November 05, 2005
Harvey Pekar Transformation
I thought that our project with the words and images of the Harvey Pekar comic "The Name Story" was very interesting. It was really fun trying to create words to go along with the images of the comic. This showed how you can think that an image means one thing, but find out that it really means something else when you see the true story.
Harvey Pekar seems like a very interesting man, even though he basically portrays himself as a somewhat dull person throughout his comics. He seems sort of dissatisfied with himself and his life, but he really captures the comic readers interest by explaining his grief.
The Harvey Pekar movie did in some ways relate to the comic that we studied in class, but because it was a movie the actors sort of overdid the actions that were in the comic. This sometimes ruined the idea that I had in my mind about Harvey Pekar, like how he looked, behaved, and sounded like. It pretty much like when I have read books and then saw the movie, which completely distorted my idea of the characters in the book.
--Yasmin
Posted by lcisperez at 07:56 PM | Comments (0)
October 30, 2005
American Splendor / Harvey Pekar
Seeing the words to The Harvey Pekar Name Story was enlightening and somewhat surprising. I'd never imagined that it would actually be filled with so much action and so many different characters.
My perception of the pictures has since changed in that Harvey Pekar is no longer blank and receptive to my imagined narrative. However, I don't think it's ironic that our "words" group came up with a character whose tone and frame of reference are so similar to that of Harvey Pekar's Harvey Pekar.
When I saw the words and pictures together, I imagine a lot of what the "picture" group provided in their rendition - the action and characters that Harvey tell us about. I also imagine Harvey's voice and the feel of him - smell, the way he stands, shuffles his feet - all the things I was not given and could not see in the comic.
Seeing the movie further limited the extent to which I conjured up substantiating material to make the comic "live." I no longer had to imagine the sound of Harvey's voice, I could also see him transitioning in and out of moments and this provided me with information about his attitude, tone and state of being.
I saw the actual real Harvey Pekar for a short time on film and the thing that struck me forcebly was the principle of amplification by simiplification. In both the comic and film versions of Harvey Pekar his inner life and inner voice had been brought to the fore - his whole person was distilled into each narrative about a particular thought, topic, moment - and thus amplified, making him seem larger than life. When I saw the real Harvey Pekar I realized that we ourselves couldn't plug into this inner voice when we met/saw him on the street or in the filing department of the Hospital. I see his sharing the inner voice and life as being the most powerful thing about his comic.
~ Nanette
Posted by lcissavides at 12:32 PM | Comments (0)
October 19, 2005
Blogging on Comics on Blogging
Posted by lcisEllen at 10:49 AM | Comments (0)
October 10, 2005
Zippety Doo dah...
While you have all been off on a long weekend, I've been gathering my Zippy clippings...so you all could meet the real Zippy and enjoy getting to know him.
Zippy on Art
Zippy on TV
Zippy on Comix
Posted by lcisEllen at 09:03 PM | Comments (0)