Pakistan's leading arts college has pushed boundaries before in this conservative nation. But when a series of paintings depicting Muslim clerics in scenes with strong homosexual overtones sparked an uproar and threats of violence by Islamic extremists, it was too much.
Anyone wanting proof that comics aren't just for kids or socially challenged teenagers take note, this collected work by the Brazilian twins Gabriel Ba and Fabio Moon is on par with richly worded works of literature in its exploration of how a life is lived and the multitudinous paths it can take.
Comics are the new canvas. Their panels offer artists a clean slate for sharpening their illustrations and then segmenting them so they achieve maximum flow for readers' eyes. They offer the stasis of a painting and the pacing of a movie. Most important, comics are bursting with creativity. Comics illustrators can cast the net so widely they often land in wildly different universes.
At age 35, Daniel Kehlmann is already well-established as a successful novelist with an international following. When "Measuring the World," his first big book, appeared in 2007, British critic Daniel Johnson went happily out on a limb: "Daniel Kehlmann has it in him to be the great German novelist that the world had given up waiting for."
