Allan Haverholm

Eddie Campbell’s How to be an artist may be my favorite. Comic. Evah.

He mixes veiled biography and anecdote with a tongue in cheek, future tense second-person narrative mocking how-to manuals, riddled with aphorisms:

“Everybody will be full of unfulfillable promise in the cheery winesodden Friday afternoon of your life when you feel an unbearable nostalgia for events less than a day after they happen. You just see if I’m not wrong, Alex MacGarry. Just see if the Monday morning of your life don’t arrive like a broken elevator.”

(Alec MacGarry being the artist’s alter ego, to whom the instructions are directed)

If it weren’t enough that Campbell is a master of his craft, a razor-sharp critic of the comics medium, and a satyrically inspired autobiographer, his first-hand descriptions of the British comics scene of the 80’s would alone be worth twice the book’s weight in India ink.

“… guys with one eye on the coolometer and myopic guys, dilletantes, pretenders, complete wankers, sweethearts, boy geniuses. They’ll all traffic past you,” and more in-depth portrayals of the people closest to Campbell, er, MacGarry.

Also: the “Bam! Sock! Pow! Comics aren’t for kids anymore!” of the mid- to late 80’s –

“Batman. Well, of course, the whole plot has already gone to fuck as you can see right there. But it’s too late. It’s in the hands of the PR yuppies.”

- and the mess that remains the graphic novel -

“It’s a misnomer, of course, but the so is ‘comic book’ [...] The term will embody the arrival of an idea; a serious intent will be brought into the common comic and remain as a trend through the last quarter of the twentieth century, perhaps further.”

You will need to read this book, at least fifty times. In the end you may have to actually buy it.

In the meantime, Campbell is equally witty and contentious on his blog, Fate of the Artist.

You have been properly instructed, now go be an artist.

Tags: eddie campbell, How to be an Artist

This was my view all day
I’m a proud little teacher, all remaining students are hard at work at their final product, each by their individual aesthetic and ability.
“Remaining students”, yes. As expected, some have fallen by the wayside, a few even quite recently as the ambitions were raised according to their general accomplishments.
In a relatively short course like this (ie, not an entire term, or even an actual education) there is only time to play catch-up on the students who have the motivation to learn.
Fortunately, those who don’t generally have the courtesy of staying away instead of bothering others with their presence.
I am very excited that my publisher at Brun Blomst and Free Comics, Torben Hansen, is coming by tomorrow to see the almost-finished comics, and hopefully handpick a few for his monthly magazine! Yay!

Tags: Holbæk Kunsthøjskole, teaching comics

On the last leg of my seemingly endless commute to the art school where I teach comics at the moment, I recently noticed signs like the one pictured marking pathways into a large area of tenements.
The Danish text (which I believe English readers might get a kick out of) translates as “- on a leash” which is a pleonasm; the dog is quite clearly shown to be leashed.
Or what exactly is that thing standing straight out and backwards from it’s neck?
There is no hand holding the loop at the other end, which is hanging limply in the air, trailing slightly after the moving dog (from the not quite horizontal angle of the loop and the gait of the dog, I would guess that it is trotting at a brisk pace).
The only dogs that I know to wear such stiff wrangling gear on their backs are seeing-eye dogs, but I don’t think I have seen a terrier used for that purpose before.
Perhaps it is a seeing-eye dog for blind children? Or small people? Or slightly bigger, blind dogs? Either way, the image of the stray paints a heartbreaking perspective:
Somewhere, its underage (or vertically challenged, or canine; but very definitely blind) dependant is left to fate by their mutt! Alone in a world of eternal darkness and, hopefully, only recent despair!
The burning question of HOW? WHY? is answered by the pictured dog’s lack of eyes. Although many terriers have magnificent eyebrows that need to be trimmed ever so often, we can rest assured that they are not the reason for the invisible eye.
As a helper dog for the blind (and short) it would be certain that the tufts of hair are trimmed regularly. Nor would the creature be of any service if it was one or both eyes short. No, this dog is clearly asleep.
This brings into question the language of the blurb below: even though the signs are posted in a Danish rural town, the surrounding five-floor buildings are commonly held in low status, and are quarter to many friendly foreigners.
Is this image in actuality *not* the polite reminder to restrain the dog, but rather a “wanted” sign for a missing friend, servant, and invaluable assistant?
If the latter is the case, the message “I snore” suddenly makes sense even in this form, garbled by the non-English writer’s deficiency in the only common language of the local populace!
All the more touching is this desperate cry for help, rendered as it is in neatly set type by a visually impaired child (or low-statured adult, or retriever).
If you see this dog roaming the larger Holbæk area, please report to the local police. It should be easily recognizable: it gives off a loud sound akin to the sawing of wood, and is a dark green.

Tags: dog, iconography, signology

“The Mindscape of Alan Moore” went down well on Tuesday but when I tried turning it into a fast one-two combination with “In Search of Mœbius”, some fatigue seeped in.
Wednesday was time to turn in inspirational art for the “diploma comic”. That proved to be an alien concept to some students who either brought synopses for their comic or, in some cases, nothing at all. Also, three to four students were hijacked to an excursive trip with the silkscreening class, and even more were bedridden with some virus that’s running the dorm circuit.
So what was intended as a head start to the concluding assignment was somewhat stunted from the get-go. I did manage to communicate to the students present what ambitions I have on their part: that they transform the visual expression they bring from other disciplines into a graphic narrative form.
This time there are no limitations concerning panel borders, traditional tools, or straight storytelling; in other words, the gloves are off.
Unfortunately, that concept made some students nervous about giving their best shot, and I’ve had to repeatedly point out the level to which the bar has been raised.
And Thursday came repitition time again, as more students came back from sickness or Copenhagen, unprepared.
At least, by noon, most of these had finished layouts and at least some idea of the visual comic concept. We’ll see Monday if they have made progress over the week end.
During lunch I made plans for a collective exhibition with the architecture and design process teachers, in which our classes will show off their accomplishments. That way we can have a proper finale to the course, and I won’t have to print and staple any anthology mini’s.
Life can be fair.

