Comics are much more than Tintin
Belgium is home to the comic strip genre. In this country of no more than 30,000 km², great authors such as Hergé (Tintin), Peyo (The Smurfs), Morris (Lucky Luke) or Jacobs (Blake and Mortimer) were born. Through the French influence and the artistic boom of the 20th century, many Belgian cartoonists left a legacy of imagination in the art of communication.
When we talk about comics, we think of the stories of Tintin, Asterix the Gaul or Lucky Luke. Through Tintin’s adventures in America or the Congo, many young people have been introduced to the comic book genre. Short, disparate, entertaining or calm stories, all of them different, but all of them have in common the need to communicate through cartoon images.
Jan Cumps, a linguistic researcher at the Catholic University of Leuven and a connoisseur of the comics genre, assures us that “Belgium has been the nerve centre of European comics for decades, and that influence is still present, even if France is more important today”.
The origin of this genre actually date back to the 12th and 13th centuries. As the Belgian Comic Strip Center (Brussels) clearly explains, the monks of the Abbey of Citeaux (France) have devoted their lives to reproducing the sacred texts of the Bible. Without realising it, the technique they used is identical to that of the comic strip. Already between 1109 and 1299 they began to divide the stories into panels, close-ups and dialogues. Juan Auquier, the ex-director of the Comics Art Museum, defines comic strips as “the evolution of the desire to tell stories and the art of drawing”.
Comic strips throughout history have become one of the most literary art forms. Since the birth of the comic strip, the image of the drawing has been the main feature. If you go back to the 19th century, the newspaper and magazine industry already noticed that pictures and stories kept the readers’ attention longer. For this reason, a large number of newspapers decided to add cartoons and comics to their editions, such as Max and Moritz in Germany or Les Miserables in France.
Today, comics have developed in categories, like any literary genre. The art of drawing serves to convey as well as words. One example of this is the educational comic strip. As exhibited at the Comics Art Museum in Brussels, educational comics have become a modern means of enriching the intellect of readers through history, factual information or personal bibliographies.
Another genre enriched by cartoons is expressionism in comics. This is the case with authors such as Will Eisner or Chester Gould. In this type of comics, the artists use heavy lines and strong contrasts between black and white. Ferry Van Vosselen is a Flemish artist who has stood out for combining different genres of comics in his own style. In his publications he has recreated both past and imaginary worlds, an example of which is the Lan Kaledine series or Chronicles of Panchrysia. Moreover, throughout his career, he has stood out for his work as a comic author for the newspaper Le Soir, the magazines Pilote and Tintin.
Another movement that has led to a new genre is comic art and its relationship with Art Nouveau. Currently, at the Belgian Comic Strip Center itself, there is an exhibition called “Comic Art & Art Nouveau” that combines the two arts. Throughout this exhibition, the unique relationship between comics and the artists of the Ninth Art is highlighted. Comics by authors such as François Schuiten and the famous Belgian architect Victor Horta depict the cabarets, fairs and inventions of the Belle Époque.
Comic strips are a genre that has no limits. It once maybe started with Brussels as its capital, but it has spread all over the world. As an example of this, there is the San Mao statue that the Chinese embassy in Belgium donated to the country in 2015. This figure, created by Zhang Leping in 1935, represents China’s most famous comic character.
Nevertheless, expert Jan Cumps acknowledges that the genre remains fairly unknown to adult audiences. Comics are most often associated with a children’s genre, and considered less cultured. But today there is a wide range of comics for any age, genre or interest. Cumps even highlights the Dual Coding Theory, due to the increase of knowledge by linking images to words.
In particular, the professor at the Catholic University of Leuven says that “reading comics fosters students’ ability to think”. This genre is based on communicating through imagination and creativity. Therefore, comics is an art form that needs to be promoted publicly.
