Greatest Living Cartoonist

[Francis Dawson]

Matt Seneca, "Before today, Moebius was one of perhaps five individuals with a legitimate claim to the title of "greatest living cartoonist" ".

http://mattseneca.blogspot.com/

Who else could be credibly suggested in your opinion? Limiting it to five here's my suggestions:

R. Crumb (USA)
Lat (Malaysia)
Lorenzo Mattotti (Italy)
Hayao Miyazaki (Japan)
Jacques Tardi (France)

What's your take?

[Fesch_]

Mmm, problem is, none of those -except perhaps Crumb- are as relevant as Moebius. So if one wants to select a bunch among the greatest living cartoonists, there are just too many to pick. Certainly, Tardi must be among them. Miyazaki, I'm not so sure, after all he has only made one great comic (which is one of my favourites ever, BTW). Matotti is impressive, but there are others that could fit in there too (Sergio Toppi, Vittorio Giardino), and not only Italian (Carlos Giménez, Enki Bilal, Jiro Taniguchi, Joann Sfar, Yoshihiro Tatsumi, Richard Corben, Chris Ware, Daniel Clowes, Chester Brown, François Schuiten, François Bourgeon, Quino, Bill Watterson, Rumiko Takahashi, Francisco Ibáñez, David B., Art Spiegelman, Dave Sim, Fred, etc...).

As someone once said (Isaac Asimov, perhaps?) it is easy to name the best person in one field, the problem comes when you try to find the second best: too many possibilities. As you pointed out in the Moebius thread, there you have Kirby/Hergé/Tezuka/Moebius (I'd add Will Eisner)... and then who? Possibly Hugo Pratt, Franquin and Alberto Breccia, and a few others. But after those the choices are up to the taste of the reader, I guess. Too many great artists. I would say that the most important cartoonist working today is Chris Ware, but we'll need another 20 years to confirm that. I'm just glad that, even with Moebius gone, we're witnessing a global revolution in comics unlike any in their history. I'm having a great time, even if sometimes I just can't keep up with all the amazing comics being published these days.

[MDG]

Mmm, problem is, none of those -except perhaps Crumb- are as relevant as Moebius.
I was thinking about this, but my list would be too US-centric. And there's the question of "quality" or "influence."

First that came to my mind were Deitch, Spain, and Watterson (though Watterson is problematic since you'd hope the a "greatest cartoonist" would be producing stuff. As much as I've loved corben's stuff for years, a lot has been collaboration with other writers. I like Clowes, but in some ways, I feel one or both of the hernandez bros. have produced a more substantial body of work.

[Scott Shaw!]

Sergio Aragonés is the world's greatest living cartoonist. He's more prolific than all the other cartoonists mentioned put together, and since he's done so much pantomime material, his work can be printed without translation.

Aloha,

Scot!

[de Sosa]

Miguelexando Prado IMO

[pakehafulla]

Sergio Aragonés is the world's greatest living cartoonist. He's more prolific than all the other cartoonists mentioned put together, and since he's done so much pantomime material, his work can be printed without translation.

Aloha,

Scot!
Amen to that.

I would venture that his work is more widely known than the others too. A lot of "civilians", let alone comics fans, would recognise his cartoons from their MAD experiences as kids, but would have had little or no contact with the work of those others mentioned.

[Slam_Bradley]

I have no argument with Crumb, Watterson or Aragones.

First name that came to my mind was Don Rosa.

[Angilas-Man]

I like this growing list. I'd like to add Stan Sakai - not quite the machine Sergio is, but no slouch.

[Fesch_]

Miguelexando Prado IMO

Miguelanxo Prado would be the correct spelling. :wink: Quite a fine artist with some great works (Trazo de tiza, for instance), though not even the greatest living Spanish cartoonist (that would be Carlos Giménez). Lately, Prado has been very quiet, and our emerging figure is Paco Roca*. As for Sergio Aragonés, though he is Spanish too, I've never been able to get his humor, so I have little interest in his work.

*Recently featured in Eddie Campbell's blog, even though he hasn't been translated into English yet:

http://eddiecampbell.blogspot.com/2011/07/spaniard-in-works-part-6.html
http://eddiecampbell.blogspot.com/2011/09/i-intended-to-write-about-paco-rocas.html


I was thinking about this, but my list would be too US-centric. And there's the question of "quality" or "influence."


