This week I drove to Cincinnati, OH (and across the river to Covington, KY) to see Carol Tyler give her talk, “Graphic Emotion: Weighted Words and Moving Marks” at the Carnegie.
Carol’s talk coincided with her participation in an art exhibit titled, “With and Without: Challenges.”
This show was amazing, and will be the subject of its own upcoming blog post. Possibly multiple posts. Far too much to process at once. It was that good.
Carol’s contribution to the show was to present the process of and ephemera from her three volume graphic novel, You’ll Never Know,
which is reviewed here by Douglas Wolk for the New York Times. From the review, you will get a sense of the power of these book’s content and form.
Fantagraphics will be issuing the books as a single volume in June of 2015.
This is Carol’s stage setup as seen from the balcony of the charming old Buddig Theater.
Her stage set up close:
Her talk included discussion of the process by which she created the gorgeous, hand lettered and hand painted pages of You’ll Never Know (see below for photos from exhibit) and the chaos of emotional trials, caregiving, PTSD, cancer, stroke, loss, and betrayal that was her life as she tried to make this book a reality. It was emotionally exhausting to hear, but at the same time, unbelievably inspiring.
There was even baton twirling. Highlighted quotes from my sketch notes:
My process is that I figure out how it works as I go along.
Never put the word shitty in the title of your book.
I had to build furniture to accommodate the making of this book! I’m a carpenter!
I’m not the subtle image lady. I’m the story lady.
I always keep a pencil in my hair so I can jot stuff down.
Spend all the money.
There’s always a wreck of some sort. But you’ve got to do your work.
In Carol’s part of the exhibit upstairs from the Buddig Theater, she wrote (and her husband Justin Green painted) directly on the walls to tell the story of how she spent nine years creating the You’ll Never Know trilogy. We read through the exhibit on the walls and shelves and floor, in comic format, panel by panel. (two slideshows below)
You’ll Never Know is an astonishing graphic novel, work of art, and I eagerly anticipate the full series being released as one volume next summer. Seeing Carol discuss her process, her work ethic in the face of chaos was unspeakably inspiring to me as I begin work on my own graphic novel. I did get the opportunity to chat with Carol briefly, but I was too shy to request a photo of the two of us. I’m confident there will be future opportunities. In the meantime, here’s a selfie with plastic penguin from back at the 21c Museum Hotel.
I know Carol a little and she is absolutely one of my favorite comics-making people. I once called her “a force of nature deposited on our planet just to create comics, inspire creativity, and make people happy.” She’s the best!