Showing posts with label comic strip. Show all posts
Showing posts with label comic strip. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 08, 2020

Exhibit Review: The Comic Art of Lynn Johnston


by Mike Rhode


The Comic Art of Lynn Johnston. Kate Grumbacher. Washington, DC: Embassy of Canada Art Gallery, September 13, 2019-January 31, 2020.

The Canadian Embassy on Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, between the White House and Congress is a striking setting for this small exhibit on For Better or For Worse, the long-running and popular comic strip. From 1979- 2008, the strip followed the lives of the Patterson family, a wife and husband (a dentist) and their three kids and dogs as they grew up in Canada. The strip is still running in reprints. The exhibit was originally shown in a gallery in Canada and modified by Grumbacher for exhibit in Washington. Johnston was in town for the exhibit opening, and also spoke at the Library of Congress the following day. She noted that she can no longer draw the strip due to tremors, but she’s being creative in other ways. On the back of the introductory plinth is fabric that she’s designed and goofy paintings of dogs and cats, but the exhibit largely concentrates on the comic strip.



 

As you walk into the exhibit, a large panel depicts a collage of her characters over the life of the strip, and has the title of the exhibit in French and English. The exhibit is bilingual throughout. In French, for the record the title is L’Art de la Bande Dessineé selon Lynn Johnston. Turning left from the title plinth, Johnston’s desk is featured along with some early drawings framed above it. The desk looks barely used compared to some other cartoonists’. The ‘office area’ is bounded by a small wall, and on the other side of that is a small interactive section where a visitor could color a sheet with characters from the strip, or create their own four-panel strip in a blank sheet of squares. A large set of labels explains the process of creating a comic strip. Next to that is a small enclosed exhibit case with family photos, toy cars and other materials she used as references to draw the strip. Next to the exhibit case is a group of several original Sunday strips matched with color prints to show how they 
 actually appeared in the newspaper. 

 

The main characters of the strip are introduced, and then large panels with purple headers explains the high points of the strip over the years. These included “Michael & Deanna” (the oldest son and his wife), “April’s Birth” (the third child), “Infidelity,” “Lawrence Comes Out” (when the character was revealed to be gay, it was a major controversy), “Mtigwaki” (the eldest daughter Elizabeth goes to work in a First Nations community), “Shannon Lake” (an autistic character introduced in a school setting), “Elizabeth’s Sexual Assault,” “Elizabeth’s Wedding,” “Death & Illness,” and “Farley’s Death” (also controversial when the family dog died saving April from a stream).


 
The exhibit concludes with a short film, a quilt of the characters (hanging up very high), and in a nod to our locality, reproductions from the Washington Post of a page of comic strips, and Michael Cavna’s article about the end of the strip. 

This is a celebratory exhibit. There is no deep analysis of the social or historical implications of the strip, beyond the purple panels’ basic claims, and that is fine. The exhibit is both a celebration of a Canadian artist and an enjoyable hour-long stop for Washington’s tourists, in a venue they would not normally see. More photographs of the exhibit are at https://flic.kr/s/aHsmGVy4FY and Johnston’s Library of Congress talk at https://flic.kr/s/aHsmGVvahH
 


(This review was written for the International Journal of Comic Art 22:1, but this version appears on both the IJOCA and ComicsDC websites on January 8 2020, while the exhibit is still open for viewing.)



   


 


(This review was written for the International Journal of Comic Art 22:1, but this version appears on both the IJOCA and ComicsDC websites on January 8 2020, while the exhibit is still open for viewing.)

Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Nancy to replace Knight Life in Sunday Post

Keith Knight has cancelled his daily strip, The Knight Life, in favor of working on a television adaptation of his life. The last strip, which only ran on Sunday in the Post, had a header saying the Post would replace it with Nancy.

Knight was actually in the area this past weekend, attending SPX. Unfortunately I didn't see the news in time to ask him about it. The strip was a favorite of mine, and I was annoyed that the Post didn't run it daily.



Friday, September 13, 2019

Lynn Johnston and Jaime Hernandez in photos (UPDATED)

I'm not sure if the link to the Flickr site works correctly, so I've added some images just in case.

Jaime Hernandez and Gary Groth at the Library of Congress 












Johnston drew on an overhead projector and tossed the transparencies on the floor behind her.



PR: The Comic Art of Lynn Johnston opens at Embassy of Canada Art Gallery in DC

NEWS RELEASE – The Comic Art of Lynn Johnston opens at Embassy of Canada Art Gallery,
September 13, 2019 to January 31, 2020. 

https://connect2canada.com/2019/09/the-comic-art-of-lynn-johnston/




Washington, D.C., September 11, 2019 –
The Embassy of Canada is pleased to present The Comic Art of Lynn Johnston, an art exhibition exploring the career of Canadian comic artist Lynn Johnston and the themes of her popular comic strip For Better or Worse. The Comic Art of Lynn Johnston shows selections from the comic's 30-year history, highlighting the characters that readers know and love, and includes content from the Washington Post, as well as original artwork and current projects.

For Better or For Worse underwent many changes - taking the comic from a glimpse into the everyday home life of the Patterson family, to a comic with three-dimensional characters that seemed like real people. Seeing Elly Patterson and her family go through familiar situations added to the overwhelming success of the strip. Styling changes and character development were features that made For Better or For Worse uniquely relatable.

Throughout her career Johnston consistently drew from her own life and personal experiences. The exhibition gives a behind the scenes look at Johnston's creative process, her life, and the ways that her experiences made their way into her work, culminating in realistic characters and a complex storyline full of detail, color and humor in For Better or For Worse.   
     
The Comic Art of Lynn Johnston opens September 13, 2019, through January 31, 2020. The Embassy's art gallery is located next to the Newseum at 501 Pennsylvania Avenue NW and is open to the public Monday to Friday, 9am-5pm, free of charge.

Monday, May 06, 2019

Those Were The Happy Days! sample from the Washington Star in 1940

Pete Mullaney has been looking through scans of the Washington Star for old comic strips and passed this one along.

Those Were The Happy Days! by Dick Mansfield is from the Washington Star January 7, 1940. Note the mentions of Washington Market, Hagerstown, and Alexandria, although most of the cartoon is generic reminiscences of the past. Today, the Post runs the similar Flashbacks strip by Patrick Reynolds, but that's produced in Pennsylvania.

Dick Mansfield was a DC police inspector though, and actually made it up to Hagerstown on occasion. Markus Ring (whom I knew, in the small world department) recalled the strip in 1997 although his memory placed it in the 1920s.

Thursday, November 30, 2017

Jim Scancarelli, Arlington high school cartoonist

Yesterday, we reprinted a piece about Gasoline Alley cartoonist Jim Scancarelli being selected for Arlington's Wakefield High School's Hall of Fame. Today we present some of the cartoons he did for the school newspaper, again courtesy of the Alumni group which also sponsors scholarships.

The Signal, November 10, 1955
The Signal, November 21, 1955

The Signal, December 7, 1955

The Signal, February 9, 1956

The Signal, March 28, 1956

The Signal, May 17, 1956
 
The exhibit at Wakefield High School featuring the original art for Gus Todian's return to comics in Gasoline Alley.