Jacob Bladders and the State of the Art

(Hardback)

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Description

Jacob Bladders: illustrator, braggart, and victim of assault by thugs sent by the mysterious Charlie. Part satire of commercial art, part noirish detective story, part puzzle to be solved or left in pieces. Roman Muradov's latest is an ink-smeared Blakean vision of 1940s New York where Twitter exists as a network of pneumatic tubes, but artwork is still delivered by hand.

Roman Muradov was born in Moscow, Russia. He now resides in San Francisco, California. As an illustrator he has worked forVogue, Random House, the New Yorker, the New York Times, and Penguin. In 2013, Muradov received a Gold Medal from the Society of Illustrators. His first book, (In a Sense) Lost and Foundwas published last year by Nobrow Press.

Reviews

"Forget about pens being mightier than swords. Roman Muradovs pen is more like an exploding bomb. There is so much graphic innovation in this book that Muradov can hardly contain it in a panel. Its exciting to see this much talent let loose on a piece of white paper. Beauty and chaos in perfect harmony."Seth, Author of Palookaville "The State Of The Art also reflects his current concern with a kind of parallax aesthetic, seemingly clear but just out of grasp. In a panel, a figure may be clear, but read with the kind of gusto the book invites, images quickly blur into one another; speech balloons from one panel appear to be picked up by a different character in another, and curlicue dialogue trails off or is irredeemably smeared by ink. Muradov builds The State Of The Art on non sequitur, elision, and circumlocution."Onion A.V. Club "But also cartooning, also comix hereMuradovs jutting anarchic tangles, often recoiling from the panel proper, recall George Herrimans seminal anarcho-strip Krazy Kat. (Whether or not Muradov intends such allusions is not the point at all. Rather, what we see here is a continuity of the forms best energies). Like Herrimans strip, Muradovs tale moves under the power of its own dream logic (more of a glide here than Herrimans manic skipping)."Biblioklept
"Forget about pens being mightier than swords. Roman Muradovs pen is more like an exploding bomb. There is so much graphic innovation in this book that Muradov can hardly contain it in a panel. Its exciting to see this much talent let loose on a piece of white paper. Beauty and chaos in perfect harmony."Seth, Author of Palookaville "The State Of The Art also reflects his current concern with a kind of parallax aesthetic, seemingly clear but just out of grasp. In a panel, a figure may be clear, but read with the kind of gusto the book invites, images quickly blur into one another; speech balloons from one panel appear to be picked up by a different character in another, and curlicue dialogue trails off or is irredeemably smeared by ink. Muradov builds The State Of The Art on non sequitur, elision, and circumlocution."Onion A.V. Club "But also cartooning, also comix hereMuradovs jutting anarchic tangles, often recoiling from the panel proper, recall George Herrimans seminal anarcho-strip Krazy Kat. (Whether or not Muradov intends such allusions is not the point at all. Rather, what we see here is a continuity of the forms best energies). Like Herrimans strip, Muradovs tale moves under the power of its own dream logic (more of a glide here than Herrimans manic skipping)."Biblioklept

Author Bio

Roman Muradov: Roman Muradov was born in Moscow. He now resides in San Francisco, California. As an illustrator he has worked Vogue, Random House, The New Yorker, The New York Times and Penguin. In 2013, Muradov received a Gold Medal from the Society of Illustrators.