ChrisWare

I’m following Tricia’s new series of “People you should know”, and today it’s graphic artist Chris Ware!

You may have come upon Chris Ware’s most famous piece of work, Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth, a very impressive graphic novel. Most people I know never finished it actually, because it’s very dense, and has almost 400 pages of very neat and tiny text, tiny tiny drawings and a very detailed and complicated back story. To be honest, it took me more than a year to read it in its entirety, with more than 3 unsuccessful attempt.
So, you might ask, why should I know this guy, if he does complicated and headache-inducing comics ? Well, here are some reasons :

1. He is VERY talented :
Let’s be clear : Chris Ware is a genius. A never-goes-out-and-looks-kinda-weird genius, but a genius all the same. To begin with, he almost never uses computer. Yep, that’s right, all this over-detailed artwork is hand-drawn. The typo too. He HAND DRAWS all text in his books. If you think it’s not that difficult, just take a look :
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This is all made by hand. I can barely write an address on an envelope without scratching it all and starting over a dozen times.

2. Nobody else can tell a story like he does
Ok, Jimmy Corrigan is weird and to this day, I’m not sure I understood everything right. But you have to admit, Chris Ware has a unique and marvelous way to tell a story. It’s all flow, sequential, flashbacks, fantasy… Here is an example :
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See what I mean ? It’s just square boxes, and then it’s so much more. Just try and follow the train of thoughts here. Magical.

3. He’s very prolific
This guy is crazy. He does so many things, I can’t keep count. He is a contributor to the New Yorker, he does lots of jazz-related work, he self-publishes numerous graphic novels… The insides of his brain must look like a very busy factory. But that means YEAH for us Chris Ware lovers, because we can’t run out of stuff to read/see/enjoy.
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4. He has created great characters
Jimmy Corrigan, sure, but also Rusty Brown, the nerd collecting action figures that lives in his own world, Quimby the Mouse and his love/enemy Sparky that cat’s head (yes, cat’s head), the Super-Man, a depressed anti-hero, Big Tex the cow-boy, the lonely girl with the fake leg… And much more.

So, I hope by now, if you didn’t already know Chris Ware, you’re eager to see more.

I’m leaving you with a video of Quimby animated by John Kuramoto for This American Life, set to Andrew Bird’s song “Eugene.” Enjoy !

Quimby The Mouse from This American Life on Vimeo.

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