Jeet Heer

I'm not in love with In Love With Art. Neither as a title, nor the book itself. Taking the former, it seems to define Mouly only in relation to Spiegelman. And really that is the problem with the latter - there is just not enough of Mouly and too much of Art.

Unfortunately, I don't feel that Heer got to grips with the art of editing. Mouly's input to RAW is described in pretty nebulous terms. I realise that memories may be hazy now, and documentation scant, but a bit more detail would have been really helpful. As it was, we only really got that she worried about the order of the stories. In contrast, there was much more detail about Spiegelman's early career, which could have been skated over. (Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge Spiegelman fan, it's just not what I was reading the book for).

It's a little scattershot too - some things are peculiarly detailed, others mentioned in passing. Someone says they don't know how they got a printing press in the loft - that would have been interesting to know. similarly, Heer asserts that Clowes changed his mind about RAW, but doesn't say when the second quote was from. Compounding this, some material just seemed a bit weak. The description of editors as spies; pointing out that "Ware" contains the letters of RAW... And while I'm grouching - the tension between Weirdo and RAW seemed poorly motivated. These are all pretty minor faults, but I just had a sense of the whole being somewhat insubstantial.

In his summing up, Heer asserts that it was through Spiegleman that Mouly found her love for art. I suspect he forces this point a bit because of the assonance of the sentence, but the the result almost reads as if any smart woman chosen by Spiegelman would have achieved what Mouly has. I know that wasn't Heer's intention, but it is, I think, a problem with this book - Heer cannot or will not put Spiegelman to one side. Maybe he's just too in love with Art. Sorry.
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The name Art Spiegelman is known throughout the world for his revolutionary work, Maus, and his editorial work on RAW, which first helped introduce the work to Chris Ware, Charles Burns, and others. But...Art didn't work alone. His partner in these adventures for over forty years has been his wife, Francoise Mouly, who has her own artistic talents. She has been the art editor of the New Yorker since 1993, including the famous black on black cover after 9/11, and was a driving force behind RAW. In this book Jeet Heer, introduces the world to Mouly, through exclusive interviews with Mouly, Spiegelman, Dan Clowes, Adrian Tomine, and more. This book provides a behind-the-scenes look at the successful relationship between Mouly and Spiegelman, as they transform the world around them. Heer does an excellent job of telling their story and capturing their personality.

This is a great book, and an easy read that covers a lot of ground between Mouly and Spiegelman. I highly recommend this book for all fans of graphic novels, comics, and art in general. I give this book 4 out of 5 stars.

Review copy provided by publisher… (plus d'informations)