Art History with BARBAR

In the last few months especially I've been finding myself going back to those Art History Books of mine and looking at some of the great classics. Because of this I was even more excited when I found this. There are 70 versions of classic paintings and drawings that Barbar creator Laurent de Brunhoff made. Of course they all featuring characters from Barbar instead of boring people. How great is that?

Here is a couple of them along with the originals they're based on.

I wish that this show would come to Vancouver or Seattle sometime so that I could go and see it. That would be a seriously fun and funny show! In the meantime though I'm pretty excited to go see Matisse at the VAG soon though. Haven't been to the Vancouver Art Gallery for a while. I think it's time again. ;)

Robert Hunter

Images via: www.rob-hunter.co.uk

I got a gift certificate for Lucky's Comics for my birthday some time ago and finally had the chance to cash in on it a while ago. Amongst other things I picked up a copy of "The New Ghost" by Robert Hunter. No it's not for kids, of course, but man is it ever amazing.

I was drawn to it right away because of it's elegant and beautiful design and illustration. It really stood out like a little glowing gem on the shelves. I was excited right away about having found it, because I really haven't seen anything similar to Hunter's style and layout combination before. At first I was worried that it might be one of those comics that let the design aspect override the narrative and story as a whole, but turns out it's not. The images are so soft and beautiful but also dark and haunting at the same time. So perfect to complement the short bits of text that Hunter inserts to tell the story perfectly and strangely matter-of-fact. The overall story of a new ghost's first day on the job is all, beautiful and strange and sad.

Also interesting was checking out the artist's amazing website and finding out that "The New Ghost" was printed with only 4 spot colours. Great palette, and great idea. This comic of Hunter's is published by the fantastic Nobrow Press. Check out all their other publications too. So great! I pretty much love everything they publish!