by matthias wivel & friends
I Radio Rackham har vi svært ved at komme os over Jean-Claude Mézières’ bortgang, så vi har lavet et ekstra langt afsnit hvor vi gennemgår alle de fantastiske Linda og Valentin-albums, han var med til at berige os med og, nåja, også de elendige der tegnede anden halvdel af karriereren. Til slut mindes vi ham personligt i nogle erindringsglimt. Tun ind og lyt med, hvis du har kærlighed til stoffet, eller hvis du (endnu) ikke har!
Nåja, og læs mere på Nummer9.
I’ve written a two-part obituary about Jean-Claude Mézières, the great cartoonist behind the science fiction series Valerian, om which worked with Pierre Christin and his sister Évelyne Tranlé. Find the first instalment, in Danish, in the book section of Information (warning: firewall), the second is in English and at The Comics Journal (free to read!)
Så deltager jeg i Supersnak igen, hvor vi — igen — snakker Jack Kirby! Det drejer sig om Jack Kirbys tegneserie The Eternals (1976-77) sker i forbindelse med premieren på Marvels Eternals-film. Jeg fik snakket mig ud i noget rod, som Kim heldigvis hjalp mig med, da jeg ad to omgange spurgte om ikke han kunne klippe nogle nye optagelser ind. Det er der blevet et… noget forvirret, men forhåbentlig også interessant podcast ud af. Morten og Kim pakker det heldigvis ind i en bredere introduktion til tegneserien, de senere apokryfe opfølgere, konceptet og filmen.
Lyt her og læs mere på Nummer9.
I seneste udsendelse fra Radio Rackham diskuterer vi Zack Snyder’s Justice League, den fire timer lange alternative version af blockbuster-superheltefilmen fra 2017, som blandt fans kendes bedre som the Snyder Cut. Thomas, Frederik og jeg har Kim Schou fra Supersnak i studiet til en livlig diskussion om Snyder, DC, superhelte og film. Jeg synes det er blevet godt og var glad for at have Kim med. Lyt her eller fang på Podimo, Spotify, Google eller iTunes, læs mere på Nummer9 og check i øvrigt min anmeldelse af Snyders Watchmen-film fra 2009 lige her på sitet.
I dag kan man i Information læse min anmeldelse af Katsuhiros filmudgave af Akira fra 1988, som netop har haft premiere i en 4K-genmasterering. Den er bestemt et (gen)syn værd. Jeg synes den var bedre denne gang, end dengang. Læs mere her.
The BBC2 documentary Titian Behind Closed Doors, directed by Matthew Hill, aired on the BBC on Saturday night. It’s a treatment of Titian’s relationship with Philip II, the king of Spain, and the series of mythological paintings, the so-called poesie, that he painted for him. It coincides with our now-shuttered exhibition, Titian Love Desire Death, at The National Gallery. I was involved in pitching it to the BBC and gave an interview for it, but have not otherwise been involved. I recommend taking a look if you’re interested in the subject — it covers a lot of ground on a complex and rich topic. If you have access to the BBC iPlayer, you can watch it here for the next twenty-odd days.
I Information, i fredagens bogtillæg, stod min nekrolog over Stan Lee at læse. Den kan også granskes her, hvis man betaler. Desværre var billedredigeringen mildest talt lemfældig og det endte med en tilfældig række forsider, to af hvilke intet havde med Lee at gøre. Men sådan går det jo en gang i mellem, når avisen skal på gaden. Tak alligvel til Information for at trykke en nekrolog over The Man.
For folk der kender min indstilling til Lee, er det nok ikke overraskende, at teksten fokuserer på det kreative samarbejde mellem Lee, Kirby og Ditko og førstnævntes efterfølgede uproportionale anerkendelse og belønning. Her et lille uddrag:
Ditko forlod i frustration Marvel i 1966, Kirby fulgte ham fire år senere. Andre kræfter kom til, men det blev aldrig det samme. Det er sigende, at mens Ditko og Kirby begge fortsatte distinkte og dybt originale kunstneriske livsbaner, skabte Lee hverken før eller siden noget, der kommer i nærheden af det, de lavede sammen. Samtidig er det imidlertid klart, at netop den kemi og den spænding, de to meget forskellige kunstnere opnåede i samarbejdet med Lee udmundede sig i værker af en ganske sjælden vitalitet.
Nåja, og så har jeg her muligheden for at supplere artiklen med en virkelig fed — og både for Lee og Kirby repræsentative splashside fra Fantastic Four #57 (1966). Hvil i fred!
The week in review.
