Anime in China

Anime is usually thought of as an exclusively Japanese-style of animated feature film, and ever since the release of the science fiction movie Akira in 1988 it has certainly been the most widely distributed in the collective west. 

The form is not unique to Japan however, and in China they have their own form of anime, usually known as "donghua." I have seen only one or two, such as the charming fantasy City of Lost Things, which appeared in 2021. The Chinese animation industry is also one of the few I am aware of to use the form to tell the stories of famous historical figures, like The Leader, a donghua biopic released in 2018 to mark the centenary of the birth of the philosopher Karl Marx, which focuses on the romance of the German philosopher with his wife Jenny, and great friendship with Engels.

You can watch the trailer with English subtitles here:

I have written several other articles specifically about comics around the world which can be read here:

https://thefreakydoodlesofrussmcp.blogspot.com/2020/02/historietas-y-tebeos-comics-in-mexico.html

https://thefreakydoodlesofrussmcp.blogspot.com/2020/02/bandes-dessinees-rich-world-of-french.html

https://thefreakydoodlesofrussmcp.blogspot.com/2020/01/fumetto-discovering-italian-comic.html

https://thefreakydoodlesofrussmcp.blogspot.com/2020/06/comics-in-gdr.html

The Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas

 A revolutionary in the true sense of the word, the American graphic artist Emory Douglas created strong, eye-catching imagery for the Black Power movement in the United States during the late 1960s and into the 70s, mostly for the BPP's newspaper The Black Panther. He wasn't just an artist who served the cause of Black Liberation through his art, but also served as Minister for Culture in the party from 1967 until the 1980s when the party was dissolved within a new climate of reaction.

Born in Michigan in 1943, Douglas was politicised at a young age after being caught up in the juvenile detention system, but found opportunities to explore his talent for print-making, and later more formal arts education, a skill he brought with him when he joined the Black Panther Party for Self Defence in 1967.

I cannot help but reflect upon how, growing up years later across the Atlantic, all the books I could find on the comix and art of the 1960s counter culture, including all of the reprints, would tend to focus on sex, drugs, music and mysticism. Growing up in the 1990s the comix of Robert Crumb and Gilbert Shelton were still very popular, including with teenagers my own age. The political satire discussed in both reprints of classic underground comix and histories of the period and the form however tended to focus on the anti-war movement or women's liberation, with the artists and journalists associated with the openly socialist Black Liberation movement barely mentioned.

This oversight is a shame, as there is a power to this imagery which should not be forgotten. I am encouraged that at the time of writing I understand Emory Douglas is still alive and some books and websites are certainly available about his fierce, revolutionary work.

For now, bathe your eyes in the revolutionary art of another time.

These savage cartoons make the editors of Private Eye look like the Cambridge-educated toffs they were (and, as much as I enjoy their work, Shelton and Crumb look like bourgeois liberals):

A  common theme in Douglas' work is the desire to link civil rights struggles within the USA to the wider anti-colonial struggle taking place at that time in Africa and Asia:

The title of this piece reminds me of a quote attributed to Ahmed Sekou Toure, the revolutionary socialist who was the first President of independent Guinea-Conakry:

In this powerful image Douglas brings together the imagery of Black Power with Women's Liberation. This woman is clearly not about to be forced to choose between motherhood or the revolutionary, anti-colonial, anti-imperialist struggle, as capitalism today tries to make women feel guilty for having to prioritise motherhood/career:

Here is a traditional newspaper-style cartoon that pulls no punches in its depiction of the cops:

It's always important for a new generations, especially those of today whose own struggles may have been shaped by the Black Lives Matter movement, to be able to see and draw inspiration from the language and imagery of past struggles. 

Lost Art Available to View and Own for the first time!

An image that has been sitting forgotten in my files for over two decades, waiting for some future time when I could be free to inflict my demented scribblings directly upon the unsuspecting public without having to pass under the disturbed glances of the gatekeepers of the publishing world, is at long last publicly available for YOU the general public to view or own.

I hope my madness fits in neatly with your own.

