Belly Button Comix #2

Posted: Monday, February 21, 2005
By: Amos Simien

Creator: Sophie Crumb
Publishers: Oog & Blik and Fantagraphics Books
Addresses:Niewe Hemweg 7e-F, 1013 BG Amsterdam, Netherlands and 7563 Lake City Way NE, Seattle, WA 98115
Price: $4.95/$7.95 (Canada)

The first issue of Sophie Crumb's Belly Button Comix earned her a Harvey Award for "Best New Series" and lots of media attention, including a feature article on her in the New York Times. Whimsical funny animal tales and stories of Parisian romance highlighted the first issue. This time around, Sophie, who is the daughter of the R. Crumb and Aline Kominsky-Crumb, focuses her creative energies on autobiographical comix.

Her "my illustrated diary of the past 6 months," details her move from Paris, France to Berkeley, CA, where she falls in love with an endearing 30-year old artist who lives in a Berkeley student co-op. Jonathan, or "Johnny Boy" is also a big time drug addict, and Sophie and Johnny spend six months experimenting with drugs and living a down and out trailer trash existence. That's just fine with them, thank you.

From the late 80's and especially through the 90's, autobiographical comix ruled. Some people consider them the height of art comix; others saw them as another comics genre no better than superhero comics. However, as is the case of autobiographical stories told in any artistic medium, good storytellers make their mundane lives compelling. The best storytellers make their compelling lives a metaphor for and an examination of the times in which they lived. Sophie isn't quite there in either case.

She's still an artist in the rough. I interviewed her over a year ago, and she seemed not sure about herself as a cartoonist or even if she would keep creating comics. For all her uncertainty, she is a natural storytelling cartoonist. "Illustrated diary" seems to drag in a few places, but her thorough understanding of the iconography of comics and cartoons helps her work; she engages the reader, just at the moment the reader might become bored. She is frank in her dialogue and narration, but not so in her illustrations. On page eleven of the tale, she focuses so much on herself in a lovemaking scene that she voids it, creating an awkward scene with no impact and not much value. That's a slip or glitch; she has them on occasion.

I don't like issue two as much as I did the first one. I miss the fancifulness of the cartoonish characters like "Zozo and Zaza," that appear in this issue, but are relegated to the sidelines. What I do like is the chance to be in on the ground floor as this talented young cartoonist rapidly earns her sea legs, which is enough to entice any alt-comics fan.

In a word:Burgeoning

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