The Style of Paul Kirchner

[p][/p][p][/p][p]We’re back! This time, we’re going to talk about one of Nirvana Noir’s inspirations, the comic artist and illustrator Paul Kirchner.[/p][p]Paul is best known for Dope Rider, a comic he created in the 70s - 80s and resumed in 2015. The Dope Rider is a skeletal hero exploring psychedelic themes, pop art landscapes, shamanistic imagery, and surreal scenarios.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Each page is a visual treat of design, layout, and draftsmanship. We’re tremendously inspired by how he balances so many different elements and the constant inventiveness.[/p][p]We also adore Paul’s other works, such as Murder by Remote Control, a trippy detective story where the fedora’d protagonist's intuition is represented visually by conceptual layouts, like this one where a biker’s past is implied visually. He’s not telling the detective everything, but we don’t need to hear his whole life story to understand who he is.[/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]We had only discovered this book after completing Genesis Noir, and it was very gratifying to discover another artist playing with repetition, graphic layouts, and visual depth to convey a timeline. Reading Murder by Remote Control left us very inspired to explore more of these visual timelines![/p][p][/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Paul Kirchner is a visionary artist whose work explores drug use in Dope Rider for High Times and sex in his work for Screw. You might think he’s a bit of a freak. But, as he writes in an autobiographical essay at the end of Awaiting The Collapse, he’s a pretty straight laced guy who had a mystical experience that “...made \[him] reluctant to use drugs, as having experienced what \[his] brain could produce unassisted \[he] was afraid to tamper with its workings.” [/p][p]Paul’s experience suggests that psychedelic territory welcomes all travelers. We hope you’ll enjoy journeying with us to Nirvana Noir’s.[/p][p][/p][p]Until next time![/p][p]
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