Enjoy!

https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/118117512?ref=studio-promote

ART IS FREEDOM

This is quite an old comic strip which I created in 2005. At the time I was still producing a lot of work for the groovy people at Hope Street Studios in Glasgow, but it wasn't stoner humour so I kept it on the back burner, and so it has sat hidden in my files for the last few years. I can't remember why I made the guard into a French-style gendarme. I hope you enjoy it.

NEW COMIC STRIP

I have enjoyed a lot of the historical comics that have been published over the last decade immensely, whether it is Mary and Bryan Talbot's graphic novels about the French revolutionary Louise Michel, or Kate Evans' book about the Polish-German communist Rosa Luxembourg, or even the late, great Spain Rodriguez's graphic autobiography of the Argentine revolutionary, and honorary Cuban, Ernesto "Che" Guevara.

What more could a former bookseller, whose principle published comics have been a series of short strips consisting mainly of gags aimed at Scottish stoners a decade ago, possibly add to magnificent illustrated tomes of this nature? After all, there are many (non-illustrated) books about these revolutionaries and others in the English language.

If you have looked at this blog before you will know that I have a particular fascination with uncovering art (including comics, music and film) that lies outside the mainstream of western culture. The Cold War years certainly shut us off from a lot of art and culture which only cheaper travel and the Internet has made (theoretically) more accessible. Yet despite being able to travel freely to countries of the former Soviet Union for thirty years, most people in the west remain oblivious of the culture of the east, effectively shut out by the invisible barriers of language. Add to this the fact that if the entire culture of a civilisation is routinely written off for by western pundits and historians as mere propaganda for a century, you create a situation in which people in the west aren't even aware of what they are missing.

The first installment of Going East is about a Canadian musician who emigrated to East Germany, and seems to remain completely unknown in Canada and the wider western world because he sang in German and any books that have been written about him are only published in German. I hope it inspires some people to find out more art they may have missed out on. I assure you, its the merest tip of the iceberg.

 

Revisiting Hanworth's Largest Outdoor Street Art Gallery 2020

It may not be the lanes of Melbourne or the east end of London, but I keep returning to the stunning work being produced in this outdoor space beside a crematorium in south west London.

Most appealing to me is the large number of artists incorporating characters into their work.

Some are far more reminiscent of cartoons than "traditional" graphotism with its elaborate sense of design.

 

Comics in the GDR

Following on from my previous post, about the British journalist who ended up becoming a hit crime author in East Germany, but also continuing the series of articles I began earlier this year about comics around the world. 

I am indebted to the German language website ddr-comics.de for much of this information and to online translation tools for helping me understand it.

Atze was the name of a children’s adventure comic in the GDR. The small-format comic magazine was published monthly from 1955 to 1991 by Junge Welt-Verlag, under the direction the national youth organisation the FDJ (in English: ‘Free German Youth’), and was aimed at the members of the Ernst Thälmann Pioneers (an East German version of the Boy Scouts or Woodcraft Folk). It’s first editor was Klaus Hilbig.

Popular themes included the October Revolution, the communist resistance against Nazism, or partisan stories, but also stories about voyages of discovery.

However, not all of the comic strips drew upon events from labour or partisan history for inspiration. Jürgen Kieser (1921-2019), who created the title character Atze, a boy from Berlin, also created the popular comic strip about two mice named ‘Fix and Fax’ in 1958. An animated version of this comic strip with puppets was produced by DEFA in 1969. Although ‘Fix and Fax’ was discontinued in 1991, the comic strips have continued to be published in various collected editions since 1994.

The series ‘Pats Reiseabenteuer’ (in English: ‘Pat's Travel Adventures’), which ran from 1967 until 1991, was about a wandering journeyman travelling around Germany in the 19^th century, often meeting famous historical personalities, and the episodes always contained a competition where readers were asked to spot the modern item hidden within the panels. It was written by Atze’s editor Wolfgang Altenburger and drawn by Harry Schlegel. The artist Günter Hain also created ‘The Bells of Novgorod’ in the 1980s.

In many primary schools in the GDR, the Working Group "Junge Brandschutzhelfer" (Young Fire Safety Helpers) was founded in the 1960s, which were known as the "Atze fire brigade" until 1990. The Atze editorial staff promoted fire safety for children and young people through regular reports on the groups’ activities. The television network of the GDR also addressed the work of the Atze fire brigades, commonly in its holiday programming.