Tags: Holbæk Kunsthøjskole, teaching comics

Pre-class: today is going to be a step backwards in terms of assignment duration. I think we need to take a break after the first longer comic, and try and apply to a shorter form what we have learned about storytelling as well as process.
There will be music, and free association from that. An intermission of sorts, almost a recess. Same with tomorrow’s class, which will be a showing of “The Mindscape of Alan Moore”.

Post-class: the short assignment, preceded by a brief and erratic explanation of what can be achieved with page layouts, brought out some shortcomings, both on the part of teacher and students.
The advantage of teaching people without preconceived ideas about comics is also the great challenge in that they lack the casual knowledge about visual storytelling. Trying to explain it to them I fell on my ass, metaphorically speaking.
Listening to Alan Moore tomorrow can either clear things up or confuse them even more. Moore, I am afraid, swings both ways.
Oh, and beginning Wednesday, we will start working on the students’ final, large assignment. It will be entirely free in terms of content and form like last week’s, but being the last task of the course, I have higher expectations this time.
The students have until Wednesday morning to gather visual clues and inspirational pieces to point me in the direction they want to take with the final comic. Excited to see how that’ll turn out!

Tags: Holbæk Kunsthøjskole, teaching comics

After Monday’s comic history slideshow we have started making the first longer comics. It’s rehearsals at this early stage so there’s no real pressure on the students when it comes to shape or contents. I don’t much care about the color of the beast, or how many legs it has, as long as it lives and breathes by noon tomorrow.
Most are progressing as planned (and instructed) while others are trying to break the mold in first go. The smarter of them will learn from that, those who don’t may succeed anyway. This first practical week is tryout time.
I know how hard it can be to work in a roundtable environment, and if asked nicely, I let individual students go elsewhere to work as long as they touch base before class ends at twelve. Although that is all well intended, morale is slipping a bit, and people seem to forget about asking before going off to wherever.
It’s a rotten way to end the week, but I’m going to have to bring that up tomorrow. The course I provide is very much an open playground, but it does have its confines, most importantly time. And, basically, it’s as much my time as their own that is squandered.
So tomorrow is Evil Teacher time.

Tags: Holbæk Kunsthøjskole, teaching comics

Today’s session was something of a quantum leap from the last two days of relative entry level assignments, and to some degree I believe the students welcomed the change of pace. Their comics are growing visibly bolder to match the demand I’m putting on them.
I’d asked them to tell a single page story spanning three clearly defined genres (without actually mixing the genres, even. That proved nearly impossible, and that criterium had to go, eventually).
Rounding off the day and week, I played Mr Bungle’s Pink Cigarette to the class as inspiration for an open assignment. That proved to be a perfect last task before lunch, and I fancy that this kind of process will be more fruitful with this class.
As for my own performance, I can tell I’m not quite following up on all students’ work, and will have to pay more attention to their individual progress in the weeks to come. I’d hate to lose someone for my not having been sufficiently alert.

Tags: Holbæk Kunsthøjskole, teaching comics

Well, that went okay I guess, in its own anticlimactic little way. I seem to have sorely underestimated the class, even after the praise I laid upon them yesterday.
Today’s assignment was to make a three-panel strip, just to measure the individual student’s ability to tell a story in pictures. So no demands to entertainment value or narrative accomplishment; it’s what goes on between-panel that counts, and legibility.
I then gave a half-hour lecture on the importance of clarity in communicating a story by means of composition, cropping and economy of linework, and ran quickly through McCloud’s six transitions.
After a few show-and-tells we repeated the exercise, applying the new knowledge beautifully. Now, a lot of students had done perfectly the first time around, but in the second attempt there were next to no slip-ups.
Even more impressively, most managed to wring a story or at least some subtle humor out of the space and time given by the assignment!
More than any class I’ve taught before, and judging from what I’ve seen the past two days, these are imagemakers already, with great intuition when it comes to visual narrative.
So tomorrow I have to up the ante a bit. We’ll lunge head first into longer-form comics, tackling layouts and more complex storytelling, AND have changing, daily constraints.
Tomorrow is last day before weekend, so I’ll give a short introduction to storytelling before giving the class a genre-mixing task of telling a simple story through three alternating genres.
See how they like them apples.
Monday will be the day of my big History of Comics slideshow, but hopefully I find the time to test their post-weekend, longterm memory with new assignments, too!

Tags: Holbæk Kunsthøjskole, teaching comics

On the train to Denmark, I noticed that there had been hung extended instructive pictograms showing how to break the windows in case of an emergency.
Always on the lookout for practical appliances of comics in public spaces, I couldn’t resist taking a snapshot of the image. It’s a pretty example of clear, communicative information graphics, showing three easily legible steps to gain exit.
Below is the infotoon pictured beside the red safety hammer shown breaking the window in pictogram 1.

Tags: emergency exit, instructional comics, train