Webcomics and their place in the art echelon

[carloswebcomic]

First of all, I don't want to put anyone down and be aware that I'm not an expert or even well learned in the subject, so feel free to correct me.

By now I think that comics have established themselves as an art form. However, in the art echelons, it is still ranked somewhere down the bottom.
Webcomics rank even lower. I mean, as far as I'm aware, we don't have a webcomic equivalent of Will Eisner, Dan Clowes or Art Spiegelman (best artist's name ever).

Now, I can only talk from my own personal perspective, but the way I see it, webcomics are generally made with one basic aim, to get readers, whether for popularity, money, ego or status, but the end, at least in my view, experimentation suffers. There's an obsession with keeping up with readers expectations rather than leading them to unexpected places. For example, webcomics are done mostly digitally (I can only assume this). Our canvas and tools are practically limitless, yet there is a persistence in imitating the old printed comic format, almost as if the work was still being done with ink on paper. It feels like there is comfort in familiarity, like saying "Hey, remember comics? You can now read them on the internet and they haven't changed a bit!"
That is not to say that webcomics are bad, but I feel that they have not gone as far as they should.

Truth is, I see myself as a guilty party to this as I'm not exactly avant-garde in any sense of the word. I try to do what will make most people happy and get more readers with a style that I know will have a good aesthetic results and please those who see my comic.
Even so, I still feel that comics in general have not reached their potential and I can't help but feel a slight tinge of regret that I am being so predictable and mundane with my own work.

What do you guys think? Is it possible to ascend webcomics to a higher art? Have we reached webcomics' potential?

[ghostnxs]

I like the old print comics format because I hate scrolling. It makes a comic seem longer than it really is. Being that there is no universal format I think it's hard to learn to deviate from print comics. But to be completely honest do we really need to? You can read books online and they are still the same, animation still looks the same. But for some reason everyone wants or thinks Webcomics should deviate from the print comic version that maybe that would gain popularity. But I think the reason you don't have Webcomics as a high art or even remotely close to print comics is money. If Webcomics were to monetize and have subscriptions or pay their artist more than just pennies, then we would see artist creating new bounds. Or webcomic sites that curate high quality work, kinda like a hulu or Netflix rather than a YouTube. As long as Webcomics imitate the wild west, I think Webcomics will never become high art. Most free or cheaper things fail in comparison to paid counterparts. This is just my two cents. Honestly we need a publisher like entity to push Webcomics.

[carloswebcomic]

True. I mean, most webcomic artists are hobbyists. Printed, on the other hand, are professionals that have a publisher, a distributor and substantial cash behind them.

On the upside though, I guess it does give us huge amounts of freedom. We can be as punk as we like with no one watching over our shoulders telling us to change things.

[ghostnxs]

But too much freedom over populates the market and lowers it's overall value. While publishers weed out the crap. Honestly I think Webcomics shouldn't enact this, I think Webcomics are perfect for Facebook similar to how cartoons and newspaper. Most people I know read comics that pop up in their news feed but they won't try and find more. I think having a wonderful community is far more important than receiving recognition from society.

[elixiadragmire]

all the things you said are totes true, we are after all a teeny tiny baby. our industry is 15 years old, that is pretty young!

But I think we've made some awesome leaps in those 15 years too we just need to continue PUSHING! Some big groups, publishing or marketing are cropping. PA and Hiveworks are getting big and recognized.

Also get the feeling were on a cusp of another big change in webcomics too. were getting saturated, some 'publishers' formats are slowing changing and evolving, crowd funding is taking off ... I'm kinda excited to see what happens here.

[kurisquare]

Or webcomic sites that curate high quality work, kinda like a hulu or Netflix rather than a YouTube.

This would be interesting to see, really. The closest I can think of is Hiveworks...? but that's not a site in itself so it's not the same. Tapastic Premium, maybe?

I agree with @elixiadragmire for the most part, this is a fairly new medium we're exploring so it's hard to compare webcomics to comics that have been here for decades! there has been some experimentation, though, To Be Continued is a very good example of that. Tapastic's "scroll format" is also a change compared to previous webcomic hosts, though it's something that can be improved.

