This is a graphic novel where much of the meaning and significance is manifested in and through the artist's method. Evens has developed a unique comics language involving the transparency of watercolor that you can get some idea of here, but only some, as the pages they chose for this preview only hint at what is to come in this dazzling 184 page work. What you can see is that Evens's figures possess varying degrees of solidity and translucency, giving them at times a vaguely wraithlike appearance which works to embody and communicate his themes of urban ephemerality, revealing to his readers the flitting souls of his characters as much as their corporeality; or, if not souls, then perhaps the fleeting electro-chemical manifestations of personality interacting with those of other beings as well as their shared environments . This is perhaps most effectively done in a central passage of sexual congress which employs his technique to its fullest extent and gives us yet another example of the inherent capacity of comics to convey aspects of experience that no other medium is capable of. Recommended! Now at a special price.
Night Animals contains two lushly rendered sequences of pantomimic pen and ink drawings employing monochromatic color schemes, each relating a revealing insight into humanity's animal nature. Equally informed by Maurice Sendack and David B., this 2007 work by the Belgian creator of the highly lauded 2010 release (and official 2011 Angoulême International Comics Festival selection), The Wrong Place, finally gets a chance to wow North American comics readers, courtesy of Top Shelf Publications, who put together a classy French-flapped edition employing an excellent paper stock. A mere 24 years old, Evens is clearly a comics prodigy from whom we have every reason to believe much more is to come. A brief word of caution is in order for potential readers of this particular work: while the image that graces this volume has a whimsical air about it, the work it previews is at its core an unsettling cautionary tale tinged with darkness.
Evens made a big splash here at Copacetic – as elsewhere – with his previous work, the Angoulême-award-winning The Wrong Place. The Making Of is an equally impressive work. Even more substantial than its predecessor, The Making Of is filled with page after page of vibrantly colored ink washes every bit as lush as it tells a complex allegorical tale of the artist's place in the community. Make sure to pick this one up and take a look; if you can't wait, here's a PDF preview.
More luscious watercolor comics from the master. Evens spreads out in this massive horizontally formatted hardcover. Panther is a visually dazzling tour de force!
Check out the first few rows on this Google image page to get an idea of what you're in for.
