An artful book that just scratches the surface of D’s life in hip-hop.
An iconic MC sketches out his brushes with music, sports, and political celebrities.
Though not exactly a memoir and not arranged chronologically, this book by the Public Enemy frontman and accomplished graphic novelist (Summer of Hamn, 2023, etc.) does capture key moments on his path from Long Island deliveryman to hip-hop royalty. Each page typically features an ink-and-watercolor rendering of the person he met, along with some handwritten commentary. The drawings have a hasty-looking but still careful aesthetic—his renderings are remarkably accurate. Unsurprisingly, many of the subjects hail from the worlds of hip-hop and R&B: Biggie Smalls, Tupac Shakur, Mavis Staples, Erykah Badu, and more. But there are some surprises, like Fox News chief Roger Ailes (who briefly hired Chuck D as an on-air analyst), Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider, and Prince, seen administering a yard sale at his studio. He shares a few examples of awkward interactions—Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich, a counterpoint to D’s late-’90s enthusiasm for file sharing, and Percy Sledge, whom D mistook for Fats Domino on a plane. And he remains a supporter of the controversial Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, rendered here as a peacekeeper during the East Coast–West Coast rap wars and the Million Man March of 1995. But generally, his commentary reflects admiration and wide-eyed astonishment that he got to breathe the same air as the named celebrity. To that end, this book feels like a missed opportunity: You sense that D could create a full-dress graphic memoir and say much more about the likes of Spike Lee and his longtime friend and sidekick Flavor Flav, or moments that cry out for more explanation, like a concert at a Cleveland roller rink where he performed on skates.
An artful book that just scratches the surface of D’s life in hip-hop.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9781636142043
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Enemy Books/Akashic
Review Posted Online: Nov. 9, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
A beautifully produced, engaging homage.
Celebrating a beloved artist.
Published to coincide with a major exhibition of works by British-born artist David Hockney (b. 1937) at the Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris, this lushly illustrated volume offers a detailed overview of the artist’s life and work, along with chapters focused on his various styles and subject matter, a chronology, and a glossary of the many techniques he employed in his art, including camera lucida, computer, and video. Contributors of essays include noted art historians and curators, such as Norman Rosenthal, who edited the volume; Simon Schama; Anne Lyles; James Cahill; and François Michaud. Growing up in the north of England, Hockney was drawn to the light and sparkle that he found in Hollywood movies. When he finally arrived in Los Angeles, the sunlit landscapes inspired him, and his new sense of artistic freedom concurred with sexual freedom: As a gay man, he felt liberated from the constraints that had weighed on him in Britain, even in the “relative Bohemia” of the Royal College of Art. Essayists reflect on his artistic interests, such as landscapes, portraiture, flowers, and the opera—for which he created boldly exuberant sets—as well as on his influences and experimentation. Michaud examines the impact on Hockney of a visit to Paris in the 1970s, where he became familiar with Henri Matisse and his contemporaries from museum exhibitions. In the 1990s, visiting his mother and friends in Yorkshire, Hockney painted both outdoors and in the studio, experimenting with various media—including the photocopier and fax machine—as he worked to render the woodsy landscape. As a companion to the exhibition, the volume offers stunning reproductions of Hockney’s prolific works. Enormously popular with museumgoers, Hockney, Rosenthal exults, “transforms the ordinary and the everyday into the remarkable.”
A beautifully produced, engaging homage.Pub Date: June 3, 2025
ISBN: 9780500029527
Page Count: 328
Publisher: Thames & Hudson
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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