The magazine FRÖSI (short for "Fröhlich sein und singen" or “Be Cheerful and Sing”, which does sound a bit coercive within the context of a one-party state) was aimed at kids between 6 and 14 and also featured some comic strips, among other content about interesting crafts and scientific and cultural stuff. From the 1960s it also published comic strips from places like Italy and Hungary. Jürgen Günther (1938-2015) created a comic strip for the magazine about a fat orangutan named Otto, which later became ‘Otto and Alwin’ in 1976 with the addition of a penguin who escaped from a zoo and became Otto’s friend.

The ruling Socialist Equality Party of the GDR struggled with what to do about comics throughout the countries' 40 year existence, which I suppose explains why the East German comics scene was quite small. Most of those that were published, like Atze and FRÖSI, seemed to strike a balance between popular strips featuring characters like Fix and Fax and more propagandistic offerings that promoted the SEP's socialist worldview. Both its small size and the fact that East German comics have been almost entirely ignored in the west means that for many years I remained oblivious that the GDR had any comics, hence the reason for this article.

My other articles about comics around the world:

https://thefreakydoodlesofrussmcp.blogspot.com/2020/02/historietas-y-tebeos-comics-in-mexico.html

https://thefreakydoodlesofrussmcp.blogspot.com/2020/02/bandes-dessinees-rich-world-of-french.html

https://thefreakydoodlesofrussmcp.blogspot.com/2020/01/fumetto-discovering-italian-comic.html

Drawing with Russ Ep.2 - Light and Shade

The second part of our new series of web tutorials teaching the raw basics of drawing that pretty much anyone should be able to master.

Drawing with Russ Ep.1 - "I Can't Draw!"

My first YouTube tutorial, aimed at complete beginners, in which we explore how much you can convey with a stick man.

Historietas y Tebeos - Comics in Mexico

Since the Spanish-speaking world covers everything from Spain itself to the whole of South and Central America that isn't Brazil or French Guyana, I am going to focus on the comics of one country for starters: Mexico.

When looking for the roots of Mexican satirical cartoons one place to begin may someone like the nineteenth century political lithographer Jose Guadalupe Posada (1852-1913). Posada's influence was of course not just confined to cartoonists but also extended to the wider culture, perhaps most notably to the muralists that emerged after the Mexican Revolution of 1910. 

Figures like Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco, David Alfaro Siqueiros and Fernando Leal, not mention the iconic surrealist painter Frida Kahlo, often referenced some of the same cultural iconography that Posada had popularised years earlier, and they certainly shared similar politics. 

One of Posada's iconic characters

A later artist to draw upon the political radicalism of Posada and the muralists was the cartoonist Eduardo del Rio (better known by his pen name Rius) (1934-2017). "Rius" created satirical comic strips in the 1960s like 'Los Agachados' as well as many books that reflected his left-wing sympathies and critique of the Catholic church, of which he was a member for many years. His 1981 book El manual del perfecto ateo (The Handbook for the Perfect Atheist) even got him excommunicated, while his history of the Catholic Church probably didn't help things either. Its called Pope Puree (which I understand is a kind of play on words of the Spanish term for "mashed potatoes"). 
Rius also carries the curious distinction of being the first author outside of the Soviet bloc to be published by Izvestia.

"Drugs: The U.S.A's Big Business"

(a cover for Los Agochados de Rius)

One of his most widely read books is Marx para principiantes (Marx for Beginners) which helped launch the whole "for beginners" genre.
Rius remained active for most of his life, helping launch the magazine El Chamuco in 1996 with other creators like El Fisgon, although sadly this version of the magazine folded in 2000 before its eventual re-launch in 2007. 

