minimalist running

Japanese playing cards

These Japanese playing cards are from a Japanese comic/manga artist that as I post this has completely slipped my mind. I’ll have to hunt for the name later, too bad I don’t read Japanese. The creepy mystical/mythical is mixed with a modern manga-toon aesthetic. I also have no idea how to play this game either, but think its based on some old traditional Japanese card game.

So I’ve been revisiting the comic genre recently, sampling and seeing whats out there as far as differing styles and narrative. My love-affair with the comic sort of died back in the early 90’s, not sure why. Anyway I’m steering away from conventional super-hero fare and focusing on more underground stuff this time around.

Jason is John Arne Saeteröy from Molde Norway (my own home town) has been making comics for a few decades now, and has in recent years been translated into English for a larger audience. His whole library is being published by Fantagraphics.

Inspired by silent films, Jason’s style is minimal featuring animal-human characters in mostly black and white. One can thumb through several pages before seeing a single line of dialogue. To top it off, the characters are not over-compensating with facial expressions. The difference between a smile and a frown is hardly noticeable. The story is enough to set the emotional stage for the characters. Hmm, this reads like a review, anyway I’ll be collecting all of Jasons comics whenever money allows.

Interview with Jason