by /u/N4th4niel



I’ve already waxed lyrical about Mickey Zacchilli so much it seems pointless, but her for sure, just read RAV!



If anyone needs a reminder:

I started re-reading the first RAV collection by Mickey Zacchilli, I love this even more than the first time I read it, there’s something so compelling about the kind of intense drawing that she does, and I know I’ve said this before, but her stories are just seem to draw all the best elements of mythology into really contemporary situations. The way her work relates to sexuality and love is also really interesting to me; both Sally and Juice have this really intense and sort of selfish anger - I can’t quite work out if I like them or not, or even untangle it enough to make out much meaning from it - for a bit I thought Juice was an asshole, then I sort of didn’t like Sally, I also can’t work out if the Snake Prince is a dick or just the guy Sally left Juice for. It’s confusing but I like it.

and

I think a lot of people who read RAV sort of see it as being carried by the rawness of its expression and don’t give too much thought to its storytelling, but its actually incredibly subtle and quite complex. Oh yeah, I watched the Fritz movie a while after I first read the collection, its good fun and Bakshi’s so skilled. Its a shame that him and Crumb fell out, I would have liked to see them actually collaborate on something rather than Bakshi doing an adaptation.

I also want to talk about Anya Davidson who’s stuff reminds me of a gutter punk version of Jaime Hernandez, her “Band for Life” series (which used to run on Vice) is really entertaining and has some good gags, her art is fantastic, they’re all these really loose sketchy drawings with really confident line work and beautiful colours, sort of like someone emptied out a box of highlighters and felt tips but in the best way! The series is a bunch of short vignettes so you can dip into it pretty easily.



From Hyperspeed to Nowhere #2

Lale Westvind Westvind’s stuff is absolutely bonkers, it seems to be inspired by superhero comics but through some sort of strangely brutal modernist figuration, her figures, especially the female ones are drawn with no consideration for beauty, instead they’re these statuesque giants, as if carved from granite which do battle in this strange sci-fi dream world filled with iron birds and other strange creatures. The sci-fi technologies seem to connect to some sort of psychedelic existentialism, they transform and warp the characters perceptions, something like CFs relationship with technology, but there’s something far more primal and vigorous about Westvind in comparison whilst CF tempts and twists your brain, this work is more like someone grabbing your head and unscrewing it and cramming a tonne of crazy stuff into it!



By /u/notEngineered

The first ones that spring to my mind since they are so fresh in my memory would be Kyoko Okazaki , Kiriko Nananan, Megan Kelso. Or living classiscs like Marjane Satrapi, Alison Bechdel and Lynda Barry to whom the culture and the medium is indebted in countless ways.

Julie Delporte is another one I really, really like. Everywhere Antennas was almost like poetry. So soft and ethereal, but still conjuring an appropriately horrible white noise between my temples. And the darnest, cutestest raccoon that still looks like an wild animal.

Julia Gfrörer does a lot of things I like and I’m a bit sad that after she did Black is the Color as an webcomic most of the rest of her work is in zines and minicomics outside of my reach.

Aidan Koch does stripped down comics that are lyrical because they must be. Her comics must be challenging because her subjects are as well. She’s one of the few people I’ve read that are still pushing the boundaries of what can be done with comics (I’m sure there are lots more, but I haven’t stumbled on them).

Lisa Hanawalt is one of the few cartoonists I actually find funny. Not just that they make me laugh. Depending on my mood it’s not hard at all to make me laugh. But even if I’m not in the mood, I am still pleasantly amused by her work.

Gathered from various comments left here.