Bandes-dessinees: the Rich World of French Comics

I have always been aware of the respect that the French hold for the arts. More to the point, since learning, in the mid-1990s, that the two most famous names of 1960s U.S. underground comix - Robert Crumb and Gilbert Shelton - had both chosen independently to emigrate to France, I have also been conscious that this high regard also extends to that form of graphic storytelling and social commentary so frequently dismissed in the English speaking world as "comics" or "cartoons" (I imagine this is because no one has yet coined a more succinct term, meaning the endless confusion with fields like animation and stand-up comedy persist).
Growing up in the UK I found that only a thin slice of French talent was ever translated and published in English. I had heard of the work of the science fiction illustrator Moebius (pen name of the late Jean Girard), for instance, or the humorous slice-of-life cartoons of Claire Bretecher, and of course books like Asterix and Iznogoud figured prominently in my reading habits from a young age (certainly as much as MAD magazine), but that was about it. 
As i grew up and found myself wanting to seek out newer or more different work I soon found that unless you read Heavy Metal magazine avidly (this being the US version of France's sci-fi/fantasy magazine Metal Hurlant, nothing to do with the music genre), there were very few opportunities to find work by French artists short of actually learning some French and going there.
One of the interesting things you find when you do go there is how mainstream the French love of comics and satirical magazines is. It extends well beyond the walls of comic shops, as here you will find that they grace the shelves of most newsagents in the country. It reminds me of that brief renaissance in the late 80s-early 90s when British newsagents's shelves were filled with VIZ imitators.

The reality for UK mass market comics aimed at a more mature audience has consisted for many years now primarily of VIZ and Private Eye (both of which are really humorous or satirical magazines that also happen to publish a lot of comic strips or gag cartoons). This figure at least doubles as soon as you cross the Channel. For every VIZ you have a Fluide Glacial and (periodically) l'Echo des Savanes. For every Private Eye you have papers printed on equally cheap looking newsprint with names like Le Canard enchaine, Sine Mensuel or Charlie Hebdo.
It also impressed me that within just one French comic magazine you find a much wider diversity of drawing styles than I am used to seeing in either VIZ or more kid friendly fare from DC/Thompson. (This is one area in which the long-running science fiction mag 2000ad bucks the trend at least.) 
Perhaps it is just because I grew up with MAD and US underground comics more than Marvel and DC that I feel more invigorated by publishers that do not cultivate a "house style"? 
In just one edition of Fluide Glacial, for instance, I have seen artists as diverse as those with the loose cartoon-style of Fabrice Erre or Edika, to those with the detailed realism of Dominique Bertail.
And that's just on the news-stands. There is of course an equally dedicated array of specialist comic shops catering for people that enjoy longer, graphic novels. Rue Dante, in the area known as the Latin Quarter (on the south side of the River Seine), has long maintained a collection of different comics and speciality stores. Over the years, we have even seen this unique market developed and catered to by a science fiction-themes creperie.  
Almost makes me wish I could speak French more fluently!

Fumetto! - Discovering Italian Comics

When I first became aware of Italian comics and graphic novels (known as “fumetto”, for “picture-stories”, in Italian), I found that most of what has been translated for English-speaking audiences are books by the greats of Italian erotica: Guido Crepax’s adaptations of erotic classics like The Story of O and Justine, Milo Manara’s amusing and often thoughtful flights of fantasy and Paulo Serpieri’s buxom heroine Druuna. Hmm, I wonder what that says about the interests of English speakers?

When you start looking, you find that Italy has produced quite a number of notable comics in both the adventure and humour/satire genres, although sadly not many of them translated into English. For example, in 1968 the writer and artist Franco Bonvicini (better known as Bonvi) created the popular anti-war comic book Sturmtruppen, which is set in WW2 but (like Robert Altman’s M*A*S*H) never had to refer directly to the conflict by name because it is obvious to the reader from the numerous German/Nazi caricatures.

There is also Benito Jacovitti’s hot-tempered, chamomile tea sipping gunslinger Cocco Bill, whose adventures in the Far West are accompanied by his cigarette-smoking, tequila-drinking horse Trottalemme (literally, “trot slowly”). Jacovitti’s style was reminiscent of Asterix co-creator Uderzo, or maybe the English underground cartoonist Hunt Emerson, although he pre-dated these artists by some years.

Then there is the satirical spy comic Alan Ford, first created by Luciano Secchi (writing as Max Bunker) and Roberto Raviola (drawing as Magnus) in 1969, which was laced with surrealistic black humour and sardonic references to contemporary Italian and wider western society. The book tells the story of a collection of spies called “il gruppo TNT” (literally, “the TNT group”) who operate undercover out of a flower shop in New York, and are perpetually broke. The characters are all incredibly smart but also incredibly lazy, and their struggle against people like the criminal Superciuk (“superhick”), who robs from the poor to give to the rich, I understand sometimes results in them defeating him purely by accident.

