Art Spiegalman is Amazing!

Art Spiegalman is Amazing!!

Art Spiegalman came to Minneapolis on Friday last week (April 25th) and spoke to a sold out crowd.  My teaching team and I brought our 9th grade students to see the iconic author and comic artist speak about Co-Mix as a part of the
Pen Pals Author Lecture series offered by the Hennepin County Library Friends.

He started his talk saying that "everything he knows he learned from comic books".  Art won the Pulitzer Prize for Maus. A Survivor's Tale.  My Father Bleeds History.  This is one of the texts my 9th grade world history students read in their English classes.

Art is quoted for saying, "Comics are a gateway drug to literacy".  I couldn't agree more.  I love comics/graphic novels and so my kids and students.  They literally gets reluctant kids reading, especially kids with Aspergers and ADHD.  I speak from experience.

His newest book is called CO-MIX.  A Retrospective of Comics, Graphics and Scraps.  Most of his speech was on this book and it details his life and features many of his comics including some of his New Yorker magazine covers.  He got his start working for Bazooka and he even drew Garbage Pail kids.  Remember those?

If you get a chance to see Art Spiegalman, you seriously need to go.  He is a genius and he is amazing.  I think I am his biggest fan.