Peter Kuper (/ˈkuːpər/;[1] born September 22, 1958) is an Americanalternativecomics artist and illustrator, best known for his autobiographical, political, and social observations.
Besides his contributions to the political anthologyWorld War 3 Illustrated, which he co-founded[2] in 1979 withSeth Tobocman, Kuper is best known for taking overSpy vs. Spy forMad magazine, which he both wrote and drew from 1997 to 2022. Kuper has produced numerousgraphic novels which have been translated into French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Swedish, Slovenian and Greek, including award-winning adaptations ofFranz Kafka'sGive It Up! andthe Metamorphosis.
In 1970 Kuper and his childhood friendSeth Tobocman published their first fanzine,Phanzine, and in 1971 they publishedG.A.S Lite, the official magazine of the Cleveland Graphic Arts Society. In 1972 Kuper tradedR. Crumb some old jazz records for the right to publish some artwork from one of Crumb's sketchbooks in a comic titledMelotoons that lasted for two issues.[citation needed]
Kuper has travelled extensively through Latin America, Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia, much of which he documented in his 1992 book,ComicsTrips: A Journal of Travels Through Africa and Southeast Asia.
Spy vs. Spy had passed through various hands after its creatorAntonio Prohías retired, but Kuper's version has appeared without interruption since 1997, although the last new edition was published in 2022.[2][8]
Kuper'sEye of the Beholder was the first comic strip to ever regularly appear in theNew York Times, and his quasi-autobiographyStop Forgetting To Remember: The Autobiography of Walter Kurtz covers the birth of his daughter,9/11, and other vicissitudes in his life from 1995 to 2005.
Though permanently based in New York City, Kuper wife and daughter resided in the Mexican state ofOaxaca 2006–2008, where he documented an ongoing teachers' strike and other aspects of Mexico in his sketchbook journalDiario de Oaxaca.[9][10]
Kuper's work in comics and illustration frequently combines techniques from both disciplines and often takes the form of wordless comic strips. Kuper remarked on this, "I initially put comics on one side and my illustration in another compartment, but over the years I found that it was difficult to compartmentalize like that. The two have merged together so that they're really inseparable."[11]
In April 2022, Kuper was reported among the more than three dozen comics creators who contributed toOperation USA's benefit anthology book,Comics for Ukraine: Sunflower Seeds, a project spearheaded byIDW Publishing Special Projects EditorScott Dunbier, whose profits would be donated to relief efforts for Ukrainian refugees resulting from the February2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.[13][14] Kuper contributed political cartoons to the anthology.[14][15]
Kuper won a journalism award from The Society of Newspaper Designers in 2001. His wordless picture storySticks and Stones was awarded the 2004 gold medal, and his comic "This Is Not A Comic" won a silver medal in 2009 both from theSociety of Illustrators. He won another gold medal in the sequential arts category from theSociety of Illustrators in 2010.[citation needed] His bookSticks and Stones,The System,Diario de Oaxaca, Ruins won the 2016Eisner Award and adaptations of many ofFranz Kafka’s works into comics includingThe Metamorphosis andKafkaesque won the 2018 NCS award.[19]
^Irving, Christopher. "Diario de Peter Kuper":Peter Kuper interview from 2009, inPeter Kuper: Conversations, edited by Kent Worcester (Univ. Press of Mississippi, 2016).
