Abstract Comics: Rosaire Appel and Bill Kartalopoulos In Dialogue

Please join us on Friday, April 24th at 6pm at 28 West 27th Street (3rd floor) for a conversation on abstract comics between book artist Rosaire Appel and comics specialist Bill Kartalopoulos, moderated by curator Nicole Kaack.  

Since the early 2010s, Appel has incorporated the conventions of comics into her practice, producing elaborate—if wordless—accordion and board books. Her interest in the graphic potency of comics as form originated in a mid-2000s visit to the Jewish Museum exhibition Masters of American Comics. “I didn’t read the comics, I looked at them,” she recalls. “Comics are graphically direct; you can take them in easily without getting hung up on niceties.” 

Kartalopoulos first encountered Appel’s work as the series editor for the Best American Comics series, which included one of her two-page abstract comics in its 2015 edition. His scholarly research focuses on links between comics and historical art and avant-garde movements. His recent projects include Joe Brainard’s The Complete C Comics (New York Review of Books) and co-curating the exhibition Rewriting the World: Isidore Isou and the Lettrist Book, currently on view at the Center for Book Arts. 

Moderated by Kaack, Appel and Kartalopoulos will discuss abstract comics from process-oriented and historical perspectives, mapping the shared terrain between experimental bookmaking and the evolving language of this graphic form.