Always a tough question. I guess a combination of both and a bit of common sense would be the only possible approach. I guess that in today's landscape, the most influential cartoonists have been Art Spiegelman and Marjane Satrapi: I doubt that the "graphic novel" for adults as a popular format would exist as we know it without Maus and Persepolis. Good call on the Hernández brothers, but don't underestimate Clowes: from Wilson to The Death Ray his work has been amazing, and I'm eager to see what his next step is.

[benday-dot]

Maybe not the one to wear the crown, but Steve Ditko ought receive a laurel or two.

[Aaron Kashtan]

Crumb is probably the correct answer. Offhand I'd say the most important active cartoonists right now are Joann Sfar and Naoki Urasawa, but I don't know if they approach the status of Crumb or Moebius or Herge.

Fesch, I absolutely love Carlos Gimenez, and it's a shame none of his work is available in English. If Paco Roca is comparable to Gimenez and Prado, then I'd like to see some of his work.

[Artycool8or]

************

[hondobrode]

I agree it's probably Sergio Aragones, but Gahan Wilson would be a strong candidate too.

89911

[Venomous Mask]

Maybe not the one to wear the crown, but Steve Ditko ought receive a laurel or two.

Definitely, he's historic. For the modern crowd, I would go with Menton3. He does noir like none other.

[Francis Dawson]

I agree it's probably Sergio Aragones, but Gahan Wilson would be a strong candidate too.

I can dig suggestions of Ditko and Gahan Wilson. Other US cartoonists unmentioned so far:

Jack Davies
Jules Feiffer
Gary Panter

[berk]

I'm not really up on this enough to have a strong opinion ... of the artists I am familiar with I might go with Bilal. Or the Hernandez brothers - perhaps Gilbert, if I have to choose just one. Or Druillet, though I haven't seen anything of his more recent work.

[Fesch_]

Crumb is probably the correct answer. Offhand I'd say the most important active cartoonists right now are Joann Sfar and Naoki Urasawa, but I don't know if they approach the status of Crumb or Moebius or Herge.

I don't think they do. I love them both, but... Truth is, if we consider the whole crowd of L'Association (Sfar, David B., Trondheim, etc) and their satellites, I guess we could say that they have been as a whole as influential as the Metal Hurlant authors (Moebius, Caza, Druillet, etc) in shaping the modern comic landscape. The younger artists like Riad Sattouf or Bastien Vivès wouldn't be publishing without them, I guess. Urasawa is great, but he works well within the limits of mainstream manga and hasn't really made anything new or influential that other artists may find inspiration in.



Fesch, I absolutely love Carlos Gimenez, and it's a shame none of his work is available in English. If Paco Roca is comparable to Gimenez and Prado, then I'd like to see some of his work.

Fortunately, Giménez has been partially translated into French, so perhaps in the future we'll see some of his works in English. It is indeed a shame that Paracuellos or Los profesionales are still mostly unknown outside Spain, as they are absolutely essential reading for anyone interested in comics. Also, his sci-fi adaptations of Jack London, Stanislaw Lem or Aldiss are well worth reading, but these are less likely to be published abroad. As for Paco Roca, I prefer him over Prado, though I wouldn't say yet that he is better: time will tell. But Prado seems to be stuck in his old works, while Roca is constantly evolving. He is not Carlos Giménez, but none could be like him in Spain. You can check a sample of his work in Eddie Campbell's blog, did you see the links?

[Scott Shaw!]

You guys are proving my point. You have to qualify many of your choices by explaining who they are and what they've done. (I'm extremely knowledgeable about comics of all types and origins and a few of your choices didn't resonate with at all!) But mention Sergio Aragonés' name or show someone one of his cartoons and almost anyone will recognize his stuff...and LAUGH. The man even gets recognized on the street and other public places constantly. His stuff may not be overly intellectual or dark or outrageous...but his writing, drawng and storytelling are as good as cartooning gets and his work has the warmth, humor and truth that any person in the world relates to. Based on my experiences in the biz, nearly any professional cartoonist would agree with me regarding "the world's greatest LIVING cartoonist."

[Drusilla lives!]

I gotta agree with Scott Shaw!, as far as cartoonists, Sergio is my pick... love his work, always have.