Well, what do you know? The Dutch portrait head that surfaced at a small English auction sale in 2007 and was bought as a Rembrandt for £2 million has now been acquired by the Getty as the earliest known self-portrait by the master for an undisclosed sum. It now also carries the Ernst van de Wetering stamp of approval, which one should take seriously even if his and the Rembrandt Research Project’s track record is far from consistently convincing. (Check this video where van de Wetering talks up the picture).
I haven’t seen the picture in the flesh, but it still looks like a pastiche to me. Like somebody imitating Rembrandt, overdoing his signature paint application and stylistic flourishes — the impastoed facial modeling, the strong contrast, the patchy fill-in of the background. But I am no specialist and may of course be entirely wrong.
Links (it’s been a while!)
The week in review
The picture above reared its head again last week when the foundation dedicated to its authentication as an earlier version of the Mona Lisa by Leonardo presented new “proof” by pointing out geometric similarities with the famous picture in the Louvre. Strangely, it did not seem to occur to them that such geometric consonance would happen quite naturally in a copy, which is clearly what this is. But don’t take my word for it, here’s Leonardo specialist Martin Kemp demolishing the spurious claim.
Besides technique, however, there’s something else about [Seven Samurai] that defies analysis because there are no words to describe the effect. What I mean might be called the irrational rightness of an apparently gratuitous image in its proper place, and the image I always think of is that wonderful and mysterious scene in Zéro de conduite where it is apparently Sunday, Papa is reading the paper, and the boy’s little sister moves the fishbowl (hanging on a chain from its stand) so that when her brother removes his blindfold he can see the sun touching it. The scene moves me to tears and I have no idea why. It was not economical of [Jean] Vigo to have included it, it “means” nothing–and it is beautiful beyond words.
Part of the beauty of such scenes (actually rather common in all sorts of films, good, bad, and indifferent) is just that they are “thrown away” as it were, that they have no place, that they do not ostensibly contribute, that they even constitute what has been called bad filmmaking. It is not the beauty of these unexpected images, however, that captivates… but their mystery. They must remain unexplained. It has been said that after a film is over all that remains are a few scattered images, and if they remain the film was memorable. That is true so far as it goes, but one must add that if the images remain, it means only that the images were for some reason or other memorable. Further, if one remembers carefully one finds that it is only the uneconomical, mysterious images which remain.
Kurosawa’s films are filled with them… For example, in Drunken Angel there is a scene where [Toshiro] Mifune lies ill in the room of his mistress. [Takashi] Shimura comes in and does not wake him buts sits by the bed. He opens the girl’s powder-box. It has a music-box inside and plays a Chinese tune. While it is playing, he notices a Javanese shadow-puppet hanging on the wall. While looking benevolently at the sleeping Mifune (and this is the first time he has been nice to him–when he is asleep and cannot know about it), he begins to move the puppet this way and that, observing its large shadow over the sleeping gangster. While one might be able to read something into the scene, it is so beautiful, so perfect, and so mysterious, that even the critical faculty must hesitate, then back away.
Its beauty, certainly, is partly that in the closely reasoned philosophical argument that is this film, it is a luxury–take it away and it would never be missed. It gives no information about plot or character. Kurosawa’s films are so rigorous and, at the same time, so closely reasoned that little scenes such as this appeal with the direct simplicity of water in the desert. There are many more… but in no other single film are there as many as in Seven Samurai.
What one remembers best from this superbly economical film then are those scenes which seem most uneconomical–that is, those which apparently add nothing to it… there is the short scene where a prisoner has been caught, and the oldest woman in the village–she who has lost all her sons–is called to come and murder him. She marches slowly forward, hoe in her hand, terribly old, terribly bent, a crone. And though we sympathize, the image of one of horror–it is death itself because we have seen, and will see, men killed and think little of it, but here is death itself with a hoe, mysterious, unwilled. Or, those several shots of the avenue of cryptomerias, and two bonfires, one far and the other near. This is where the bandits will come but we do not yet know this. Instead the trees, the fires, the night–all are mysterious, memorable. Or, that magnificent image we see after Mifune has rescued the baby and burst into tears. The mill is burning and Mifune is sitting in the stream, looking at the child and crying. The next scene is a simple shot of the water-wheel turning, as it always has. But the wheel is on fire. Or, that curiously long close-up of the dead Mifune. He has stolen some armor but his bottom is unprotected. Now he lies on a narrow bridge, on his face, and the rain is washing away the dirt from his buttocks. He lies there like a child–all men with bare buttocks look like children–yet he is dead, and faintly ridiculous in death, and yet he was our friend for we have come to love him. All of this we must think as we sit through the seconds of this simple, unnecessary, and unforgettable scene.
From Donald Richie, The Films of Akira Kurosawa (1960). Donald Richie RIP.
