The Intimate Is The Universal: Ryan Carey Reviews FRONTIER #17: MOTHER’S WALK by Lauren Weinstein

We are where we come from, the saying goes --- and if that's the case, Lauren Weinstein's newborn daughter, Sylvia, needn't worry about being beautiful, because she comes from somewhere very beautiful indeed.

Something, it seems, of a "miracle baby" in that her parents were a bit older and largely (though not entirely) convinced their child-bearing years were behind them, Sylvia's birth changed everything for mother, father, and older sister in ways foreseen and less so, but no matter where the road ahead takes any and all of them --- and there are times when it gets rocky for all children, all families --- she comes into this world gifted (a term I flat-out despise and generally don't use, the transition of fluid, intransigent, interpretive verbs into hard, fixed, intractable nouns frequently a sign of once-dynamic languages atrophying ---but in this case, trust me, it really does apply) with an earnest and heartfelt love letter in the form of Mother's Walk, which marks issue #17 in Youth In Decline's long-running "rotating cartoonist spotlight" series, Frontier.

Fortunately for us all, though, Lauren's visual hymn to her daughter is hardly a love letter overflowing with cloying sentimentalism for its own sake, but instead it’s a non-linear, even elliptical, rumination on the days (hell, moments) before a new life enters the world, and the "ripple effect" such a momentous occasion --- to say nothing of such a momentous, limitless, freshly-birthed human being --- has on everyone touched by it; by them. On how seeing things from a hitherto-unforeseen perspective changes the way one views past, present, and future. On the practical, emotional, even spiritual ramifications of loving someone immediately and unconditionally upon their arrival into the world. The thematic breadth and scope of this work is truly astonishing, and it's a safe bet that even those who read Weinstein's celebrated recent New Yorker strip "Being An Artist And A Mother" would not have seen this coming.

Something this personal, this intimate, this unflinching is clearly something only one person could have created, of course, but perhaps the most impressive single thing about Mother's Walk (and I really must stress, that's a difficult thing to isolate, as every single facet of this comic literally sings from the page) is how absolutely commonplace the thoughts, feelings, sentiments expressed herein are for parents. Not every child is loved so completely as Sylvia is, mind you, but one would hope that most are, and I think we can agree that they all should be. But the rush of conflicting emotions and sensations attendant with bringing forth human life are so little discussed except among friends, family, intimates --- the public discourse on the subject tends to be either clinical, practical, or gushing with insulting levels of borderline, even flagrant, mysticism, either of the traditional (Christian, Jewish, etc.) or "New Age" variety. No thanks, this critic says, to these fundamentally limited approaches that all seem more concerned with patting their own back for being so wise and understanding than anything else.

To her eternal credit, Weinstein eschews all this in favor of a kind of "emotional exorcism" approach, her goal apparently to let it all out onto the page --- the good, the bad, and the ugly, of course, but also the conflicted, the confusing, the cosmic. The known and the utterly, ineffably unknown compete equally for dominance in the minds of all new parents, and Weinstein's deliberately loose narrative somehow exists in a self-created space between both of these in a way that illuminates each. It's a heady experience just to read it --- I can only imagine what it must have been like to make it.

I don't know how any swirling miasma of contradictions resolves itself in the human mind and heart, but Weinstein certainly has found a way to communicate this relentlessly joyous struggle by means of her incomparable (a word I invoke in its strictest, dictionary-definition sense) cartooning : thick, dark pencils, "smudged" linework and backgrounds, fluid and frequently border-free panels, intuitive page layouts, and starkly-chosen-but-muted (again with the contradictions!) colors not competing, as one might expect at first glance, but coalescing into a beautifully messy symphony that looks a whole lot like life in all its harried, un-managed magnificence. Comics readers, non-comics readers, and everyone in between will understand exactly what is happening here, even if none of them have ever seen a presentation precisely, maybe even remotely, like this before.

It's not all soul-deep stuff, of course (whose existence, whose story, ever is?), but even the small things --- the humorous vignettes, the tragedies (losing a beloved family pet), the uncomfortable stuff (at least for some of us, given that the book features an explicit and very human sex scene with Weinstein and her husband, a well-known figure in the comics world himself that many a critic is on a first-name basis with) --- are all imbued with a sense of import, of meaning beyond their or its boundaries, not by dint of force but by a naturalistic acknowledgement that everything in life matters because life itself does. We are in uncharted emotional territory for this medium, it seems to me, but we probably have the only "tour guide" up to the job, and while the superlatives for this work have been pouring in at a pretty steady clip, I almost wonder if any amount of praise is enough to thank Weinstein for the sheer amount of her soul she's poured into each and every page here.

