We are delighted to announce the winners of the sixth Martin Schüwer-Publication Prize for Outstanding Comics Research 2024!
This year, the comic essay From Giotto to Drnaso: The Common Well of Pictorial Schema in ‘High’ Art and ‘Low’ Comics by Bruce Mutard has been awarded the Martin Schüwer Prize. The essay was published in the volume Seeing Comics Through Art History: Alternative Approaches to the Form in the Palgrave Studies in Comics and Graphic Novels series edited by Ian Horton and Maggie Gray.
On behalf of ComFor and the AG Comicforschung (Committee for Comics Studies of the Society for Media Studies GfM), this year’s jury would like to congratulate Bruce Mutard on his exciting contribution and is delighted to award him the Martin Schüwer Publication Prize for Outstanding Comics Research 2024!
Laudatio for Bruce Mutard:
With his paper on the ever-contested relationship between comics and art history, Bruce Mutard takes the title he has chosen literally. The question itself is not necessarily new. However, the form he found is extraordinary. His academic paper is a comic that reflects on art styles through art history by showing them directly on the page. It stands out because it aims to provide a detailed reflection of iconography and the visual resemblance between classic arts and comics on the level of form.
Mutard tells us a story about the representation of art through time by including classical paintings in the scenery and panels full of artworks, as well as repeatedly switching the drawing style. However, the visual information is not only part of the story the comic tells, it is also part of the academic side of the article. Mutard provides full transparency in meticulous notes and references to different sources and artists who inspired his style choices—breaking new ground on how to include visual information into an academic argument.
Mutard’s paper is a significant contribution to the controversial debate on the roots of comics within the history of the arts. The answer to this question is as apt as simple. The question is not whether historical works of art are themselves comics, which is a well-introduced strategy for a retrospectively applied identification of any sort of art that (seemingly) refers to modes of sequentiality as comics. In this perspective, there is eventually nothing beyond the comic form; hence, comics have always existed. That way, the comic medium can be understood as the end of a long-lasting teleological development in art history.
Contrary to this assumption, Mutard suggests a much more coherent and subtle response to that question. According to him, the decisive question is whether comics could have existed at the respective historical point in time. Hence, the question is not simply one of resemblance, like the sequentiality on the Column of Trajan or the Bayeux Tapestry, but that of cultural preconditions. Which cultural setting makes comics possible? And, particularly, on which cultural techniques do comics depend? Mutard finds a historical link in Susan Vogel’s concept of the “Western Eye,” developed for Vogel’s work on the Western perception of African Baule art. Mutard’s essay applies Vogel’s concept strictly and straightforwardly, which produces inspiring results. Overall, this marks the essay as an essential contribution to the understanding of the comic medium, which will, theoretically as much as methodologically, certainly inspire the further development of comics studies.
Honorable Mention:
In addition to the main prize, the jury also awarded an honorable mention this year. This goes to Helene Bongers for her essay Depictions of women in Catherine Meurisse’s ‘Modern Olympia’: A bande dessinée as feminist art history. The article was published in 2023 in the thematic issue “La bande dessinée au féminin : tendances, thèmes, styles” of the journallendemains. Études comparées sur la France (47. Jahrgang, Nr. 185) and is available on Academia.edu.
Laudatio for Helene Bongers:
Helene Bongers besticht in ihrem Artikel „Frauendarstellungen in Catherine Meurisses ‚Moderne Olympia‘: Eine bande dessinée als feministische Kunst-Geschichte“ durch eine präzise Sprache und theoretische Weite bei gleichzeitig differenzierter Analyse am Comic. Der Artikel untersucht, wie in „Moderne Olympia“ Frauen und weibliche Körper dargestellt und angeschaut, welche kunsthistorischen Tropen aufgegriffen und welche zurückgewiesen werden. Dabei arbeitet Bongers die feministische Perspektive des Comics auf zwei kanonische Kunstwerke aus dem Musée d’Orsay in Paris heraus und bindet die gesellschaftliche und kunsthistorische Rezeption der Kunstwerke mit ein, welche durch Sexismus und Rassismus geprägt sind. Damit wählt Bongers einen intersektionalen Zugang zum Werk, dem eine differenzierte und eingehende kunsthistorische Analyse zugrunde liegt.
The laudations for both award-winning contributions were read out during the award ceremony at the 19the ComFor-Annual Conference (October 23-25, 2024) in Groningen.
This year’s Schüwer Prize jury:
Jörn Ahrens
Anna Beckmann
Barbara M. Eggert
Iris Haist
Vanessa Ossa
The ComFor editorial team is pleased to expand the digital presence of the Society for Comics Studies (ComFor) and now also be represented on 
Comics | Histories: Texts, Methods, Resources
A special-themed issue #9.5 of