Mark Beyer (comics)

Mark Beyer
Born	October 8, 1950
Known for	Cartoonist
Notable work	Comics featuring Amy and Jordan

Mark Beyer (born October 8, 1950) is a self-taught American artist and former cartoonist. His comics were known for their bleak story lines, often featuring death, disfigurement, depression, and humiliation, which contrasted with his self-taught, geometric drawing style. Most of his stories were about the adventures of a codependent yet resentful couple named Amy and Jordan. Beyer made one final comic strip for the summer 2012 issue of the British magazine ArtReview .

Biography

Beyer is originally from Allentown, Pennsylvania in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. He is a self-taught, outsider artist whose work has appeared in Raw Vision magazine.

Beyer's work was prominently featured in all but two issues (#3 and 4) of Raw magazine. He has also been published in New York Press and New Musical Express . Beyer also had a recurring animated short series on MTV's Liquid Television (The Adventures of Thomas and Nardo); and a 1995 movie by Gregg Araki, The Doom Generation , was loosely based on the Amy and Jordan strips.

He has also produced cover artwork, including Xman and *** by Michael Brodsky, T-shirts and posters for John Zorn and the New York Downtown avant-garde music scene. In particular the cover and inserts for Zorn's tribute to Ornette Coleman Spy vs Spy (1989) and a popular Naked City T-shirt.

Although he mostly works solo, Beyer has collaborated with writer Alan Moore.

Books

• A Disturbing Evening and Other Stories. Allentown, PA: Mark Beyer, 1978. OCLC   36752209.
• Manhattan. New York: Raw Books, 1978.
• Dead Stories. Allentown, PA: Mark Beyer, 1982. OCLC   37763474.
  • Dead Stories. Sudbury, MA: Water Row Press, 2000. ISBN   0-934953-72-4.
• Agony. New York: Raw Books, 1987. ISBN   0-394-75442-5.
  • Agony. New York: New York Review, 2016. ISBN   9781590179819. ^{[n 1]}
• Agony. Augsburg: MaroVerlag, 1992. German translation.
• Amy + Jordan. Paris: Sketch Studio, 1993.
• Amy + Jordan. Augsburg: MaroVerlag, 1996.
• We're Depressed. Sudbury, MA: Water Row Press, 1999. ISBN   0-934953-65-1.
• Amy and Jordan. New York: Pantheon, 2004. ISBN   0-375-42270-6.
  • Amy and Jordan. Paris: Camboukaris, 2013. ISBN   9782366240238.

Zines

This list may not be complete.

• Mark Beyer. Death. PA: Mark Beyer, 1980.
• Mark Beyer. Amy and Jordan at Beach lake. PA: Mark Beyer, 1983.
• Mark Beyer and Emilia Brintnall. Pain Parade. Edition of 250. ^{[n 2]}
• Mark Beyer. Pooooo. Liancourt: CBO Éditions, 1996. Edition of 150.
• Mark Beyer. Lost Faces. Zürich, 2000. Edition of 350. ^{[n 3]}
• Gary Panter and Mark Beyer. Panter versus Beyer. Liancourt: CBO Éditions, 2003. Edition of 100. OCLC   907799569.
• Mark Beyer. Ne'er-do-wellers. Trapset Zines, 2017. Edition of 200. ^{[n 4]}
• Mark Beyer. 2016–17. Marseille: Le Dernier Cri, 2017. Edition of 500. ^{[n 5]}

Notes

1. "Agony". New York Review Books. Retrieved 2022-10-29.
2. Description of Pain Parade at a retailer.
3. "Die Tollen Bücher: Mark Beyer, Lost Faces". www.tolle-hefte.de. Retrieved 2022-10-29.
4. Description of Ne'er-do-wellers by its publisher.
5. Description of 2016–17 by its publisher.

External links

• Raw Vision, "Mark Beyer Letting out the Id", Les Coleman, Issue 78, 2013
• Escape from the Pondox Corporation: Mark Beyer and the Mystery of the Mundane, 2018
• Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum Art Database