Having a good laugh about it all

The situation surrounding our trip to Iligh, what Bert and I would find there and what we would do with it was so confusing we had a good laugh about it. We decided that whatever would happen, we would take it in our stride. Whatever bridge we'd encounter, we'd cross. Whatever we would find on the other side we would take on and not despair. In short: this was it. This was the story. This we would shape into a graphic novel. Well, supposedly one had to know beforehand what the purpose of the effort was and which part of the public we were aiming for. Initially the Jewish History Museum of Amsterdam had been interested in it as a possible part of educational projects they were doing to create more understanding of Jewish history among Muslim school-age children of Moroccan descent. Many kids with a Moroccan background believed that current Israeli politics was what being Jewish was all about (to say it politely). Anyway with this radical change of plan, we didn't know anymore who our public was and if we would have any at all. And the designers of my website whom I told our plans to also pressed the importance on me of making it fit tablet and smartphone. I did a little try-out before I left: it looks as confusedly scattered as I felt.

Doubt is creeping in

In the two months between booking the plane tickets and hiring a car for our trip to Iligh and actually traveling doubt started to creep in. At least with me. Bert and I rarely spoke. I was busy in Polranny, Ireland and she was busy in Amsterdam. I knew she tried a couple of times without success to get Aicha on the phone or by Messenger. We knew already that she had been ill for quite a while in the winter. But what was ailing her we didn't know. What were we going to find when we stood at the door in Iligh? It was all one big uncertainty. Letterlijk & Figuurlijk the book by Joost Pollmann about the different forms a graphic story could take had had a profound influence on me. Did it still make sense to draw a straightforward historical story set into the traditional framework? I had visions of me researching endlessly the original props surrounding Michiel De Ruyter on his trips to Iligh. And how about the detailing of the court of Aboudmiaa? It would take years for the graphic story to get finished. On top of that I always had said myself that a 'historical' movie said more about the time it was made in than the time it was supposed to be in. Wouldn't it be the same for a graphic history? And what about making an entire graphic novel on the computer instead of on paper? Was Photoshop really the right software for it or did I have to resort to Illustrator or Indesign? Did I have to take a subscription out for the software and do a course in how to use it? Did I really want to spend time and money on those things? When Bert and I got together again three weeks before the departure we didn't know anything anymore. Wasn't the whole rigmarole surrounding our involvement with Iligh a story in itself?

The birth of an idea

On November first 2016 Bert and I flew back from Agadir to Amsterdam. The plane was full and not having a seat booked we were placed far apart from each other. It is a four hour plus flight so I had plenty of time to think over our meeting with Aicha. Yes, I would like to come back to Iligh to make drawings especially if Bert could come along. Of course we would have to pay our own fare, but if we could stay there and we could do our own cooking that would make things a lot cheaper. Bert could do research into those mysterious documents and I could draw. And then I got the idea for a graphic story. We could make the history of Iligh come alive if we told the story from the point of view of Aicha's father as a young boy. Start at the time that the film crew from the Alliance Israélite came to Iligh to film in the Mellah. That must have been a life changing experience for a ten year old. Him being the crown prince having to witness that the spotlights were turned instead on the scruffy kids from the narrow dusty alleys. That would make a great intro. From there the story could revert back to the time that Michiel De Ruyter did business with the first Aboudamiaa trying to sell Dutch hats and sides of smoked pork to a Muslim ruler. When the plane landed I thought I had it all in the bag. Bert wasn't adverse to the idea, but wanted first to see if there was any interest in the Netherlands for a story on a little chiefdom on the edge of the Sahara.

