Art Spiegelman

It's been a long, hard road for comic books in Russia. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, attempts to build a comics community consistently met with economic hardship, and failed. It's only over the last several years that Western comic books have become a popular medium in Russia, and in that very short time, there have already been three highly publicized incidences of comics censorship.

The holiday season is fast approaching, and that means it's time to hit the shops! If you're looking for inspiration for gifts for all the important people in your life, ComicsAlliance has put together a series of guides centered on different themes and personalities! It's likely that everyone read some form of comics as a child, and for many of us it's where our passion for the medium first began. If you've got a young reader in your life who can't get enough of comic books, or you're ready to start them on that adventure, we've put together a list of some of the best titles for young readers available to buy today.

On this day in 1992, Maus, a two volume graphic novel by Art Spiegelman, became the first comic to win the Pulitzer Prize. Looking back, it's tempting to attribute that win, and indeed the book's acclaim in general, to the seriousness of the subject matter. And it couldn't be more serious: Maus tells the true story of Art Spiegelman's father, Vladek Spiegelman, and his experiences as a Polish Jew who survived the Holocaust, spending time in both Dachau and Auschwitz along the way.

Originally published by Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly's RAW Books, and featuring characters that appeared in several issues of RAW magazine, Mark Beyer's Agony is a highlight of the 80s art comics movement, spearheaded by that landmark publication. Now available in a new edition as the first release of the New York Review Comics line, the abstract, absurd, and bleakly funny comic book returns, and it's just as oddly beautiful and relevant as ever.

Many comics creators can be applauded for garnering the art form a more popular legitimacy, but it can be argued that nobody has done more than Art Spiegelman. Born to Holocaust survivors on February 15, 1948, Spiegelman has acted as comics' ambassador for decades, working to reduce the gap between the perceived high art of the galleries and the perceived low art of the comics page. And it wasn't entirely because of Maus...

Being one of just 20 cartoonists called to study cartooning at the prestigious Center for Cartoon Studieseach fall has to be an incredible honor. It's also got to be kind of terrifying to find one's self suddenly in the presence of James Sturm, Jason Lutes, Chris Ware and other giants, and have to impress them.

Movies: The Dark Knight Rises star Christian Bale and his wife Sibi Blazic visited the Medical Center of Aurora in Colorado yesterday afternoon and met with several patients (including Carey Rottman, pictured above) who were injured in the Friday shootings that took place during a midnight showing of the film...

If Alan Moore's involvement wasn't enough, Occupy Comics has added additional esteemed creator to its ranks with the news that Art Spiegelman and a host of other established talent will be contributing to the continuing political anthology...

Presented by an uncharacteristically reverent Harlan Ellison, Masters of Comic Book Art is a documentary film that offers insightful on-camera remarks from some of the medium's most gifted artists: Neal Adams, Steve Ditko, Will Eisner, Jean Giraud aka Moebius, Jack Kirby, Harvey Kurtzman, Frank Miller and Bernie Wrightson, all of whom muse on their most famous works and the medium that they love..

As conversations with non-traditional comic readers go, the term "graphic novel" almost always conjures up Art Spiegelman's Maus, which uses anthropomorphic animals to tell the story of how his father survived the Holocaust. Celebrated in equal parts for its craftsmanship, literary merit and historical importance, Maus is easily one of the most -- if not the most -- important comic works