Books Blab! #14 By Leroy Douresseaux December 1, 2004 - 15:03 Publisher(s): Fantagraphics Books Cover Artist(s): Camille Rose Garcia ISBN: 1-56097-557-1 120 pp., color (54 pp.)/B&W, $19.95 BLAB! #14 Billed as the "preeminent anthology of the graphic design and illustration arts," BLAB! #14 includes contributions from Spain, Camille Rose Garcia (who also provides the wraparound cover), David Sandlin, Monte Beauchamp, Doug Allen, Baseman, Mark Landman, Minus & Despretz, Peter Kuper, and Sue Coe & Judy Brody Blab! is now less about comix storytelling and more about graphic design and graphic art, and illustration. Gone (for the most part) are the alt-comics short stories. Contemporary visual art, illustrations by fine and commercial artists, bizarre high art and really low art, abstract expressionism and representationalism have taken over the show. That's a good thing, but only if the contents are worth a damn. And worth may be highly personal or subjective. Suffice to say that this is not a comic book or a graphic novel, but it is a coffee table art book. So accepting that, the question has to be, is Blab! Vol. 14 any good? There is some good work here, including Peter Kuper's "Dead Sea Stroll" and Mark Landman's "Fetal Elvis." If I had to pick out an absolute favorite, it would be Sue Coe & Judy Brody's "WOMD" or "Weapons of Mass Destruction." While she isn't a comic book artist, Ms. Coe certainly uses graphic art in a narrative fashion; heck, maybe she really is a "sequential artist." Whatever she may be, Ms. Coe's work is always an invigorating experience. Her art defines power, and "WOMD" is worth at least $12.95 of the $19.95 price tag on Blab! #14. Some may be ready to see Blab! go away now that it is no longer what it once was. I'm not ready to see it leave, but it will take more Sue Coe-like work to keep me interested. B- © Copyright 2002-2026 by Toon Doctor Inc. - All rights Reserved. All other texts, images, characters and trademarks are copyright their respective owners. Use of material in this document (including reproduction, modification, distribution, electronic transmission or republication) without prior written permission is strictly prohibited.