After reading Living of Line from. Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics, I learned how lines can be used to show so many different things. Sound, emotions, weather (cold and hot). In many ways, Lines are used in many different ways to convene an idea or emotion in the mind of the viewer. With this in mind, looking at the different examples during our visit to the MASC, I have found that the best example of lines comes from an old two-page panel called Pantheon sive Idola Judeorum and from a panel from The Amazing Spiderman comic.

A panel from Pantheon sive Idola Judeorum. Grace Kannberg-October 15, 2019.

The Pantheon sive Idola Judeorum uses lines differently in each small section of the whole panel. Each one has a different emotion effect on a viewer. The lines in the first square, located in the top right-hand corner, show swirling fire. It not only has a warm effect but also creates the emotion of tension within the scene. Each square in the panel has its own use for line, creating a unique story when it is looked at as a whole. The line work and emotion used in this are more complicated from my next comic, The Amazing Spiderman.

The Amazing Spiderman- The Goblin Power. July’98. Grace Kannberg-October 15, 2019

When looking at the panel from the Spiderman comic, the linework here is simpler in comparison. The majority of the lines used in this comic are strongly horizontal or vertical. The lines that make up this exception are the ones in the ceiling framing the characters. These lines aren’t like the others, and this was deliberately done by the artist. They did this to emphasis on the attention to the characters. The emotion of urgency and anxiety is shown through these strong, uneven, lines.

Religious panel from the MASC. Grace Kannberg-October 15, 2019.

In addition to learning about the importance of lines from reading Scott McCloud’s book, I also learned how the combination of word and pictures are interdependent. This means that together both words and a picture show an idea that neither can show on its own. When exploring the MASC I found one example of this from one of the oldest printed books. In this one-page panel, Jesus is talking to Saints around him. The words used in this panel name each individual in the photo for the viewer to understand what is going on. Without the words, the viewer doesn’t fully understand or know what is going on.