We are all more than familiar with rote recitals of a parent's hopes and dreams for their children being committed to print, but those usually end up as the "end all, be all" of most "welcome, new baby" narratives. In Mother's Walk, they are just one factor among many in a journey that goes in any number of directions, often all at the same time, before all roads meet and acknowledge that none of them ever, really, ends. You can't write, draw, or even create a work this absolutely unique and infinitely wondrous --- Lauren Weinstein has brought it existence by the only means possible: by giving birth to it.

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Ryan Carey lives and works in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He writes about comics for Daily Grindhouse, Graphic Policy, and at his own blog. He also maintains a long-running film review blog, Trash Film Guru.

Review: FRONTIER #11: BDSM by Eleanor Davis

FRONTIER #11: BDSM by Eleanor Davis

Published by Youth in Decline

Available Here

In private spaces and public faces, with gestures intended and performed, life is a series of understandings and actions that form a convoluted collision between truth and deception, fabrication and verisimilitude. Others observe what we perpetrate and, in that, make us mirrors as much as victims.

Regarding Eleanor Davis’ new comic BDSM, publisher Youth in Decline says it’s a “modern SM dating story tackling the complex, intersectional relationships between friends and lovers, feminism and kink, and projection and consumption.” Its subtle precision is rendered in Davis’ confident clear ink lines, often stark against an almost exquisite lack of background. It breathes deeply with the conviction of an artist who understands that the complicated nature of human desire is best conveyed head on, allowing the underlying cacophony of resolution to resonate in the perception of the onlooker.

The seeming simplicity of BDSM almost contradicts the intensity of what Davis is confronting, and, in this disunion, her purpose becomes more innate, forcing the reading of it to become an internal conversation between public and private understandings. From the front cover to the final panel, everything in this book works to pose the questions we more often than not shy from asking out of fear of what the answers may reveal. 

Whether it is confronting the ramifications of power in what feminist film critic Laura Mulvey conceptualized and labeled “the male gaze,” or understanding the interpersonal dynamics of dominance and submission in a sexual relationship as it plays out in both a public arena and a private space, Davis uses the framework of a tight narrative structure to expound upon her ideas, allowing the reader to assign understanding a posteriori. In the end, though, the reader ultimately has to confront themselves.

The Frontier series from Youth in Decline has consistently been a venue for some of the most engaging and powerful comics being published today. By publishing Davis’ BDSM, they have raised the bar even higher.

You can pick up a copy of Frontier #11: BDSM here.

Top 10 Comics (I reviewed) of 2015

Click on the titles to read the full reviews.

10. DHARMA PUNKS by Ant Sang. Published by Earth's End Publishing.

While Sang is working deep within a philosophical construct, at its heart Dharma Punks is a character driven story. Sang uses all sorts of temporal tricks to not only tell his story, but also to unfold motivations and emotional ballast in each one of his characters. It pulls you in as it smacks of the way we actually learn about the people in our lives. Traditional “Origin Stories” are lazy, simplistic, and false – we get to know people through layers of time, we understand them in pieces and through that, formulate the whole. Sang breathes this sort of life into Dharma Punks and thus engages his audience on a level more true to experience than narrative convenience.

9. HOUSES OF THE HOLY by Caitlin Skaalrud. Published by Uncivilized Books.

Houses of the Holy is a beautiful, horrible, unyielding, noble, and ferocious diary of self-introspection in which the narrator journeys through her pain, the damage at the heart of her psyche. Everything is alluded to in page after page of art installation metaphors laid inky thick in panels, in splashes, forcing the reader to piece together fragments into wholes that never fully gel because outside in the periphery there are still moments to be confronted.

8. VACANCY by Jen Lee. Published by NoBrow Press.

The experience of Vacancy is one that fills the gap and suffuses the emptiness that its title suggests. It peers through the hole in our fence and fills our minds with the possibilities of what might be on the other side.