Rome wasn't built in a day, I think we still need to give webcomics time to completely flourish

[ghostnxs]

Tapastic premium isn't a monthly subscription, though. Webcomics like tv shows have upcoming episodes which people want to read when they come out as well as previous ones. Imagine if Netflix charged $3 an episode, Netflix wouldn't be as big. Also before tapastic, which isn't that old, I don't know of a site where you could read lots of comics at one site. I despised bookmarking to check what webcomics were updating. But I think If you change web comics too much, you can lose focus as a medium. I think Webcomics need unity in terms of format one that isn't too cumbersome or require technical knowledge. I make comics because it's simple compared to something like video games or animation. If webcomics were to have a more complex standard, I'd stop making webcomics.

[eschaefges]

I think if Tapastic got Netflix-style numbers and/or were publicly traded multibillion dollar companies, they would switch to a general subscription model, but right now, they have to make ends meet and reward the creators. It WOULD be cool if more comics jumped on board the site, as I think it is vastly superior to the other group comic hosting sites out there in virtually every way.

[chacsan]

What you're talking about with format sounds a lot like some Scott McCloud stuff. (very interesting ideas in that video)

I think many webcomic artists don't push the format a lot because we still want to print, which is far from impossible thanks to kickstarter. One might argue that selling physical copies isn't necessary when the creator can earn money through things like patreon, tapastic support and selling digital goods, but there will always be people who want a physical copy. Some creators might be happy making unprintable comics and might push the format, but a lot of us still want to print, and that's ok.

And comics netflix? Comicsfix. Idk how big it is yet, but someone is trying.

Then we have comixology, which I think is much bigger. You pay per comic (or bundles) but I have friends who I didn't know were into comics who love comixology. They are also open for submissions, so webcomics could be 'published' there.

[eschaefges]

Comixology and Comicfix are mostly focused on the big publishers though - it doesn't leave a lot of room for webcomics to get heard, as the people making those books (by and large) are full time comic artists..

[JigokuNeko]

The thing about "higher art" is that a large percentage of it is pretentious baloney marketed to equally pretentious people with a lot of money and wall space. So I'm not sure I'd like to see that sort of "gentrification" happen to a medium I love. The beautiful part of webcomics is that you can find any story you want and some you never knew existed because they would not make it to print through the standard publisher company road. The indie part is what makes it special I guess.

[chacsan]

Some webcomic artists are full time comic artists too though...

I think this huge divide between webcomics and 'real' comics needs to go, and I also think it's slowly disappearing. Those sites have a lot of published comics, yes, but they also have indie and webcomics, so someone might go to the site for mainstream published stuff, and then discover some nice indie stuff as well. I think there's a lot of potential there, although it might not be perfect yet. You just gotta be patient and not expect everything to work just like you want it straight away. Like @elixiadragmire said; webcomics are really new.

[elixiadragmire]

Something my hubby pointed out. webcomics ARE being recongised now by the Will Eisnser Awards

The 2014 Eisner Awards for Best Digital/Webcomic Comics are announced and… oh, *#%@!!! It’s The Oatmeal

[kurisquare]

It's a start

(not-entirely-related: As The Crow Flies is such a beautiful comic, it's a shame it didn't win on that category!!)

[carloswebcomic]

Funny you should mention this as it is Scott MaCloud's book that got me thinking about this.

[elixiadragmire]

also Witchy is up to some awards too!
http://witchy-comic.tumblr.com/
gonna research more on this (I love talks like this)

[Jrej]

I heard of a webcomic site on the french news. http://www.watchcomics.com
It's a small group of artist from East of France that decided to launch this together.
It's a 3€ per month subscription and you get high quality comics all year.

I thought it was pretty awesome and could change how people see digital work.

On the subject of art echelon. I think it's sad that money is such a big part of art.

But isn't that the beauty of webcomics?
How artists can create stories against all odds.