{"id":14414,"date":"2015-02-03T16:26:46","date_gmt":"2015-02-03T16:26:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/the-sculptor-scott-mcclouds-magnum-opus-about\/"},"modified":"2015-02-03T16:26:46","modified_gmt":"2015-02-03T16:26:46","slug":"the-sculptor-scott-mcclouds-magnum-opus-about","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/the-sculptor-scott-mcclouds-magnum-opus-about\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sculptor: Scott McCloud’s magnum opus (about magnum\u00a0opuses) [New review, please share!]"},"content":{"rendered":"

mostlysignssomeportents<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n
\"image\"<\/figure>\n
\"image\"<\/figure>\n
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Scott McCloud is best known as comics\u2019 most accessible, smartest theorist, thanks to his 1994 classic Understanding Comics<\/a>. But the other<\/i> McCloud, of superhero comics like ZOT! is equally beloved by the cognoscenti. With The Sculptor<\/a>,
\n McCloud reminds us that he is one of the field\u2019s great storytellers,
\nwith a story of love, art, madness and death that wrenches, delights and
\n confounds. <\/p>\n

David Smith is a sculptor who almost made it: he moved to New York,
\nfound a wealthy patron, began flying high \u2014 then crashed and burned
\nafter his patron destroyed his reputation and career in retaliation for a
\n blunt, even cruel interview with an arts newspaper. Now Smith is barely
\n hanging on by his fingertips, about to lose his apartment, out of
\nmoney, and about to break the promises he made to himself \u2014 and his
\ndead father \u2014 no make a name for himself, without taking any handouts,
\nin New York City, or die trying.\n<\/p>\n

\nThat\u2019s when David runs into his beloved uncle, who joins him at a table
\nat the diner where he\u2019s drowning his sorrows and gives him the
\nsketchbook he\u2019d kept as a small boy, a sketchbook David could swear he
\nburned years ago \u2014 and as he pages through it in delight, he realizes
\nthat the last time he saw his uncle was\u2026at his uncle\u2019s funeral.\n<\/p>\n

\nIn fact, David\u2019s not eating with his uncle. He\u2019s eating with a walking
\navatar of death, and death has a bargain for him. David will be able to
\nsculpt the pieces he has lurking in his soul, to become known and make
\nhis mark, but in 200 days, death will come for him.\n<\/p>\n

\nThis is the setup for The Sculptor<\/a>,
\n and the 200 days provide a tense countdown to a ticking bomb, driving
\nthe story at a pace that never slows down to anything less than a dead
\nrun.\n<\/p>\n

\nBut the speed is just the engine driving The Sculptor<\/i> and what\u2019s really interesting is the freight that it pulls.\n<\/p>\n

\nBecause this is a book that is a look at the paradoxical drives that
\nmake us want to create and how it relates to love. David\u2019s desire to
\nmake art is uncompromising, selfish, wonderful, and totally destructive.
\n The art he makes is both a gift to those he loves and a thing he takes
\nfrom them, because even when he meets his heart\u2019s true love, his need
\nfor artistic posterity rivals his ardor for the love of his life.\n<\/p>\n

This is a book full of warm, complicated, difficult relationships, full
\nof drive and vision, full of brutal honesty and difficult choices. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Read my whole review\u2026<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

mostlysignssomeportents: Scott McCloud is best known as comics\u2019 most accessible, smartest theorist, thanks to his 1994 classic Understanding Comics. But the other McCloud, of superhero comics like ZOT! is equally beloved by the cognoscenti. With The Sculptor, McCloud reminds us that he is one of the field\u2019s great storytellers, with a story of love, art, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-words"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6PWot-3Ku","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14414\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rafaelfajardo.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}