Btw, I have to compliment Scott here on his recent Bart Simpson work... great job on the artwork for that "Warlord" piece dude, I really enjoyed it. And it was a pretty long one at that (14 pages I think), well done. Hope to see more of your work soon. :smile

[dupont2005]

Too tough for me to even attempt. Not to mention like a lot of members of this board many of my favorites have passed away over the years.

[Fesch_]

You guys are proving my point. You have to qualify many of your choices by explaining who they are and what they've done. (I'm extremely knowledgeable about comics of all types and origins and a few of your choices didn't resonate with at all!)

Which is quite difficult when some of these authors are almost impossible to find in English. :frown: As far as availabilty goes, I think it is impossible to be truly knowledgeable without learning a foreign language or two. I read comics in English, Spanish, French and Italian, and while I think that it may be possible to sort out who the most influential living cartoonist is, I doubt that there's anything like "the world's greatest living cartoonist". How could you compare Sergio Aragonés with Yoshihiro Tatsumi? Robert Crumb with Jacques Tardi? Sergio Toppi with Carlos Giménez? On what basis would you say that one is greater than the other, considering how different their cultural backgrounds and styles are?

[Chris N]

I like this growing list. I'd like to add Stan Sakai - not quite the machine Sergio is, but no slouch.

At day's end ', I don't know comics well enough to answer the question. So I tend to defer to the knowledgeable.

But Stan is the name that comes to my mind when I ponder the question.

[dr chimp]

too many people around the world can draw the bejesus out of a comic book to say s/he is better than him/her in my opinion. as long as people are able to express themselves then thats the most important thing

[FanboyStranger]

There's a lot of great choices in this thread, but I have to confess I thought of Sergio Aragones as soon as I saw the title.

[Venomous Mask]

You guys are proving my point. You have to qualify many of your choices by explaining who they are and what they've done. (I'm extremely knowledgeable about comics of all types and origins and a few of your choices didn't resonate with at all!) But mention Sergio Aragonés' name or show someone one of his cartoons and almost anyone will recognize his stuff...and LAUGH. The man even gets recognized on the street and other public places constantly. His stuff may not be overly intellectual or dark or outrageous...but his writing, drawng and storytelling are as good as cartooning gets and his work has the warmth, humor and truth that any person in the world relates to. Based on my experiences in the biz, nearly any professional cartoonist would agree with me regarding "the world's greatest LIVING cartoonist."

Fair enough. Here's my first choice. Mark Bagley, an artist most famous for his work on Ultimate Spiderman as well as Amazing spiderman in the mid-nineties. His work did have some flaws, such as occasionally making someone's head to big and making people's expressions look somewhat samey. But on the whole, he's brilliant, making the characters almost jump out of the page and make it seem like you're watching a movie.

http://d1466nnw0ex81e.cloudfront.net/iss/600w/344/19843441/19843524_1.jpg

http://x.annihil.us/u/prod/marvel/i/mg/2/00/4bb7edf33aad5/detail.jpg

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lr4yirnzrv1qbgo38o1_500.jpg

[Venomous Mask]

The next one I'll mention is Menton3. I was torn between choosing him or Ben Templesmith, but something about Menton's artwork speaks to me. It's very much of an acquired taste; sort of Van Gogh meets Giger meets Beksinski. He's drawn for the series Monocyte, Silent Hill: Past Life, Zombies vs. Robots, as well as covers for That Hell-Bound Train and Proof Endangered. His artwork is creepy, stark, and beautiful

http://menton3.com/images/gallery/preview/Monocyte_m3coverA_book3_big2.jpg

http://menton3.com/images/gallery/preview/mementomori4.jpg

http://menton3.com/images/gallery/preview/001a2.jpg

[Chris N]

Fair enough. Here's my first choice. Mark Bagley, an artist most famous for his work on Ultimate Spiderman as well as Amazing spiderman in the mid-nineties. His work did have some flaws, such as occasionally making someone's head to big and making people's expressions look somewhat samey. But on the whole, he's brilliant, making the characters almost jump out of the page and make it seem like you're watching a movie.


But Bagley is an artist, not a cartoonist.

But he knows how to tell an exciting superhero story better than most of his generation. And he drew possibly my favorite comic page ever.

[Scott Shaw!]

Believe me, he's a cartoonist!

Aloha,

Scott!

