Why Isn't There More Collage In Comics?

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It seems odd to me that there is so little collage in comics, especially since some of the most brilliant pages Jack Kirby ever made included the technique. For example:

http://homepage.mac.com/phantroll/.cv/phantroll/Public/crossroadssmall.jpg-link.jpg

Can you recommend any comics that include collage? Why do you think so few artists use collage in modern comics?

― Matthew C Perpetua (inca), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:10 (twenty years ago)

Did Kabuki kill collage?

― Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:14 (twenty years ago)

That's a great page btw.

― Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:14 (twenty years ago)

That's probably my single favorite page in any comic that I've ever read.

― Matthew C Perpetua (inca), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:16 (twenty years ago)

I'm not clear on his techniques, but it seems like there is some collage and use of altered photo images in Alex Maleev's recent work on Daredevil. Does anyone know more about that?

― Matthew C Perpetua (inca), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:18 (twenty years ago)

i've heard something about that too. that's about all i heard though.

I remember there were a few incidences of it during Mike Grell's early Green Arrow, for which Mike Grell wasn't usually doing the art. I think it may have been Ed Hannigan. It was mostly little things like money and such.

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:21 (twenty years ago)

On the Green Arrow series that directly followed The Longbow Hunters, Grell was only the writer & cover artist. Ed Hannigan & Dick Giordano were indeed the artistes.

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:22 (twenty years ago)

Kabuki didn't KILL collage - it sure made it cliche, though.

I'm thinking JH Williams used collage in Promethea, but I could be mistaken.

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:24 (twenty years ago)

god that's a great page

― j blount (papa la bas), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:24 (twenty years ago)

Thanks, Dr. Diva.

Neal Adams did a lot of photo/art covers in the 60s/70s.

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:26 (twenty years ago)

Blount & others OTM. Wish it was colored, tho!

There's also one (I found it in Essential FF #3) where the FF (in their space SUV) are in front of this fantastic galactic backdrop (which includes, I think, a Buckyball).

"Dr. Diva" sounds like a Venture Brothers nemesis.

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:28 (twenty years ago)

Also, Dave McKean to thread. Obviously his covers are all about collage and mixed media, and I seem to remember some in Arkham Asylum. Has anyone read Cages?

― Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:40 (twenty years ago)

No, but it's on the list!

I wonder if other folks (between Kirby & the 80s indie boom) employed ... I don't know what to call it ... art techniques atypical to the pencil-ink paradigm.

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:44 (twenty years ago)

McKean's issue of Hellblazer (just before "Original Sins") was crazy as fuck! It was, like, the second one I ever read.

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:45 (twenty years ago)

ihttp://www.comics.org/graphics/covers/1448/400/1448_4_084.jpg

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:52 (twenty years ago)

NB: That should be "Dangerous Habits" rather than "Original Sins".

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 9 March 2005 18:57 (twenty years ago)

Swamp Thing number 60 is nothing but collage. And it's awesome.

― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 19:09 (twenty years ago)

Cages is mostly ink, but there are some pages of interior collage mentalism. It is a very good book, too.

― Leeeter van den Hoogenband (Leee), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 20:03 (twenty years ago)

That page looks like it was drawn by Bill S.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 9 March 2005 20:34 (twenty years ago)

Eddie Campbell does a lot of collage stuff. In some of the later Deadface comics, Bacchus is married to Collage, the spirit of Dadaism... or is it Dada the spirit of Surrealism? Something like that. It's part of a story arc that takes off 90s comics trends, and I think she's supposed to be a Gaiman character.

― Colin Rankine, Thursday, 10 March 2005 03:48 (twenty years ago)

Cages is great, don't recall much collage in it though. It's almost all drawn/painted - maybe completely all.

Just looked - there are definitely many collaged pages. Dangol' memory!

― Austin (Austin), Thursday, 10 March 2005 16:32 (twenty years ago)

I think most of the collage happened in the last two issues, after the (five or six year?) gap meant no-one bothered buying them anymore, yeah?

― kit brash (kit brash), Friday, 11 March 2005 12:32 (twenty years ago)

I just got the first volume of Kirby's Jimmy Olsen in trade paperback today. It's got lots of collage, but this one is my favorite:

http://homepage.mac.com/phantroll/.cv/phantroll/Public/supermandna.jpg-link.jpg

― Matthew C Perpetua (inca), Saturday, 12 March 2005 03:43 (twenty years ago)

Chris Garrett and Mick Kidd have been doing a newspaper strip called BIFF in the UK Guardian for years that's pretty much all collage.

Borin Van Loon also does a regular collage strip in 'The Chap'

― Soukesian, Saturday, 12 March 2005 11:50 (twenty years ago)

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