Art Review

When we hear the word comic book or graphic novel, we tend to think of the small paper books we remember buying when we were children featuring action heroes like Spiderman, The Incredible Hulk, or Ironman. Installation art is surely not something that generally pops into our mind when we hear those words, but one artist proved that comics can be read and displayed in more ways than one. Kerry James Marshall incorporated his own comic strip into a site specific installation work that he presented covering the glass panels of the display cases in a museum. He titled this piece Rythm Mastr, produced in 1999-2000 the 20 (17 X 11 inch) double page, two-sided printed newspaper comics where made using a photocopy of ink drawing and design marker on paper. This piece is a representational narrative that Marshall uses to try and bridge the gap between modern art and African art.

Throughout the comic strip there are many visual elements incorporated into the work, I will point out a few of these. One of the first visual elements that I noticed was the artist’s use of implied time and motion, which is defined as “non-moving image(s) that shows movement through the attributed present in the image.” For example take the stances of the figures and superheroes in the comic strip, each one has its own individual way of showing movement, whether it is the front foot being lifted off the ground, or the arms coming out from the figures sides as it is about to step forward. The artist does a skillful job of showing the implied time and motion this way. The second visual element that caught my attention was the dominant use of primary colors in the color scheme throughout the strip. The primary colors are red, yellow, and blue; they are described as being primary “because theoretically they cannot be made by mixing any other colors together.” Marshall uses the primary colors in the strip to contrast each other and make each one stand out more against the other, the brick...