Arnold Friberg – A Motley Vision

The New Yorker: getting warmer

This month, The New Yorker has published two articles that take Mormonism seriously. The first was a “Critic at Large” (wherein the critic takes a look at several related works). Sadly, among the works considered was not Grant Hardy’s Understanding the Book of Mormon, which means that critic Adam Gopnick is unable to rise above the standard of Book-of-Mormon-as-lit criticism set by Edmund Wilson’s constantly quoted phrase, “farrago of balderdash.” But he does seem to have actually attempted reading it, even if he didn’t seek out a more experience guide. Which is more than I feel comfortable saying about John Lahr who probably takes Wilson’s word on everything. And let’s face it: Wilson was not always right. History’s on my side here, folks.

Anyway. Back to Gopnick.

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Weekend (Re)Visitor: Arnold Friberg

Arnold Friberg’s passing this week is cause to reexamine him. His work has been a victim of backlash lately from the High Minded. (I suspect because of the massive influence his Book of Mormon paintings have had on depictions of the book’s characters, particularly of Lehi’s family. It’s simply understood now that, for instance, Nephi wears leather over one shoulder, Lehi has a long white beard, Laman and Lemuel are physically brutish. His influence has so overwhelmed Book of Mormon art that sometimes people seem to forget that his work is not The One True Depiction.) Continue reading “Weekend (Re)Visitor: Arnold Friberg”

A Survey of Mormon Comix by Theric Jepson

When I asked Theric Jepson to write a bit about Mormon graphic novels, I didn’t expect that he would launch a full on bibliographic project. But he did — and even though the results make for a very long post, it’s very much worth a read. Indeed, it’s quite the amazing project and must have taken quite some time to put together. Thanks, Theric. ~Wm Morris

I’m also going to make you click through for the full post because the “more” tag seems to be causing some problems with the special formatting for the post.

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