The Life of Alie Snoek

In the late eighties I approached the poet/writer/magazinist Sjuul Deckwitz with the request to 'do' something together. It resulted in the graphic novel 'Alie Snoek mijn leven' (The life of Alie Snoek). Originally it appeared page by page in the magazine of Dutch comic/actor/play-write Paul Haenen. Later it was collected into a book. Ali Snoek was the first project I did together with somebody else. Later I would work together with another cartoon artist but never with a poet/writer. Because Sjuul Deckwitz at the time had a very distinct and original style of writing, I left the initiative to her. She wrote the text and I would make it into a graphic story. She communicated with Paul Haenen about when the next deadline was, wrote a little story about something in the life of Alie Snoek and dropped it into my mailslot. We never communicated about either the graphics or the story. It turned out to be gas! I thought Sjuul's stories absolutely brilliant. And she liked my renditions. I never found it difficult to turn her text into images. After the first page (on view here The Death) I never kept to the literal story. I let the drawings tell a parallel story to the text. From the beginning I left the text intact and wrote it under the frames in full. No Balloons. No frames within the action frames. It worked! Of course it wasn't a totally new way of telling a graphic story but to me it was. However it was also the last graphic story I did. I got very much into the business of cartoon making working for clients and earning good money. I had nor the time or the inclination to continue with 'free work'. Until I went to Syria and started 'Urban Sketching'. But that is another story.

How I made a Graphic Story

Tintin by Hergé has always been the seminal graphic story for me. There was Tintin and then came the rest. Tintin has everything: a good well-written story, interesting story lines, lovable characters, hilarious jokes, beautiful graphics and lots of tongue in cheek action. However the most amazing thing about Tintin was that although it was written in French by a Wallon and set in Belgium, it translated without any problems into totally different languages and still be culturally recognizable. How strongly unique Hergé's touch had been became evident when Steven Spielberg made a animated film of the graphic story: it became just an other thirteen in a dozen action movie. Tintin deeply influenced me. That was how a graphic story was made and should be made. Of course the medium had evolved, but the basics stayed the same. Between 4 to 9 frames on a standing page of around A4. The page was read from the top to the bottom from left to right. All the action happened inside the frames. The dialogues if there were any, were put into so called Balloons. Additional description got their own frames inside the action frame. Sometimes one picture could be cut into more than one frame while the action progressed. Ideally the story should have a bit of a cliff-hanger at the bottom of the page to encourage further reading. The storyline could also be for a book or movie. It had a hero (or in rare cases heroine), a villain and supporting actors and actresses. It had a problem, mystery or challenge that the protagonist had to solve and bring to a good end. It had two plot points when the hero had an epiphany that would put the story into a different gear. And that was how I made my graphic stories.

Letterlijk & Figuurlijk by Joost Pollmann

When Bert came to Ireland in the summer of 2017 she brought a Dutch language book with her: Letterlijk & Figuurlijk (Literally & Figuratively) by Joost Pollmann. It was the precursor of 'De Strip Professor'(The Professor of Comics)a bundle of 50 essays on different aspects of 'telling a story in images'. In that anthology Joost also included a few lines on me and my 'Urban Sketching' in particular the sketches I made while in ICU after a cardiac event. When I got home from hospital I reworked them on the computer into a graphic story using Photoshop software. Curiously enough Joost had headed the essay in which I featured: 'After Photoshop'. The book had been an eye-opener for me. I had used the medium of comics on and off to tell a story since I was 13 years old and over the years had published three graphic novels. It turned out: I didn't know a thing about the medium. In 'Literally & Figuratively' Joost puts the medium under the microscope. What is a comics/graphic story? Is it literature, is it art, is it film or is it nothing more than 'The Funnies'? Joost concludes: it is a separate medium, should be treated as such and should have its own academic platform. Which it hasn't even though it exists since the invention of the printing press. The title refers to the dual aspect that is so unique to a comics/graphic story: the written word and the imaging. It also refers to how the story is told. Is it told in a literal manner keeping close to a story line as for instance in literature? Or is it a bit like art: an expression in images and maybe words of an idea or emotion or just some vehicle for the use of materials and skills? In Dutch the title also refers to lettering. An important aspect of the medium as it is usually an integral part of the image and isn't conceived or printed separately. Anyway the book shook up my idea of how the graphic story about Iligh could take shape.