This is a - shit, the name for it hasn't really been determined yet. There are plenty of labels one could throw onto it, but the technology that allowed it to come into existence has temporarily stunned language into this still zone where the silence is really the buzz of everyone talking at once.
That, ladies and gentlemen, is an image created on an iPad. It's something that isn't obvious at first, but after you find out the information your brain lurches over into understanding. Upon looking at it closer you can see the wide swathes the digital brush tools left behind as artist Sean Phillips brought this image to life. Did he paint it? Did he draw it? What the hell did he do exactly to make this piece of art exist?
If the biggest problem is the inability to label something, then everything is okay, right? Also, trying to wring some sort of philosophical discussion out of this points toward the obvious answer when someone asks themselves about the future of the world (comic book or otherwise); Will we be okay? This image gives us the answer.
Yes. Yes we will. There are gorgeous iPad - shit, let's call it a painting - paintings that exist which prove everything will be fine. These paintings prove that there are artists working within the comic book industry who elevate the form to a level of majesty and beauty worthy of that one huge word, the one co-opted by anyone with an opinion or a feeling, that sometimes scary word; art.
Whether you embrace or reject technology, or the idea of comics as art, this is a joy to look at. Phillips even posted a time-lapse video of the painting coming into existence. I suggest you go watch it. If it made me react like this, who knows what it'll do to you.
-Austin
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