Here’s the Nutricia Baby Book for this week. This time, it’s clearly a lesson in gender discrimination that no one should do without !
Also, if you have tips for the translation, please send them over. I’m not sure about the translation of “omspitten” (to dig in a garden befor sowing) or “boerin” (a farmer’s wife)
Nevertheless, have fun, as we present…
“Peter’s Little Farm”
OK, bear with me. So there’s a chain of sandwich franchises named after the Blondie character Dagwood. And there’s a shoppe” opening up in Washington DC, as ComicsDC reports based on an article in the Washington Business Journal.
But look at that photo. Does that look like a sandwich to you ? I mean, this thing could feed a family. I would have thought that after Super Size Me things like this would be a bit less probable…
Merchandising gone absolutely haywire : the Mr Potato Head - Spider Spud Red. I didn’t like the “red vs black” thing the first time around, and I don’t like it now.
After reading Charlie Gower’s post on tantramar about the cover Chris Ware did for Rousseau’s Candide, I checked out the Penguin Deluxe website for other covers by cartoonists. Most of them are fairly recognisable, such as covers by Art Spiegelman, Seth, Roz Chast and Anders Nilsen respectively :
Not only do these covers immediately jump out as different than all the other book covers you see on the shelves, the cartoonists never even tried to shy away from their trademark style (which is not to say that I don’t like them - I think this is a very interesting project, and the books are more beautiful than most).
What struck me, though, was that I’d not recognised two covers as being by cartoonists, namely those by Frank Miller (for Gravity’s Rainbow) and Tomer Hanuka (for the Marquis de Sade). They looked to me as covers made by bona fide book designers, not cartoonists trying something else for a change.
I’m not really sure what I prefer - the books that sport covers that have a high “comics ephemerist” value, or the other ones. I do know though that, if Frank Miller were to look for a different profession after comics and movies, book design would be a very valid alternative.
Before he became immortal as the creator of the Cat in The Hat, The Grinch and Horton, Theodor Seuss Geisel made a living creating advertising campaigns that were at least as hilarious and strange (most notably the “Quick, Henry, the Flit” campaign). Check out The Advertising Artwork of Dr. Seus for a very complete overview.
While you’re at it, Dr Seuss Went To War, a website by the Mandeville Special Collections Library , offers a meticulously complete overview of the editorial cartoons Geisel produced during the Second World War for the New York newspaper PM. It’s nice to see how he referred to his other work, as the example below shows…
Over at The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log I’m dealing out some opinions about the new Largo Winch book, and on David B’s new graphic novel. As if that would matter…
Chlorophylle Parc is an educational adventure park near La Roche in the Ardennes, Belgium. It’s situated somewhere in the middle of nowhere, where the only cars going by are of people looking for the park’s entrance. There’s no blaring music, no ice cream stands, no roller coasters. There is a very nice playground with wooden constructions to climb on, jump off and swing on, but the main part of the park is set up as an experience journey trough the forest, showing that there’s more to the woods than trees.
Along this path, visitors are shown what intricate system that each forest is, what animals live in the Ardennes forests, what plants grow there and how they all depend on each other. You’re lead from the fox’s lairs deep in the ground up to the tree tops where birds sing and falcons prey. You get to measure your strength, speed, climbing prowess with what animals can do, and follow the tracks of different species.
In a final part, the exhibition sheds light on man’s relationship with the forest, with folk tales and history, but also the double role of the timber industry and the need for forest conservation.
Cartoonist Jean Claude Servais, an Ardennois pur sang, has made some very nice illustrations for the several “chapters” in the hike along the park. They function as a kind of frontispice for each chapter. Naturally, I took photo’s…
The first part of the walk deals with the animals and plants in the forest.
Colleague Jourik Migom sent me these photos yesterday. They were taken in the Pink Flamingo’s Bar in Ghent (a “legendary kitsch café), which has his windows completely dressed in a comics theme.
But since Jourik is strictly Jommeke, we only have photos of Annemieke and Rozemieke with Pekkie the Dog (above), and the almighty Flip (the bestest and most romantic parrot about, below). Neat !
i-merge, the advertising agency I work for, also has a Shanghai office. Our art director over there, Anne Ng, has created a very nice illustrated (and animated) story to explain our service model to prospective clients.
I particularly like the scribbly drawings, and the tiny animated touches she’s added to the art. To understand the story, I have to listen to the English version, but the Chinese one just sounds more authentic.
The story is also published as a tiny red book that you can order from i-merge China. Check the website for more details…
In 2006 Matthew Woodson created a series of four page comics for Perry Ellis’ 2006 Fall/Winter print advertisements and catalog. The comics appeared in several US men’s magazines and are reprinted on his website, Ghostco.
I can’t help but like his style, which reminds me of A Scanner Darkly. However, Woodson’s own, “free” work that he created for anthologies like Flight and Meathaus is so much stronger. Especially “Tendergrass” is very gripping.
