Sunday, April 25, 2010
Satrapi's Style
While reading Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, I noticed that she has a very distinct artistic style. The first thing that I noticed right away was fact that all the characters were drawn in a simple fashion. As you probably recall from McCloud's Understanding Comics, this means that the characters (mostly Marjane) are more iconic and relatable, so you are more likely to see yourself as a particular character in the story. Another method that Satrapi used in the early part of the book was when Marjane talks about how she wants to be a prophet. During that time, she often talks to God, but she doesn't talk to him through prayers; Satrapi depicts her having conversations with God as if he was a physical person in her room with her. I thought that that was a smart move, and it probably could not have been done if it weren't a comic. One more thing I noticed about Satrapi's style was that she had a tendency to have the characters almost always have closed mouths, even then they have a dialogue bubbles. I'm not sure if that really makes a difference, but it just seems kind of strange to see someone talking while looking they are just staring at something.
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i think it's also kind of neat how she tell the story through the eyes of a little girl rather than through her adult eyes. if you think about it this sort of plays into your idea of compatibility with how the characters are drawn. mostly everyone can think back to a time when they were young and older people have a sort of complex to want to relate to children because of their innocence. so with her drawing s and use of characters i think she has achieved compatibility with the audience.
ReplyDeleteI've also noticed the closed mouth part of the drawings. When their mouths are open and speech bubbles come out, they are most likely shouting something. I thought the author drew them like that just so she can show their emotions more easily.
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