7. FEDOR by Pat Kelley. Published by Hic + Hoc Publications

This is a book about connecting as much as it is a book about outsiders. It touches on questions of identity and appearances, but also sacrifices and longing. Kelley’s beautiful and light cartooning adds a distance to its heavy subject matter, and the brown watercolor washes that cover every page augments both its historical conceit and its sense of grounding in the real world.

6. PLANS WE MADE by Simon Moreton. Published by Uncivilized Books.

Longing is a human construct that is saturated with hope. It is the wellspring from which arises disappointment as much as it slakes desire. Within all discontent comes the impetus for change. Morton takes this all apart in Plans We Made through narrative, through pace, but mostly through his simple lines and layouts. In Morton’s pages, forms are dissolved into naked shapes through which the reader makes meaning, attempts closure, overlays the self. Here, what is less becomes more; the silence echoes reflections like a placid lake seen from above. Each moment is about that which is unsaid and undrawn; it leads to the cacophony of silence and an emotional center that holds tight insomuch as it becomes universal.

5. CASANOVA: ACEDIA by Matt Fraction and Fabio Moon. Published by Image Comics.

Sure Casanova Quinn is all mid-70’s Mick Jagger swagger, but at its heart, Casanova: Acedia grooves with the strum und drang of Ziggy Stardust’s impossible mission realized, to become a rock and roll star by just being a rock and roll star. You show up in a stretch limo, gonked to the nines on rails of cocaine — you step out in your fashion with a guitar in your hand and people start taking notice, people start taking pictures. Suddenly you climb up on stage and everybody wants to sing along with your songs, everybody wants to be you, and they feed and they feed on your dream until there is nothing left to do but escape to the Eastern Block wearing Jimmy’s pants, crank up the electronica mood inducers, and start howling into the microphone all that is left of your soul.

4. BORB by Jason Little. Published by Uncivilized Books.

Borb is infinitely accessible and incredibly hard to swallow. It confronts the idea of homelessness full on, relentlessly, and, although presented in humor comic format, it doesn’t candy-coat. In fact, the choice of exploring an issue of such gravity in the style of something that evokes a light-hearted expectation is what gives Borb so much of its power.

3. GENEROUS BOSOM #1 by Conor Stechschulte. Published by Breakdown Press.

See, there’s a thickness to every aspect of this book, as if gravity itself is exerting some different type of influence on these pages. There’s a disturbing weight to it, as if it were a singularity unto itself, composed, metaphorically, of an infinite density.

2. SAINT COLE by Noah Van Sciver. Published by Fantagraphics.

Because Saint Cole is part of the long tradition of the balladry of brutality. It sings the song of the sink hole caused by a life lived in response to expectations it could never fulfill. It's the chant you hear in the places people gather to drown out their sorrows, it echoes in the alley behind the neighbor's house whom you've never met, it rings in your own head from time to time, that is, if you are sensitive to it.

1. ANN BY THE BED (FRONTIER #6) by Emily Carroll. Published by Youth in Decline.

In this book, Carroll manipulates conventional narrative with a surgeon's scalpel cutting through cause and effect, bouncing her reader through time and space, disconcerting as she disconnects, adding a layer of displacement to the tone of its entirety. Then there's her apt choices of art style and color use, each of which adds another emotional hue. As well, she varies the thickness of her inking to contract and expand, and her lettering changes to resonate with the mood she is working with. In Ann by the Bed, Carroll uses all the evocative tools that comics offer in order to concentrate the tenor and the feel of the reading experience.

HONORABLE MENTIONS:

HOLLOW IN THE HOLLOWS by Dakota McFadzean. Published by One Percent Press

PERPLEXING STORIES by Jonathan King. Published by Eel Noir.

BIG PUSSY by Gina Wynbrandt. Published by 2D Cloud.

SUPERCAKES by Kat Leyh. Published by Yeti Press.

ABSTRACT KIRBY 1 and 2 by Mark Badger.

BOOKS I LOVED BUT HAVE YET TO REVIEW

UNDERSTANDING MONSTER #3 by Theo Ellsworth.

SHADOW HILLS by Sean Ford

Books in Bites 7: Three Comics Worth Your Attention

Quick Reviews of Three Books you may be interested in.

FRONTIER #9 by Becca Tobin

Published by Youth in Decline

Available Here.

