an author took a lot from and big publishers definitely need to read and try to understand why they might work.

dresdencodak:

So, following the immense popularity of my 5 Essential Character Redesigns post, I decided to take a more thorough stab at revamping DC Comic’s Justice League. I’ve already mentioned before that I think their current “New 52” reboot, aimed at gaining new readers, is terribly ineffective,…

Quoting this whole text would become quoting a quote within a quote… so PLEASE click on through to read a beautiful real-life example of why comics are so awesome.

Also, I’d like to add how much I love “Atomic Robo” ever since it first started coming out, although I didn’t have a chance to get the latest storyline.

Such an awesome comic book, I really hope that I get the free copy and promise to buy another one as soon as I have some money. :(

jessfink:

I need some help spreading the word about the Chester 5000 book!

If you’d like to help you could also win a copy of the book! Just reblog this post and leave a reply with your email address so I can contact you. On September 28th I’ll randomly choose a winner!

What you get:
-A brand new signed copy of Chester 5000 XYV with your choice of character sketched inside
-A Chester paper doll
-A signed print

You can also read all of Chester 5000 XYV online (NSFW, 18+)
The only difference between the online version and the book is that the art in the book has been re-scanned at a higher resolution and re-cleaned. Some of the art has been redone for the sake of consistency and I can assure that it’s a very handsome volume.

Thanks, I love you! :D

(via erikamoen)

This is a terrible, terrible text for oh so many reasons (most of which have been mentioned already) but it made me think: how much space do we have in the modern times to make comics (especially comic strips) without any technology whatsoever in them?

I’ve been doing it somewhat successfully for the past  year and a half with Kid Amnesia and I keep making new adventures often intentionally avoiding all the different mobile devices I see children carrying all around me. One of the new (undrawn)  episodes even illuminates the readers as to why is that, but am I only lucky that I don’t have tighter schedules and can write whatever I want to, not limited by the need to reach at least commercial (if not financial) success?

Do artists, and especially cartoonists, feel compelled to write/draw about technology? Does everything in our lives really have to revolve around our cell phones and other mobile technology?

I like stories. I don’t think that’s any news to anyone who knows me or reads this blog, but stories are… small miracles to me. I connect with people through stories and disconnect from them just the same.

Stories, in all their shapes and sizes, make us what we are (beautiful name that guys behind the Science of Discworld use - Pan Narrans, or the storytelling chimpanzee) and more importantly, will make us what we will come to be. Whatever we may become, I am not worried when I see videos like this one up there and projects like StoryCorps. No matter what we do in the future, the real value of storytelling will not be lost and there will certainly be people (even just little babies, like in the video above) who recognize, sometimes almost instinctively, what is really worth telling and what is not.

I try to be a storyteller. Whatever fascinates me, whatever I really deem worth telling, I think it worth spreading it far and wide. Hence this blog, but there is always that question that keeps nagging me: is it enough?

Why do it anyway, in the sense of, what is there except the perfect joy of sharing stories with others and enjoying their laughter or the fact that they (willingly or unwillingly) know more than before? Immortality would be a good addition. :) I want to become famous for my stories, and as impossible as it sounds, I haven’t given up quite yet.

Terry Pratchett, The Light Fantastic (via womenfighters)

(Source: terrypratchettbooks.com, via )

Love the idea and love the images, kudos for thinking of it. I’m sure it will inspire one of my future stories.

womenfighters:

Nice motion to this one.

(Source: )

What’s this got to do with art? Everything! Besides the destruction of one of the most artistic cities of the world, these issues are regularly discussed in the greatest TV show on Earth - HBO’s Treme. Watch it, learn it, do something about it if you possibly can.

Anyone who reads this post from New Orleans please post your photo reply (something beautiful, something despicable, but totally New Orleans) because God how I miss that city.