Robert Crumb – Collectie

Beschrijving

Complete set – R. Crumb Sketchbook – Taschen HC – Volume 1 – 6

Vol. 1: Jun 1964 – Sep 1968 HC
Vol. 2. Sep 1968 – Jan 1975 HC
Vol. 3: Jan. 1975 – Dec 1982 HC
Vol. 4: Dec. 1982 – Dec. 1989 HC
Vol. 5: Dec. 1989 – Jan. 1998 HC
Vol. 6: Feb 1998 – Mar 2011 HC

With approximately 2600 pages in total.

Volume 1 combines the two earliest volumes from the limited editions, produced directly from the original artworks now belonging to an ardent French collector, into one fat 440-page Crumb feast. This book contains hundreds of sketches, including early color drawings from the master of underground comic art, cover roughs for the legendary Zap and Head comics, the original Keep On Truckin’ sketches, the first appearance of Mr. Natural, plus his evolution and refinement, Fritz The Cat, the Old Pooperoo, and many, many voluptuous Crumb girls, all wrapped up in a quality hard cover featuring an illustration newly hand-colored by Crumb himself.

Volume 2 Called the Bruegel of underground art, Robert Crumb is an American icon of comic introspection, cultural satire, and sexual obsession. His pen and ink drawings first documented, then shaped, the 1960s/70s counterculture. This new collection presents an affordable 444-page trip through the hippie years, 1968–1975, personally sourced by the artist from his original sketchbooks

Volume 3 combines volumes 5 and 6 from the second R. Crumb Sketchbook boxed set. Among the hundreds of subjects included are Crumb’s move to rural California, his marriage to Aline Kominsky, the birth of daughter Sophie, as well as further adventures of Mr. Natural, mischievous Snoids, Arcade comics strips, political discontent, existential angst, huge powerful women, geeky little guys, Mao Tse Tung, Mick Jagger and moral outrage,

Volume 4 combines volumes 7 and 8 from the first boxed set (confusing, we know), it spans the years 1982 to 1989, a period when the artist was comfortably ensconced in rural California, raising his young daughter Sophie, who appears throughout this volume. But Crumb was still Crumb, declaring in one drawing, above a lovingly rendered tree, “As I get older I get more twisted, convoluted, depraved, cynical, embittered, self-centered, jaded, debauched, ruthless, greedy, conceited, set-in-my-ways, long-winded, absent-minded, prejudiced, closed-minded, misanthropic, nervous…”

Volume 5 of the R. Crumb Sketchbooks covers two of the most noteworthy events of the artist’s life: the family’s move to southern France in 1991 and the release of Terry Zwigoff’s 1994 documentary CRUMB. Solidly in his midlife crises years, our curmudgeon finds a measure of peace and acceptance of the cruel whims of fate—until the final pages, when he pronounces himself “such a fucking QUEER.”

Volume 6 fills the final page in this final volume, with a devilish creature telling the anguished Crumb, ‘YOU Will Soon Be DEAD!’ He was a mere 67, but in his self-absorbed Crumbish way was obsessing about death, when not making intimate and loving portraits of his mistress Carol Vinson, his wife Aline, and all the other women who’d tormented his libido since boyhood. Most impressive in this book are his historic tableau, some single page, others multi-page strips, including Piers the Ploughman of 14th century England, My Secret Life by ‘Walter,’ Rough Women of the Dark Ages and The Apache Dance, from a 1930s Parisian postcard. His Rapidographed cross hatching is superb as ever and we are treated to long screeds displaying his undimmed brilliance at analyzing the human condition, in a morbid but nonetheless amusing way. One could say there are no surprises in content, as Crumb has produced a consistent body of work over the last 40, if not 50, years, yet each page is also jarringly different from the one before, due to his personal juxtaposition of images. So much is packed in you can spend an hour and find you’re only a quarter of the way through, with Crumb bemoaning his mortality, while continuing to prosper, every few pages. A fine stand-alone volume, and must-have completion for the sketchbook set.

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