Customer Reviews

Kramers Ergot 7

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

For me, the book succeeds massively and on many levels.

First off, the concept is ambitious and uncalled for: "let's invite 60 of our favorite artists to create giant-size comics, and then put them all together and see what happens." Probably without quite knowing why they were doing this project -- except that it sounded like fun -- Buenaventura Press gave it a shot. Good for them!

Second, the look and feel of the physical object is borderline absurd. Another reviewer aptly notes that the book is so big it hurts your arms to hold and so tall it won't fit on any sane bookshelf. How refreshingly strange! (Like the comics inside??) Part of the book's ingenious beauty, I think, is its physical impoliteness. In other words: the funny frustrations of the package weirdly "rhyme" with the work inside. The whole is truly greater than the sum of the parts.

Third, Chris Ware has drawn an actual-size baby in the center of his two-page spread. She's a full-size baby, just lying there and staring up at you from a cradle of comic panels. Don't miss it. The book is full of unexpected stuff like this -- touches that the editors never could have anticipated when they devised the format. Not every artist does something extremely unique-feeling with the big page, but not every artist has to. It's a thrill to see all the individual takes on the format, some more conspicuous than others.

Fourth, the production values are first-rate. The paper is super-premium, all the binding was done by hand, and the title is stamped on the cover and on the spine in a delightful, subtle rainbow foil that feels just right. (You have to see the rainbow stamping in person to really see it.... Online pix don't communicate it.)

$125 seems like a high price, I guess, until you consider that this is effectively a limited-edition art object with a print run of 3,000 or 3,500. (I've read both numbers online.) I'm not saying it's not a lot of money; what I'm saying is that it's not so much money that anyone who wants one can't save up and buy a copy if they really really want it.

What's more, Amazon's discount is pretty incredible. To be able to get a book like this for $80 postpaid -- the cost of a mid-range pair of sneakers -- is just super.

This is probably the coolest book I've ever seen. It still totally blows me away every time I open it and I've owned it for a few weeks now.

The size is awesome! It takes me back to memories of being a small child and laying on the floor looking at "Where's Waldo" books for hours. It is so awesome that some of today's most experimental comic artists have had the opportunity to do something on the same grand scale as the old Little Nemo comics from about 100 years ago and that it can actually be published.

The art is awesome! As an art object alone, I feel it is well worth the cover price. There are so many great artists featured in this book; almost one for every page, and their styles are so different it will keep you turning the pages in astonishment and curiosity just to see what will be next.

The comics are awesome! So many different approaches to this opportunity and for the most part they all feel like they fit together fairly well, even without any sort of theme at all. It is awesome to see Chris Ware continue his "Building Stories" story in this way as that is my favorite thing from him so far. The story of Noah's Ark is another one of my favorites that I've read multiple times.

All in all, this is a perfect example of a book where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It was hard to bring myself to spend so much for a book, but after reading it over and over again, I would in retrospect have been willing to pay double what I did. This book is absolutely worth what they ask!

First read: 10/10
Re-readability: 10/10

This book would have gotten 5 stars, if not for the Amazon shipping.
The book itself is fantastic. Most artists have taken the opportunity to create something stunning on this large format. Page after page it is an amazing collection of art.
The problem is that Amazon decided to throw the book in a large box, add a few (empty) bubbles and ship it over the ocean. Naturally, all corners are damaged. I know there is a steep discount, but I would rather pay $10 more for a sturdy box like the Absolute Sandman is shipped in.
So, you decide. A wonderful book with some damage at a steep discount or for the full price at your local comic shop.

I might be slightly biased because I have a shelf large enough to hold this book, and a great big bed to read it on, thus overall I think the book is fantastic! Yes, there are a couple duds, but the great ones from the likes of Kim Deitch, Daniel Clowes, Johnny Ryan, Xaime Hernandex, Tim Hensley, etc., overrule the possibility of me knocking off a star. This belongs in the home of every comics fan!

can't express how incredible this new Kramers is. The format is absolutely hand happy as well as being larger than life very literally. Every moment is exciting fun and fabulous. Major recommendation for anyone who loves art, comics, and fun!

i work out a little bit, not that much, and i don't find the book a problem to hold, it's not THAT heavy.

one way to read it is to put it on the floor next to your bed and dangle your head off the edge of your bed, that way you can see the whole page and no one needs to hold up anything.

annnnyway contentwise it's another kramers, meaning if you love everything in kramers 5 and 6 you'll probably love everything in here, but if you're like me and you only really liked maybe half or 60% of ke5-6 then your ratio won't be much better with this book.

some of the creators annoyed me by contributing pages full of small panels that could just have easily been printed in minicomics.

(this isn't a full review just a few thoughts.)

overall the book is lovely

This book is an anthology of mostly 1-2 page short comic strips reproduced the size of an unfolded, traditional newspaper. As for the work itself it's hit or miss depending on your personal taste. It's all in full-color, semi-glossy paper and looks great. After the novelty wears off, though, you have to ask if this is a worthwhile purchase. For the work itself: while I found some of the artist's use the large format as something that could be taken advantage of, most of the pieces are simply normal comics on a large page. So no on that count. In terms of it's size, well... good luck storing this in years to come. No one I'm guessing has a bookshelf that would hold this oversized volume meaning you'll have to find some place (under the bed, behind a shelf, in a closet) to put this away. After reading this you're left with quite a large book with no place to go. Kind of like countries trying to see who can build the tallest building in the world for bragging rights, this feels like an exercise in publishing ego. If more of the comics had incorporated their unusual format into the stories they were telling it might have worked, but this feels more like an attempt to create something unique by it's sheer weight and size. An interesting but failed attempt. Worth looking at but not worth buying.

On the plus side this is a bold, vividly colored and impressive anthology of what's currently in vogue in the medium of comics today. Most of the heavyweights are represented within, Clowes, Ware, Deitch, Hernandez, Brunetti and others and there are a lot of artists only of marginal familiarity to this reviewer including some who I found more interesting than others. Without a doubt this is a beautiful volume and impressive in it's scale and on occasion in it's ability to deliver a sustained narrative, as well as the occasional abstraction, bordering on narrative. I was mesmerized by this book and it was nice to be able to read a piece by Chris Ware without feeling the eye-strain that usually comes with digesting his art.....but, after a few minutes of holding this book open on my lap, I started to feel a bit numb in my left arm due to the size and weight of this book. I suppose if one has a large enough table with which to spread this book out on it may prove a less wieldy read, but for just sitting in a chair and casually flipping through the pages, this book is a bear. It's also a very hard book to find a shelf for in between readings. I have a fairly substantial library with many sizes of bookshelves and I can't find one place where this book will fit without being an obstruction. To the publisher this may be a good thing because one is always aware of the presence of this tome, but in general it's aesthetically a sore thumb. If this book were the size, say, of art spiegelman's Breakdowns or Ware's Quimby the Mouse, I'd give it 5 stars, but I can't really do that for the book as it stands now. As much as I love looking through it, I kind of dread pulling it off the shelf because it seems more work than benefit....so 3 stars overall.