The week in review
I’ve been asked a few times about the painting that the National Gallery in London has recently cleaned and put back on display as Titian’s portrait of the physician Girolamo Fracastoro, as mentioned by Vasari in his Life of Titian of 1568. It’s a difficult one. The argument, as presented in an article in last month’s Burlington Magazine, is based partly on plausible provenance, but mostly on the fact that it it carried on the back of its frame a 19th-century note identifying its sitter as Fracastoro.
The painting is clearly Titianesque, but rather dull. As mentioned repeatedly in the press coverage, by far the most attractive area is the lynx fur worn by the sitter — compelling tactile eruption flecking through an otherwise rather bland surface. In any case, it pales in comparison with the other Titians in the same room at the National Gallery. None of this means the attribution is wrong, however: it is apparently quite damaged, which probably accounts in large part for its somewhat unconvincing appearance, and although very consistent, Titian did have bad days.
Another problem is the identification of the sitter. He looks quite different from known portraits of Fracastoro, such as the woodcut on right. The sitter in the painting is clearly slimmer of face and with a thinner, more elegant nose, but he is also clearly older in the woodcut, which might account in part for his fuller, more plump appearance. Plus, we still know very little about the extent to which, and how, painters at this time idealised, rejuvenated, and otherwise altered the appearance of their sitters . It’s an issue, which always makes identification of sitters in Renaissance (and later!) portraits difficult. The nineteenth-century label helps in this case, of course, but is far from proof, even if it repeats an older tradition.
Summing up, I don’t see any reason to disagree outright with the proposal made by the gallery, which largely convinces, but cannot help but feel a little uneasy about it.
Links!
The week in review
Once again, I find myself moving house. This is the fifth time in two years. It’s a drag, but promises to be good once it’s done. This just to say that for the next while there’s a better than normal reason for spotty updates here, or at the very least incomplete ones. Such as this one.
Damn, sometimes I wish I didn’t own so much junk.
At least, here are some links:
So, Cool Comics — the exhibition I co-curated at Gammel Holtegaard (greater Copenhagen) — is over. For a show running just a month on a modest budget and with very little prep time, I was impressed with what they pulled off at the gallery and it seems it was a success, with a good number of visitors and lots of media coverage through its run.
The director Mads Damsbo is really dedicated to showcasing the intersection between popular culture and high art and is planning to continue to do so in the coming years with new iterations of the Cool Comics idea. Color me excited that we have a gallery that devotes its energy simultaneously to such forms as comics, animation and digital media and to once popular, now enshrined high art such as the drawings of François Boucher — the object of a world class selection of drawings displayed beautifully at Gammel Holtegaard just prior to Cool Comics.
Click on over to the Bunker’s photo page to experience our virtual walk-through of the exhibition courtesy of our ailing Canon Ixus camera. Enjoy, and keep an eye on future shows at Gammel Holtegaard!
Not that I want to jump on the silly media bandwagon or anything, but this End of Days affords me the opportunity to post the video above, for seminal Danish hip hop group Malk de Koijn’s “Braget” (‘The Boom’), written and directed atmospherically by Tobias Gundorff Boesen, alumnus of The Animation Workshop in Viborg — the school which has just announced a new educational track for comics makers. From the Gilliamesque vistas of a Copenhagen apocalypse to the Tarkoskyesque finish, it shows a keen visual talent and a sure directorial hand.
Happy Apocalypse. Next.
Raphael’s Portrait of Lorenzo de’Medici
The Metabunker summarizes the problems of attribution surrounding the Raphael portrait sold at Christie’s in 2007
Interview: El-P & Aesop Rock
Click here to read our 2003 in-depth interview with two of New York’s finest.
Continuous Creation — Titian’s Nuova Natura
On Titian’s aesthetic of the unfinished and Renaissance notions of the subjective.
Bleed Runner
On Blade Runner: The Final Cut. Also, read producer Charles de Lauzirika’s comments here.
Hergé and the Order of Things
Hooded Utilitarian column on Hergé’s vision and the necessity of comics criticism that engages deep form
Bruegel, Rembrandt, Crumb and Cartooning
Extended Hooded Utilitarian piece on R. Crumb’s Genesis and the cartoon tradition.
New Yorker Cartoons: A Legacy of Mediocrity
A deadening force at the heart of the art form, smothering the field in bourgeois mediocrity
Hogarth’s Chicken Fat
An analysis of Hogarth’s rich imagery as both support and counterpoint to his storytelling
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The Batman i Radio Rackham
I vores seneste episode snakker Thomas Thorhauge og Frederik Storm med Christopher Leo fra Troldspejlet om Matt Reeves’ nye film The Batman og Batman mere bredt, som kulturelt fænomen og del af den pesonlige dannelse. Lyt her og læs mere på Nummer9.