Hi Ivan! Thank you for this interview! Let’s start right away: your Drifter is a very visionary comic book… Is that your vision of the future? Have you been inspired by something in particular?
A lot of different things! Nick (NdR: Nick Klein is the artist of Drifter) and I decided to work together, Nick wanted to do a science fiction story… We basically put together different ideas, mine and Nick’s, they fit perfectly together. We met halfway. We’ve been inspired not by specific things, but just a lot of weird stuff, like music, a piece of wardrobe, a photograph. This is a story we built by ourselves together, piece by piece.
Anyone in particular, regarding music? I don’t know, any band or something?
It’s hard because I think music influence is greatly subconscious. We both are huge fans of Moebius, so I think that’s been an influence. But, anyway, there hasn’t really been anything specific, in music either.
About your other work, Vikings: it is action and introspection, a very unique kind of comic book. What would you say to describe it to potential new readers?
When we started Vikings we wanted to do something that could break the rules of classic Viking stories. Viking stories have always been appealing to a small target of people, with their myths and symbolism… We wanted to do a broader appealing version of that, something about a personal mythology, how is like to be a Viking, how is it to grow up as a kid, with that mythology, what are your aspirations, who you want to be… Our Vikings is basically a story about two young guys trying to make a man out of themselves, in a very violent world. I also like the idea of archetypes, so I wanted to explore the Viking mythology, wondering how it was from the inside! So these two guys grow in the middle of and are inspired by terrible things happening around them.
How did this great collaboration with Nick Klein start?
I really really loved Nick works when he was starting in American comic. I emailed him, wrote to him: “Hey, I think you’re really great, I would love to work with you”, and we started to! It was a really cool experience because we have very different tastes, complementarily. We both tried to be experimental, put crazy ideas together, in a way that works, and to me that’s a lot of fun. I think making comics IS making experiments, try new things, push storytelling. So we enjoyed that a lot.
About making comic books and experimenting: can a you describe whatever you imagine, with a picture?
Sometimes picture describes MORE than I can imagine. If something doesn’t match it’s only because of the limits of my imagination, or my imagination is smaller than the artist’s talent. Of course there are certain things that you can’t do in comics, but for the most part comic is one of the most flexible types of storytelling. Any crazy weird idea that I have or that he has, we can express it, also because Nick is very talented.
Christianity is such an important element in Drifter. How come?
It’s really not about Christianity and its importance in the story. Drifter is more about transporting elements of society without society itself, so taking these characters, their beliefs and their practices, and removing them from their system. What is that like if you’re a million of miles away from home, you don’t know where, in the middle of the desert on an alien planet? More than examining Christianity, is just what happens to people when the things they believe in are removed from them.
It’s a stupid question but I have to ask: any future project on the way?
It’s not a stupid question. We just finished Drifter Volume 2 last week, which will be published in December in the US, don’t know exactly when it will in Italy.
Will you be at Napoli Comicon?
I hope so. I’d like to. I love pizza! (laughs) Napoli is one of my favorite cities. Everybody keeps telling me that Napoli is dangerous, but I’m from in New York, I grew up in the ’70s and the ’80s and also that was dangerous, but in a way that I loved. Anyway I also have two new projects that I really can’t talk about, unfortunately. Two new creator-owned projects, that will be out next Spring or Summer, and will be announced early next year. It’s one science fiction and one fantasy, that I can say.
Well, thank you very much for your time and attention. Can you say “Hi” to our readers from Stay Nerd?
Hi, Stay Nerd!
Article by Gabriele Atero di Biase e Andrea Giovalè