The books became very popular in Italy, but although editions appeared in French, Danish and Portuguese (primarily for Brazil), it never really caught on in the same way in those countries. It also never appears to have been published in English, despite the fact that Magnus modelled the main characters' appearance on the English actor Peter O'Toole. 

We can only wonder if the way the books were translated had something to do with it, as the only country outside Italy where Alan Ford caught on in a big way was across the Adriatic in neighbouring Yugoslavia, which at that time stood between the capitalist west and communist east with its unique commitment to market socialism and the Non-Aligned Movement it helped create.

When Alan Ford was picked up by the Yugoslavian daily newspaper Vjesnik (“Bulletin”) in 1972, its success appears to have been partly down to its translator Nenad Brixy, who inserted lots of uniquely Croatian references into the strip. The comics’ Italian writer certainly credited Brixy’s work as playing a large part in the books success in the Balkans, and it is clearly a testament to their combined skill that the Ford books remain a cult icon in a number of Yugoslavia’s successor states, primarily Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia & Herzegovina.

The latter even hosted an exhibition “Alan Ford in BiH: yesterday and today” in 2014 as part of its Month of Italian Culture. For its curator Professor Daniele Onori of the Italian Embassy “in the characters and their behaviour, Yugoslav readers found something which spoke directly to them.” Perhaps it was because unlike Batman or James Bond the characters all lived in poverty on the floor of their flower shop, or because Yugoslavs saw in the leader of the TNT group, a man named Number 1, an unintentional caricature of Tito...who knows?

Although Alan Ford and the TNT group have proved most popular in the Serbo-Croatian speaking parts of the Balkans, the villain Superciuk is notable for having inspired the name of a Macedonian punk rock band, and despite the paper Vjesnik having come to an end a few years ago Alan Ford continues to appear in print thanks to the Croatian publisher Agarthi Comics.

On a side note, the paper Vjesnik actually had quite an interesting history. In the west the so-called “underground” press merely referred to newspapers and comics that were published and distributed quite openly, but generally marginalised to outlets like head shops frequented by mainly young people with left-liberal political leanings. They were sometimes targeted for obscenity, like Oz magazine in the UK was in 1971, but were generally allowed to publish unhindered.

Vjesnik however was started during WW2, when Croatia was under literal Nazi occupation/annexation, as a paper of the leftist Yugoslav Partisans (the anti-fascist resistance), only becoming a national newspaper-of-record after the Nazi defeat in 1945. Within this context, printing and distribution must have been quite a challenge.

It seems a shame to me that after the break-up of Yugoslavia the paper came under the control of the Croatian Democratic Union, which was at the time the country’s ruling conservative party, who even changed its name for a while to Novi Vjesnik (literally “New Bulletin”, which to an English speaker reminds me of the same kind of right-wing revisionism that led to New Labour). These moves only led to a terminal decline in readership and the papers eventual closure in 2012.

Fortunately, like most good comic strips, Alan Ford’s cult appeal seems to go far beyond his original platforms.

Hanworth's largest outdoor (unofficial) Street Art Gallery

An unofficial gallery of street art can be found in a derelict train yard. The site itself has been re-colonized by wilderness over the years, and recently has found itself slowly being transformed into an official Nature Reserve between Pevensey Road, Hanworth and South West Middlesex Crematorium.

Here are a few examples of the works on display by local artists. As is traditional, new works are painted over old. Presently you will find a nice mix of figurative and typographic. I'm afraid I do not know any of the artists whose work is presently on display, as I only became aware of the unofficial outdoor gallery when first attempting to walk the full Crane Valley, and I would caution anyone seeking to view the art in person to be careful as there is a lot of broken glass on the ground. Presumably some kind of interactive conceptual piece using found objects...

Watch me draw in under 4 minutes

Art for Spring

Some 'fineliner' drawings which attempt to capture the feeling of hope, optimism and renewed life that often accompanies the return of spring (in the northern hemisphere).

