The known and unknown world of comics Cover Image

Znany i nieznany świat komiksu
The known and unknown world of comics

Author(s): Beata Biesiadowska-Magdziarz
Subject(s): Cultural Essay, Political Essay, Societal Essay
Published by: Instytut Slawistyki Polskiej Akademii Nauk
Keywords: comics; mass culture; popular culture; frame

Summary/Abstract: The term comics in the U.S. came to define early newspaper strips, which initially featured humorous narratives. The first successful comics series featuring regular characters was either R. F. Outcault’s single-panel cartoon The Yellow Kid (1895). It became so popular as to drive newspaper sales, and in doing so prompted the creation of other strips. Comics are the combination of both word and image placed of images in sequential order. Comics, as sequential art, are a hybrid form of art and literature. In comics, creators transmit expression through arrangement and juxtaposition of either pictures alone, or words and pictures, to build a narrative. Comics are a new and separate art; an integrated whole, of words and images both, where the pictures do not just depict the story, but are part of the telling. Comics start to be one of the genre of art, when Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol incorporated comics into their work in different ways. Maus: A Survivor’s Tale by Art Spiegelman attracted an unprecedented amount of critical attention for a work in the form of comics, including an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and a special Pulitzer Prize in 1992.

  • Issue Year: 2007
  • Issue No: 31
  • Page Range: 45-49
  • Page Count: 5
  • Language: Polish