Submitted by Brian Moore on August 19, 2010 - 14:00 Gus and His
Gang by Christophe Blain Vampire Loves by Joann Sfar This is a
quick examination of some color, drawing and design techniques
used in two great bandes dessinées. I've kept Vampire Loves
close to my drawing table for some time now, trying to glean
some ideas and inspiration from Sfar's art. More recently I
picked up Gus and His Gang and that's also been both enjoyable
to read and to look over, saying "How did Blain do that ...?"
Both artists have versatile, energetic, and very "cartoony" art
styles, in the best sense of using all the tools of caricature,
exaggeration, and symbolism that are available to cartoonists.
They are Big Guns and worth close study. Some other artists in
this vein that I enjoy, but didn't have time to fold into this
post, are Kerascoet and Emile Bravo, both of whom have some work
available in English (and probably a much vaster amount in
French.) I hope you'll look them up!