Cages #1-10
Published by: Tundra – 1990
Written and Illustrated by: Dave McKean
Cages, written and illustrated by Dave McKean—whom was, at the time of its commencement, a mere twenty-seven years old—is a surprising achievement in a medium where the art and writing are so often separated as two unrelated skillsets. That mastering the art of telling stories visually tends not to accompany the trait of having good stories to tell or the ability to write believable characters and dialogue is a commonly held fallacy—commonly held perhaps because there are so few writer/artists in American comics and due to the delineation of the two disciplines in public education as unrelated and incompatible.
In comics, mediocrity can only stand if it is counterbalanced by excellence; thus, a crap story needs great art, or vice versa, for the comic to ever see the light of day—though, I’m sure there is the occasional exception wherein crap through-and-through somehow makes it to the comic-store shelves.
The list of writer-artists who have achieved success in each of comics twin, constituent mediums, is limited almost entirely to the greats and the unknown—Will Eisner, Frank Miller, Chris Ware, David Mack, Daniel Clowes, to name but a few—and occurs more commonly outside the mainstream. It is among these greats that McKean belongs.
Best known for his Combines—mixed-media paintings featuring photography, sculpture, drawing, found objects, and digital manipulation which most-prominently graced the covers of Neil Gaiman’s DC/Vertigo series Sandman, as well as numerous c.d. covers and a beautiful but troubling tarot card set—McKean demonstrates in Cages that he is not just a “pretty face” but is also a mature and fully formed writer with an acute sense of character, knowing clearly what drives them and what defines them—characters that are themselves, without having to explain who they are.
The art in Cages might disappoint someone only familiar with McKean’s comic covers, but—though largely limited to stylized black, white, and solid grey pen-and-ink drawings—it is competent and demonstrates a highly evolved design sense of how to compose a page, as well as a naturalism that allows his characters to emote with the subtleties of body language and facial expressions—a feature often limited in mainstream comics to grimaces of rage or steely looks of determination rather than the vast array of emotions in the human compendium.
Cages opens with a creation myth—or, perhaps, several—conveyed as large blocks of text accompanied by large full-page paintings which set the contemplative tone of the story. This tone is later reinforced by the pacing, dramatic depictions of setting, the dialogue, characters, and the somber black cat making its way silently through the long shadows of nighttime—a silent observer of the narratives. There is some humor and some sadness, and, by the end, also something a bit supernatural.
The story focuses on several characters—a jazz musician, a painter, an elderly landlord, a writer and his wife, and several other, more minor characters—all of whom live in the same apartment building. There are also mysterious men in hats and trench-coats, the aforementioned black cat, a man with what appears to be a tenuous grasp on sanity, and a naked man—all of whom walk the streets at night. The search for inspiration and mastery of craft recur as themes.
Over the course of the story, McKean also gives life to several vignettes of imagination by depicting them as if they were a world as real as—or perhaps even realer than—any “real” occurrence in the book, resorting during these moments to painting and photo collage—making them quite literally appear more like the real world than the pen and ink of the rest of the chapters in Cages.
Cages has little to offend aside from a sex scene that spans a few pages which, though semi-graphic, is far from pornographic; it is rendered very loosely and becomes progressively more visually abstract as it evolves.
Recommendations:
Anyone fond of Cages should definitely look at McKean’s other solo work, such as the two volume Pictures That Tick. McKean’s solo narrative work has a unique mixture of the intensely personal and the surreal and the seemingly allegorical that is not easily found elsewhere in American comics. His stories tend to be fairly straightforward and don’t necessarily incorporate the complex plots that are characteristic of some of his collaborators—most notably Gaiman and Grant Morrison—but at the same time they are not simple stories as they search for something true in the human condition—even when they are concerned with the dreamlike and impossible. Much of his other short fiction is more akin to illustrated poetry.
McKean’s collaborations with Gaiman—of which there are several—span the gamut from superheroes (Black Orchid) to realism (Signal to Noise) to children’s books (The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish), and even a movie (MirrorMask). The one most similar in tone and execution to Cages is Signal to Noise; it shares the juxtaposition of the everyday and the mundane with the surreal and imaginary, but replaces the pen and ink with fully painted interiors.
One rare fact that might be of note is that some of the original serialized issues—specifically certain copies of issue four—feature misprints where certain pages are repeated while others are omitted. To my knowledge this error is not repeated in the collected-edition graphic novels.
Brian Bigelow
March 15, 2017
