New and Used Blab!
In lieu ofBlab 14comes this two-for-one combo of half new stuff and half reprints from earlier numbers of the premier avant comics showcase. (After finishing one-half, you must flip the book top-over-bottom to read the other right-side-up--a circumstance that the, er, stunning cover art makes explicit.) As usual, the artwork is technically awesome and awesomely mannerist. Standouts among the new selections are Blanchet's grim folktale takeoff "Sweet Teddy," in which all the figures are silhouettes; Mark Landman's twisted "Fetal Elvis!" done entirely in lurid Day-Glo hues; Richard Sala's German-expressionistic rendering of a Scandinavian folktale; and the funniest piece, "The Paper Grin," by the writer-artist trio Charles Paul Freund and Peter and Maria Hoey, which incorporates mordantly twisted parodies of conventional comic strips. The reprints, though generally outshone by the new stuff, notably include Julien Mandel's art nouveau photo-comic, in which a lovely nude strikes balletic poses, and a portfolio of satiric drawings by Boris Artzybasheff (1899-1965).Ray OlsonCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.