We explain what the comic is and the history of this form of artistic expression. In addition, the different types of comics and their particularities.
What is the comic?
The term comic is an accepted loan from the English language (comic, that is, "funny"), which today is understood as synonymous fromcartoon or even a graphic novel.
In any case, it is a form of artistic expression, as well as a media, which consists of a series of illustrations that, read in continuous sequence, allows the reader to compose a story of some kind.
They can be framed in vignettes, that is, in boxes whose form and style correspond to the narrative or thematic content that is inside, and they may or may not have the support of the text writing or signs and characters of the genre.
Similarly, it can be drawn on different types of paper, or even in digital format (Webcomics). It is often the result of collaborations between artists of different kinds: cartoonists, screenwriters, colorists and designers.
The same goes for its audience, which can be extremely varied: there is a theme and a comic style for practically all tastes of reading, even the most artistically demanding. For this reason, the comic is considered today as theninth art (of the Fine arts recognized by the Academy).
The term comic, finally, comes from comic magazines (comicbooks) which were one of the first mass production formats of this type of work.
From there also comes a certain aura of disrepute and rejection towards reading it, associated with leisure, mere entertainment and even pornography and vice. Luckily sayings prejudices they are already largely in the minority.
Comic history
The precursors of the comic go back to the ancient pictorial forms of the humanity, which mixed text and image in a reading sequence, as was the case with Egyptian hieroglyphs or codices mayan.
However, its earliest royal forms appear as a means of protest and political satire, as far back as the Roman Empire. These cartoons of political humor showed the powerful or the rulers in ridiculous, vulgar or laughable situations, and therefore they were usually anonymous and illegal.
The invention of printing and lithography, very later, began its massive dissemination, often as a pedagogical format for the education religious of children and women, and later as a polite means of providing instructions to the reader regarding the assembly of an artifact or the conduct you should have in an enclosure (for example, the drawings that still appear in the brochures of commercial aircraft).
In the nineteenth century the explosion of the written press also massed the comic, causing it to regain its parodic function in the callsComic strips: more or less elaborate sets of vignettes that told funny, satirical, mocking stories, often linked to current affairs, or recovering stories from the tradition popular or literary.
From there he passed, after the First World War, to publication in magazine format (thecormicbooks), intended for a child and adolescent audience eager for entertainment and imaginative escapes, in the difficult times of the Great Depression (around 1929).
The magazine format would be the most famous of the genre, giving rise to the superhero magazines that still survive and that were the main youth entertainment for decades. Many of his characters would go on to movie theater, to animation and then to video games.
At the end of the 20th century the format reached its maturity in thegraphic novel: an adult, demanding, complex composition that brings together the artistic attributes of drawing and illustration, with the narrative composition and linguistic reflection typical of the literature.
Comic types
There is no formal classification of comics, as even their nomenclature appears to be controversial. Some reject this term, finding it closely linked to the ephemeral and banal origin of the comic for adolescents, proposing more sophisticated terms such asArtssequential (Will Eisner). However, according to its publication format, it usually talks about:
- Comic strips. Whether they come inserted in the newspaper (they still do) or inside magazines, or even in compilation books of a specific artist, the comic strips respect the format that their name indicates: they are a strip of three or more vignettes in which a narration brief, often similar to joke, to thegag or, also, to the serialized narration, typical of the 19th century.
- Comics or magazines comic books. Printed on higher or lower quality paper, but generally all colorProfessionally finished and mass-printed, these are the classic bullet point magazines, although they are far from being solely about superheroes or amazing adventures.
- Graphic novels. This is a broad and diverse category, where the most formal, cultured and demanding artistic proposals fit in, often for an informed public, willing to interpret them as is done with a artwork written or illustrated. However, there are graphic novels without any text, others with a predominance of text, in short, there is no single model for them.