Korongo: An Interview with Steve Bissette

Thursday, May 26, 2011

An Interview with Steve Bissette

The Onion's AV Club has a fascinating interview with Steve Bissette, who will be speaking with Phil Godenschwager at Korongo next week. Steve grew up in Duxbury, Vermont, and was one of the first graduates of the Kubert School; he now teaches at the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction—his newest book is Teen Angels & New Mutants. Steve is a brainy guy and the interview covers a multitude of subjects, most of them relating to his great love: horror comics. "Part of what defines the horror genre to me is exploring the deepest crevices of who and what we are," he told interviewer Chris Dahlen. "I am always drawn to anything that takes me to or over the edge." What follows is an excerpt. To read the full interview, click here.

"Horror is one of the few genres—romance and comedy are the other two that come to mind—that’s all emotion-driven. It’s not a rational genre, like science fiction is. It’s irrational by nature. And it is capable of exploring all aspects of human experience. And that was my belief from the time I was a little kid, and I don’t know why I understood that. I couldn’t have articulated it. I couldn’t even articulate it while I was at Kubert School. I just knew that the fact that [horror comics] kept pouring that old wine in the same bottle was frustrating to me, because it’s like 'Man, so much more can be done!' Some of my favorite books, short stories, songs, movies, that to me were clearly horror genre, others weren’t defining as that. Jerzy Kosinski’s The Painted Bird, an award-winning novel about being a war orphan during World War II, and the atrocities he survived. It’s one of the most horrific books I ever read. B. Traven, who’s best known for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, did an incredible book called The Death Ship that my friend Tim Viereck loaned to me. And it’s this grueling narrative about a man who’s been shanghaied and put into the most dangerous, crap job on a ship he cannot escape from. It’s another ordeal. These vivid narratives, to me, were clearly horror, but no one was calling them that. They would reserve that term for something that had fangs in it, or a werewolf. And to me, that was restraining what was possible, not just in horror, but in comics in general." —Excerpt from a 2009 interview with Chris Dahlen. Steve and Phil Godenschwager will talk about the cartoonist's art at Korongo on June 2 (Thursday) at 7 p.m. Call the gallery for reservations, as seating is limited.

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The Randolph Herald on Korongo

From Herald writer Dian Parker: "Living in the East Village in Manhattan in the late '60s and all through the '70s, I’d often hang out with artists at a street café and we’d talk about our work incessantly. Bongo drummers lined Second Avenue and the small alcove of my eighth-floor walk up was often a place for bums to sleep. Artists opened their apartments as tiny makeshift art galleries. On one wall hung a tie-dyed sheet and on the floor a double mattress. Not much else except art. And more art. It was everywhere, some of it not very good, but it was an outpouring nonetheless; a place to be seen. We never thought the East Village would become what it is now, one of the hip places to live in Manhattan, still filled with art, only much more expensive.

"Along comes the Korongo Gallery to Randolph, and we have promise again of a beginning that could very well burgeon into something hip and wonderful, a place for artists and writers to display and read their work, congregate and hang out. At the opening on March 17 there was a feeling of excitement and expectation that we might just be on the verge of a new happening, right here in downtown Randolph. The gallery was packed. Patrick Texier, the owner, schmoozed with the folks and Laurie Sverdlove Goldman, the painter, and talked about her work which hung on three of the walls. Jack Rowell took photographs and everyone was smiling and milling about. The food was delicious. This was a real opening in a new little gallery that has a big and bright future." To continue reading Dian's article on the Herald website, click here.