Frontier #9 is a golem story. According to Alden Oreck’s article about The Golem, “In Jewish tradition, the golem is most widely known as an artificial creature created by magic, often to serve its creator. In Hebrew, 'golem' stands for 'shapeless mass' and according to Talmudic legend, Adam is called 'golem,' meaning 'body without a soul' for the first 12 hours of his existence.” 

In Becca Tobin’s new book from Youth in Decline, the golem is called Saltdough.

You might think you know Saltdough, but you don’t know Saltdough.

Becca Tobin’s Frontier #9 is about when art becomes a burden to the artist. It is about how fame and success are antithetical to creativity. It is about how a creation can consume the creator to the point where the original intent disappears entirely.

Much like a golem, success in art can devour the artist. It can suck you dry then erase you completely.

Tobin explores all these ideas in beautiful and graceful watercolors. There is a deceptive lightness to her panels that washes in color and perspective. Even her writing seems to come from a place of innocence and glee. But Tobin is playing the bait-and-switch, her joyous pages are a bamboozle, as her themes and purpose work in darker hues.

It is in this turnabout that heightens the bite of what could misconstrued as pedantries. There’s more of an appeal and an empathy at the heart of Tobin’s work here, more so than one of those envy-driven admonitions against the price of successfulness. It’s gentle and it ends with what appears to be a solid statement, but in such it leaves the door open just ambiguously enough that Tobin is asking for you to step inside.

It’s a thing of beauty.

You can pick up a copy of Frontier #9 here.

A STORY FOR DESMOND by Jason Walz

Published by Tinto Press

Available Here.

I’m glad this book is being published because it gives me another reason to re-read Jason Walz’s Eisner-nominated Homesick, a book I love for all the things that can be said about comics. Tinto Press calls A Story For Desmond a “(sort of) Epilogue” to Homesick -- which it is, but it also stands on its own as a complete work.

Walz describes his A Story for Desmond as, “A parent explains the loss of a grandparent, her legacy and hope for the future to a very young child through the telling of an adventure that spans the depths of the ocean to the farthest reaches of space. From loss, so much can be found.” And it is that entirely and completely.

It’s an all-ages book in the truest sense, as I can’t think of a single age demographic that couldn’t get something out of it. It’s both joyous and darling without being precious. Like Homesick before it, everyone will bring something of themselves to the book.

Yes, Walz says, “From loss, so much can be found,” and this is the working motif of this comic. The book is stocked with the stories we tell to each other and ourselves to help us make sense of the world, to understand that we come from somewhere, that our sense of self is formed from those that have passed us the baton. It also stresses the obligation of a parent to a child and how that obligation can be what grounds us or give us purpose.

A Story for Desmond is a soft comic, gentle in reading, beautiful in execution, and purposeful in its sense of place and intent. While maybe not as profound as Homesick, it brings to the fore all the heart of its predecessor.

You can grab a copy of A Story for Desmond here.

30 MILES OF CRAZY: ANOTHER ROUND 
by Karl Christian Krumpholz

Published by Drunken Tiki Comics

Available Here.

30 Miles of Crazy: Another Round picks up where the last collection of 30 Miles of Crazy left off, which, of course, makes sense as these are diary comics (in a way), or, as Karl Christian Krumpholz characterizes them, “true-ish tales of the bars, characters, denizens and derelicts of the City and Other Low Places” based around (for the most part) the 30 mile stretch that is Colfax Avenue in Denver, Colorado.

Once again, Krumpholz is finding the pulse of each place he goes. He overhears just the right turn of phrase that encapsulates a person’s being, a place’s vibe, a moment’s truth. Often times it is from the mouth of those whom society has pushed out of its embrace that we see how truly absurd our daily concerns are. When we go to an “out of the way” place, we re-evaluate what is “in the way” as it were. When you step out of your comfort zone, sometimes you finally find a new path.

So while 30 Miles of Crazy is filled with moments that are bonkers, with people that are off-kilter, and with places that you might think twice about walking into, Krumpholz parses each page with affection at a distance, celebrating instead of mocking what he is chronicling.

As so much of today’s commentary comes at the expense of an ironic turn of phrase, 30 Miles of Crazy is a welcomed relief.

What Krumpholz is narrating are the experiences that operates at the margins, and sometimes, really, that’s the most interesting place in the world to be.

You can pick up a copy of 30 Miles of Crazy: Another Round here.