Paul Karasik

Paul Karasik ( ; born 1956)Kartalopoulos, Bill

''Indy'' magazine (Spring 2004). is an American cartoonist, editor, and teacher, notable for his contributions to such works as '' City of Glass: The Graphic Novel'', ''The Ride Together: A Memoir of Autism in the Family'', and ''Turn Loose Our Death Rays and Kill Them All!''. He is the coauthor, with Mark Newgarden, of ''How to Read Nancy'', 2018 winner of the Eisner Award for "Best Comics-Related Book". His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post and he is also an occasional cartoonist for ''The New Yorker.''

Life and career

In the early 1980s, after having graduated from the Pratt Institute, Karasik studied briefly at the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in New York, where he was a student of Will Eisner, Harvey Kurtzman, and Art Spiegelman.

In 1981, Spiegelman, with his wife, Françoise Mouly, invited Karasik to become associate editor of their seminal international comics and graphics revue, ''RAW'',Karasik profile
Who's Who of American Comic Books, 1928–1999. a position Karasik held until 1985. During this period, originally under the auspices of Spiegelman and SVA, Karasik co-edited with fellow cartoonist Mark Newgarden three issues of '' Bad News'', which ran work by many of the ''RAW'' cartoonists, including Kim Deitch, Ben Katchor, Richard McGuire, and Jerry Moriarty. He and Newgarden wrote the essay " How to Read ''Nancy''," originally published in ''The Best of Ernie Bushmiller’s Nancy'' by Brian Walker (Henry Holt/Comicana, 1988). Karasik and Mark Newgarden expanded the "How to Read Nancy" essay to book length, published in 2017 by Fantagraphics Books. The book won an Eisner Award in 2018.

In 1994 Karasik collaborated with David Mazzucchelli to adapt Paul Auster’s novel '' City of Glass'' into a full-length comic. This adaptation was cited by ''The Comics Journal'' as one of the "100 Best Comics of the 20th Century". Translated into more than a dozen languages, the graphic novel has been exhibited in Italy. It was excerpted in ''The Norton Anthology of Post-Modern American Fiction''.

Karasik's book ''The Ride Together: A Memoir of Autism in the Family'' (2004), co-written with his sister, Judy Karasik, employed the format of alternating prose and comics chapters to tell their story of growing up with an older brother with autism. ''The Ride Together'' was named the Best Literary Work of the Year by the Autism Society of America.Lash, Elissa
"Galleries: Laugh Lines,"
''Martha's Vineyard Times'' (December 24, 2008).

Karasik co-edited of ''Masters of American Comics'' (2005), the coffee-table companion catalog to the first major American exhibition of comics, co-sponsored by the Hammer Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art.

His anthology highlighting the work of the (previously) obscure Golden Age cartoonist Fletcher Hanks, ''I Shall Destroy All The Civilized Planets'' (Fantagraphics, 2007), won a 2008 Eisner Award, the highest honor in the industry. A second volume, ''You Shall Die By Your Own Evil Creation'' (Fantagraphics, 2009), when combined with the first, comprises the complete works of Fletcher Hanks. ''Turn Loose Our Death Rays and Kill Them All!'', a volume combining the two earlier books with some added material, was published in 2016.

As Program Director of the comics festival Comic Arts Brooklyn for two years, Karasik conducted interviews with Paul Auster, Charles Burns, Roz Chast, Jeff Smith, Art Spiegelman, et al.

Paul Karasik’s gag cartoons and essays have appeared in ''The New York Times'', ''The Nation'' and ''The New Yorker''.

Teaching

Also a teacher, Karasik has taught at Packer Collegiate Institute, the Rhode Island School of Design, Boston University, and the School of Visual Arts in the United States, and abroad at the EESI school in Angoulême, France, The Animation Workshop in Viborg, Denmark, and, at the Scuola Internazionale di Comics in Rome and Florence, Italy. He has given workshops and lectured at The Center for Cartoon Studies, American University, Princeton University, Penn State, and Wheaton College.

He was the first Stuckeman Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Penn State University in the autumn of 2017 and Visiting Professor at Texas A&M in the spring of 2020.

Personal life

Karasik grew up in the Washington, D.C. area. He moved to Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, in 1989. Karasik's wife, Marsha Winsryg, is an accomplished pastel artist and painter."Paul Karasik Marsha Winsryg Exhibit,"
''Vineyard Gazette'' (December 14, 2016).

Bibliography

* ''Paul Auster's City of Glass'' (Avon Books, August 1994) e-issued 2004
* ''The Ride Together: A Memoir of Autism in the Family'' (Washington Square Press, September 14, 2004)
* ''I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets'' (Fantagraphics, 2007)
* ''You Shall Die By Your Own Evil Creation'' (Fantagraphics, 2009)
* ''Turn Loose Our Death Rays and Kill Them All!'' (Fantagraphics, 2016)
* '' How to Read "Nancy"'' with Mark Newgarden (Fantagraphics, 2017)

Notes

References

Karasik profile
Lambiek.net's Comiclopedia

External links

*

Karasik's blog

''The Ride Together'' website

{{DEFAULTSORT:Karasik, Paul
Living people
1956 births
Rhode Island School of Design faculty
Wheaton College (Massachusetts) alumni
American cartoonists
American writers
Comics critics