Die Hure H

Die Hure H #1

by Anke Feuchtenberger

A beautiful illustrated book that is poetic and innovative by one of the Europe's most innovative artists.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels

Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Shortly before the Berlin Wall came down, Anke Feuchtenberger, Henning Wagenbreth, Holger Fickelscherer and Detlef Beck joined together to form a ‘Produktions-genossenschaft des Handwerks’ (production cooperative for handicrafts, PGH for short), called ‘Glühende Zukunft’, or ‘Glowing Future’. Their artistic activities in public spaces, such as graffiti and wall paintings, were motivated by creative actionism and were an expression of their political opposition. After the collapse of the Communist system, the individual artists in the East Berlin artists’ collective were very much in demand, particularly for their theatre posters, but also amongst book publishers and the print media for their illustrations. At the same time they were using their comic-like work to experiment with the visual forms of expression within the two different cultures and combining the aesthetics of East-European graphics and illustration with the Western narrative tradition of the comic. The PGH, along with the Renate Group, is one of the core groups of the German comic avant-garde, because the artists combine comic and art, illustration and picture-narrative without any inhibition, showing their work both at comic festivals and in galleries.

In the first comics published by Anke Feuchtenberger, her drawings are dominated by angular contours, portraying characters and objects in hard lines. Their design is reminiscent of woodcut and linocut prints. The colouring is modest and restrained, with the individual areas being accentuated instead by opulent or minimal ornamentation.
Feuchtenberger’s current works, however, appear more free and less hard, because she now draws with charcoal. On the coarse-grained paper, the lines become blurred, blending with the fine powder of the grey shades in the shadows and outlines. The trained commercial artist unites words and images to form a graphically united texture, with only an indirect connection to the narrative level.

Anke Feuchtenberger usually works with the author Katrin de Vries. Together they develop stories and bring the images and the words into line with each other, as in Die kleine Dame (1997), Die Hure H (1996) and Die Hure H zieht ihre Bahnen (2003). Their enigmatic portrayals have a somnambulistic character, which is reflected in both the surreal motifs and in the cryptic combinations of words. Observers must fill in the space between image and text for themselves, in order to be able to unite the individual fragments.
Sexuality and physicality are the central themes that Anke Feuchtenberger confronts in her comics. In Das Haus (2001), she divides the human body into thirty parts. In five to six pictures for each part, she reduces and condenses individual terms with the aid of metaphors and symbols. Instead of telling a story, Feuchtenberger creates visual and textual chains of associations, which initially appear to be separate from each other, but which achieve a profound or ambiguous expressive power when combined.

Matthias Schneider,
Goethe-Institut

Reviews

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

On female lives.
Brian Nicholson's review of the work is well written. http://arecomicsevengood.tumblr.com/p...

[drown_like_its_1999 · Rating 3 out of 5]

A series of eeire, abstract vignettes about the often hostile or tedious experience of womanhood within the trappings of modern society.

I thought this had a wonderfully grim visual style that aptly translated the cynical tone but felt the individual stories were a bit thin and reductionist for my taste. However, one could argue this oversimplification better communicates the themes and allows the reader to discover their own meaning which I can appreciate. While this feels deeply personal and certainly holds no punches, I found myself a bit wanting in the quality of the storytelling.

[Lescactouss · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this.
It's a weird story that allows a lot of interpretation, which is fun for the reader .
The drawings are simply whimsical, with the black and white "colour"scheme adding an extra layer of darkness
It feels very feminine, in the best and realest way possible.
I highly recommend this book.

[Simone van Aalten · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this yesterday at the Grafixx festival in Antwerp. It is so strange - it gives me the Murakami feels. However, every story is tender in its own way, which is why I had to take it home with me.
The art is AMAZING and it will be a big inspiration for me during my studies at the art academy.

[Robin]

Great art, but I think something may have been lost in translation with the text.

[Julie Rylie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love the graphics, a lot. I think the story is all and all a bit weird and lacks a bit of sense but there are a lot of good ideas in here.

[Mza · Rating 2 out of 5]

for fans of menstruation lit