Speaking of artists using handwritten text, Trenton Doyle Hancock’s book Me A Mound is a great example. It’s a very strange but beautiful book about the battle between the Mounds and the Vegans. Mounds? Trenton describes them in an interview for Art:21 as “…these half-human, half-plant mutants that came to life about fifty thousand years ago, when an ape man masturbated in a field of flowers and up sprang these creatures and they’re called Mounds. Since then many of them have died off for various reasons, but the main cause of death of Mounds is the premature death caused by creatures called Vegans who are evil creatures who can’t stand Mounds at all.” I haven’t read the whole story which is handwritten on pink newsprint inserted between full bleed illustrations of the described events. Apparently there’s all sorts of biblical references mixed in. This is Trenton’s first monograph (or graphic novel is what I would call it) and it is a big one. It’s about the size of a history textbook, with a die-cut cover, fold-outs, inserts and removable trading cards about the artist. Some of it is painted, some is sketched, some is very graphic. It’s a real variety and a huge amount of work for a person in their early thirties to have done. Read more about Trenton here- you can watch excerpts from PBS’s Art:21 series. Pick up a copy of the book here.

© Julia Rothman 2007