After his first nove l via Chennai’s Blaft, Bangalore-boy George Mathen aka Appupen now has another visual delight on the stands, this one under the HarperCollins banner. All set to officially release The Legends of Halahala at his home-city’s Comic Con this weekend, Mathen explains that this one is a pure graphic novel — the distinction being that it has no text at all. It was time for something completely image-driven with no clouding of the concept of visual storytelling. “Its 150 pages of visual art consists of five stories — love stories — with a cynical view of the concept of love, as all comic artists love to do,” he says, adding that the world of Halahala is something that he “hopes to build as something iconic over time.” Hopefully, it won’t be too long before Mathen comes out with book two and three of Legends of Halahala and well as another book he’s working on called Aspyrus — expect ideas and dragons, all in one.
Taking the lead
Although he’s looking forward to the Comic Con for the same reason most artists are — to sell — Mathen believes that much more needs to be done for comics. “People are watching films and then turning to the comic. It’s working in reverse,” he laments, but hopes that in time people will take to comic books and look at it as a dominating art form. It is also for this reason that his art is being exhibited at Gallery 545 in Bangalore — to change the perception of how people view comics and graphic novels. “When we stop looking at a superhero only as someone in his underpants and muscles, then we’d have evolved in term of comic books in this country,” he tells us. That is also his way of saying, “Dress up as characters of my stories and of the Halahala land for the event rather than being a jaded version of superheroes!” Experience his work, first hand, at georgemathen. com. The Legends of Halahala costs Rs 499