Category Archives: art

academic, art, from the Internet

DHQ Features “Graphic Images of YHWH,” Adapting Ezekiel to Comics

In their final issue of 2015, Digital Humanities Quarterly (DHQ) dedicated nearly the entirety of its content to the theme “Comics as Scholarship.” Included among the sensational pieces there was B.J. Parker’s daring imagining and annotation of Ezekiel 16, a text “early Jewish communities were wary of including […and] Christian communities have likewise wrestled with.” Parker not only fashioned his own comics version of the scripture but also some of his own exegesis. Such an approach, says Parker, “requires the scholar/artist to engage in fascinating and novel means of reflection.”

A panel from B.J. Parker's adaptation of Ezekiel 16 (DHQ 9.4, 2015)

B.J. ParkerSee Parker’s graduate student profile at Baylor University. His full adaptation can be downloaded as a .PDF file or .CBZ file for viewing (sans annotations).

art, from the Internet

L.A. Artist Merges Comics, Superheroes, Modern Judaism, and Women

Isaac Brynjegard-Bialik's"Tree of Mothers and Daughters
Detail from Isaac Brynjegard-Bialik’s”Tree of Mothers and Daughters,” 2015. The artwork is on view at exhibition “Women of Valor.”

Last month, Shana Nys Dambrot wrote a piece for the Artbound section of KCET’s website, spotlighting the work of Southern California artist Isaac Brynjegard-Bialik. Dambrot explores his latest work, a show for the National Council of Jewish Women,  and its incorporation of the superheroic with Jewish moral responsibility via papercut techniques:

The thing about superheroes is that they are a way for us regular folks to imagine being better — to imagine being strong enough to help others and fix the world, as well as being dedicated enough to understand how important it is to use our powers for good.

Currently a teaching fellow at American Jewish University’s Dream Lab, Brynjegard-Bialik feels, “Comic superheroes exist outside of the ‘natural’ world. Be they visitors from other planets, or people whose powers stem from strange scientific accidents; they have weaknesses and flaws, and their struggles are often a metaphor for the human experience.”

His “Women of Valor” show concluded November 30th but its catalog can still be viewed online through his site.

art, cultural, events

New Philadelphia Museum of Jewish Art Exhibition on Comics

“House of El” by Joel Silverstein

Beginning Tuesday, October 15th, the Philadelphia Museum of Jewish Art (along with the Jewish Art Salon) will be featuring a new exhibit: JOMIX – Jewish Comics: Art & Derivation. The show promises a showcase “of cutting-edge creators, reinvestigating traditional genres like superhero, political satire, romance, horror, science fiction and confessionals through a Jewish lens.”

Guest speakers are scheduled to include Joel Silverstein, Richard McBee, and Aimee Rubensteen, Exhibit Curators from the Jewish Art Salon. Introductions will be provided by Yona Verwer, President of the Jewish Art Salon, and Participating Artists include

Shay Charka, Howard Chaykin, Leela Corman, Jessica Deutsch, Aliza Donath, Dorit Jordan Dotan, Josh Edelglass, Zev Engelmayer, Liana Finck, Stuart Immonen, Miriam Katin, Scott Koblish, Michael Korosty, Yonah Lavery, Miriam Libicki, Sarah Lightman, Rutu Modan, Archie Rand, Ariel Schrag, Liat Shalom, Dov Smiley, Joshua Stulman, Arthur Szyk, Deborah Ugoretz, Eli Valley, Julian Voloj, JT Waldman, David Wander, Al Wiesner, Jack Kirby, Joel Silverstein, and Ephraim Wuensch.

A catalogue for the exhibit will be available in September.

academic, art, contributors, events, online

Asher J. Klassen Discusses Comics, Semiotics, and Islam – Draws Superhero Afterlife

One of S&S’s founding members Asher J. Klassen gave the following lecture this week at Durham University’s Theology and Religion Department.

In this lecture I tackle first and foremost the matter of censorship, both in the lecture hall and as it pertains to depictions of Muhammad in modern media. I look at the prophet in animation and then in comics, before moving on to discuss some of the visual functions of the comics medium and connecting visual abstraction as presented by McCloud to identity as defined by religious symbols. After a brief comparison of the idea of bodily representation in Christianity and Islam I close with some thoughts on the human drive as meaning-making, cultural animals and the role of censorship as we create our history.

(The audio for the recording is a little quiet, so turn up your speakers if need be; it begins around 1:30.)

Klassen also collaborated with another S&S founding member, A. David Lewis, on an eight-page comics version of Lewis’s book American Comics, Literary Theory, and Religion: The Superhero Afterlife as “The Superhero Afterlife (Abridged)” for the Sacred Matters web magazine of public scholarship.

The Superhero Afterlife (Abridged) - page 1
Opening page from “The Superhero Afterlife (Abridged)” at Sacred Matters. Words by A. David Lewis, Art by Asher J. Klassen.

Read the full comic here.