The reality is that a bunch of previous artists arguably worked in an ‘LC-style’ (see sidebar if needed) before Hergé, just that it was the Belgian bloke who famously got associated with the term. And yet McCay was perhaps the standout ‘early-LC’ artist, given his absurd, but creative and relatable comics, depicted in a clear, recognisable style, fairly distinct from most of his contemporaries.
And of course, via Little Nemo in Slumberland, he tackled head-on the subject of dreams, always a fertile premise, yet a genre arguably requiring a good bit of imagination and intelligence to pull off well. That was his most famous creation, but he also did other comics, and even worked in early animation!
Eh, after 2.5yrs of having the pleasure (mostly!) of running this community, it just wouldn’t be right not to mention McCay at some point.
Now, Lambiek doesn’t always give creators the full credit they deserve, but look! 🙂
https://www.lambiek.net/artists/m/mccay.htm
He was also one of the first to do hand drawn animation if I recall!
He had a vaudeville act called Gertie the Dinosaur where he would stand on stage and “interact” with a hand-drawn animation being reverse-projected on a screen behind him. He would feed the dinosaur, play fetch with her, make her do tricks, etc.
The movie Jurassic Park actually makes a cute reference to this when Hammond has his little scripted sequence with the cartoon Mr. DNA in the intro movie/ride that they show the visitors.
Yeah, I did include a link up there. Is that not showing up for you?
The “Centaurs” (1921) animation is something else…
Wow this is so cool I’m really enjoying this artist
Good!
I’ll see about posting more of his art in future.Btw, you might possibly also enjoy Prince Achmed, the first animated movie:
https://piefed.social/post/739907#comment_11101357