You can see more drawings like this on my Instagram.

Zine review: Morgenmuffel

I cannot believe I have not mentioned Morgenmuffel, which for more than a decade between the 1990s and very recently, has chronicled the life of its creator Isy, a German-born anarchist, and her experience of life, love, friendship, political activism and DIY culture in the UK.

There is a humanity to Isy's work which is as beautifully honest as it is by turns angry, impassioned, funny and, at times, heartbreaking. In 2009 many of the main stories from Isy's early zines were collected in book form by Last Hours as Diary of a Miscreant. The collection runs the gamut from anti-G8 protests and climate camps to mini-rants about things that annoy her (everything from periods to the gentrification of Brighton, England, a place which long-term followers will know I'm very familiar with). I found the most personal identification in shorter pieces of hers like "My First Big Demo" and "Bovine Encounter," as well as the title itself, which is apparently derived from a German word for a person who do does not like waking up early.

If you're lucky you might find a few copies via Active Distribution of London. Age, life events and a downshift to a rural co-op means that Isy will be producing Morgenmuffel far less than previously, but I hope more will follow soon, together with a fresh print-run of Diary of a Miscreant.

The Cartoons of Naji al-Ali

The cartoonist who perhaps receives the most attention in the western media in relation to Palestine and the Palestinian struggle is not himself Palestinian, but was born in Malta and now lives and works in the United States.

Joe Sacco has produced some of the most technically accomplished and searingly honest works of comics journalism in the field, including such hefty tomes as Palestine and Footnotes from Gaza (both published by Jonathan Cape in the UK), and it is testament to his knowledge with regards the Palestinians and their struggle for basic rights and dignity that Verso Books chose him to write the introduction to their collection of cartoons by the great Palestinian cartoonist Naji al-Ali (1936-1987), creator of the iconic character Hanthala.

A Child in Palestine first appeared in 2009 and is still available in most bookstores or online from the publisher, and is an excellent compendium of his beautiful, often heart-wrenching, but always searingly satirical cartoons which simultaneously poke fun at the U.S., Israel, and corrupt Arab elites. As Sacco tells us in his introduction: "Naji al-Ali remains a hero in the Arab world, in particular to the Palestinians, who say his name with the same tenderness with which they mention the great poets."

His recurring character, the child Hanthala, is a perennial observer, who always appears with his back to the audience and never says a word. It has been said that Hanthala represents the Palestinian people, watching silently, in outrage, defiance, sorrow, as all manner of brutality and hypocracy unfold before them.

I urge you all to check out his work.

Cartoonist held without charge in Israel

Mohammad Saba'aneh is a political cartoonist who creates beautiful work which is by turns angry, impassioned, heartfelt and touching. I see his work as continuing in the grand tradition of other great Palestinian political cartoonists, such as the late Naji al-Ali.

As well as being the editorial cartoonist for al-Hayat al-Jadida, the official daily newspaper of the Palestinian National Authority, he is also a member of the international cartoonist collective The Cartoon Movement (based in Amsterdam), and a contributor to the UK-based current affairs magazine New Internationalist. Beyond cartooning, he is also employed by the Arab American University in Amman, and it was while returning home from the University on Saturday 16 February this year that he was detained by the Israeli Defense Forces at the Allenby Bridge checkpoint, which sits on the border of Jordan and the occupied West Bank.

He is currently being held without charge and has so far been denied access to his lawyer.

A number of international organisations have been working to draw attention to the plight of Saba'aneh, and calling for his immediate release/access to his lawyer, including Reporters Without Borders, the Committee to Protect Journalists, the Cartoonists Rights Network, as well as many of the publications already mentioned above.

Really good political cartoons (or any form of artistic expression) have the power to afflict the comfortable while comforting the afflicted. The sooner Mohammad Saba'aneh is allowed to return to making the beautiful and inspiring art for which he is known the better.

Update: The website of the Palestinian Prisoner Support Network, Samidoun, reported the good news that Mohammed Saba'aneh was released on July 1, after a five month sentence for "contact with a hostile organisation." This seems to refer to his open support for Palestinian political prisoners and communication with a Jordanian book publisher who is interested in publishing a book of his cartoons.