[LEADER DESSLOK]

If we are talking about visuals only, my vote goes to JACK DAVIS--whose work was ALWAYS entertaining and could also be scary as well as humorous.

But if we're talking about someone who is not only a great artist but an exceptional writer then my choice is SANPEI SHIRATO! His KAMUI stories were simply wonderful and the artwork--mindblowing!


1. SANPEI SHIRATO


------------------------------------------------------
runners up:

YOSHIHARU TATSUMI

PETER BAGGE

SERGIO ARAGONES

RUMIKO TAKAHASHI

JACK DAVIS (visuals only)

STEVE DITKO (visuals\co-plotting)

TODD McFARLANE (most successful)

[Fesch_]

I've just stumbled upon this open letter by Lewis Trondheim concerning the Angoulême festival, and I think it is quite relevant here:

"And the Grand Prix! [The nomination of the festival president for the following years' festival] I was flattered to have been chosen by my peers, and I thank them, but I’m ashamed to have been selected before Munoz, before Blutch, before Spiegelman, before Chris Ware, Bill Watterson, Otomo, Toriyama, Tatsumi, Binet, F’murrr and many others.

When I see, during the deliberations of the nominating committee, how many of my colleagues are neither familiar with most of these names, nor with their work, nor have they even heard of a Japanese artist, I’m ashamed! And I tell myself that I can’t do the job I was chosen for, which is to vote for the artist whose work has contributed the most to the development of comics.

That’s why I left the meeting room in the middle of the deliberations this year and why I won’t be back for the next round of nominations."

From http://sarahglidden.com/angouleme-love-it-or-shove-it-an-open-letter-by-lewis-trondheim/

[dr chimp]

exactly - no-one wants the title of best cartoonist - as soon as you try and give it to them the first thing they are going to say is - no no you should check this guy out - thats why they are such good artists - because they love the medium - everyone has their own personal favourites who they love to death but there is no "the best".

(oh and i like jim woodring.)

[Slam_Bradley]

exactly - no-one wants the title of best cartoonist

Next thing you know there are young bucks coming along challenging you to a draw-off. Ink brushes at dawn.

[dr chimp]

Next thing you know there are young bucks coming along challenging you to a draw-off. Ink brushes at dawn.

jim woodring comes with the heavy artillery

http://www.boingboing.net/assets_mt/2011/01/10/woodring-demos-his-giant-pen.jpg

[hondobrode]

When I think of cartoonist, I think of the classical sense of an artist who does the whole she-bang and, my own biased, skews less towards super-hero and more towards a pop culture appeal.

In this sense, I think Kyle Baker would be a strong candidate.

90156

[de Sosa]

Mike Mignola deserves mention here as well.

[FanboyStranger]

jim woodring comes with the heavy artillery

http://www.boingboing.net/assets_mt/2011/01/10/woodring-demos-his-giant-pen.jpg

I donated for him to get that monstrosity. That's how much I love Jim Woodring.

But it's still Sergio Aragones, for my money. (Which is why Sergio should come to me early if he wants a gigantic pen.)

[FanboyStranger]

When I think of cartoonist, I think of the classical sense of an artist who does the whole she-bang and, my own biased, skews less towards super-hero and more towards a pop culture appeal.

In this sense, I think Kyle Baker would be a strong candidate.

90156
Definitely up there, and probably the guy whose work I like the best. Still, Aragones.

[de Sosa]

any advice of the best english Aragones albums to get? I know absolutely nothing about this guy and have never seen his work except for google images.

Dave Sim also I think is pretty great

[shaxper]

any advice of the best english Aragones albums to get? I know absolutely nothing about this guy and have never seen his work except for google images.


Most of his Groo stories are pretty interchangeable, though you might want to try the Groo Houndbook, as this was the storyline that introduced Rufferto as an unforgettable traveling companion.

[dr chimp]

I donated for him to get that monstrosity. That's how much I love Jim Woodring.

But it's still Sergio Aragones, for my money. (Which is why Sergio should come to me early if he wants a gigantic pen.)

i salute a man who not only helps buy one gigantic pen but would then buy another one. The things you stand for are good and noble.

[FanboyStranger]

i salute a man who not only helps buy one gigantic pen but would then buy another one. The things you stand for are good and noble.
Hah. I wouldn't help buy one for just anyone, though.

I just thought it was kind of a neat thing.