George Herriman

George Herriman

George Joseph Herriman (22 August 1880 – 25 April 1944) was an American cartoonist, best known for the comic strip Krazy Kat (1913–1944). More influential than popular, Krazy Kat had an appreciative audience among people in the arts. Gilbert Seldes' article "The Krazy Kat Who Walks by Himself" was the earliest example of a critic from the high arts giving serous attention to a comic strip. The Comics Journal placed the strip first on its list of the greatest comics of the 20th century.

Born in New Orleans, Louisiana, to mulatto Creole parents, Herriman grew up in Los Angeles. After graduating from high school in 1897, he got his first job in newspapers, doing illustrations and engraving. He soon moved on to cartooning and comic strips—a medium then in its infancy. He did a variety of strips until he introduced his most famous character, Krazy Kat, in his strip The Dingbat Family in 1910. Krazy spawned its own daily strip in 1913, and from 1916 also appeared on Sundays. The strip was noted for its poetic, dialect-heavy dialog, its fantastic, shifting backgrounds, and its bold, experimental page layouts. In its main theme, Krazy would be pelted with bricks by Ignatz Mouse, which the naïve, androgynous Kat would interpret as a symbol of love. As the strip progressed, a love triangle between Krazy, Ignatz and Offisa Pupp became pronounced.

Herriman lived most of his life in Los Angeles, but made frequent trips to the Navajo deserts in the southwestern U.S. He was drawn to the landscapes of Monument Valley and the Enchanted Mesa, and made Coconino County, Arizona the location of his Krazy Kat strips. His artwork made much use of Navajo and Mexican themes and motifs against shifting desert backgrounds. He was a prolific cartoonist who produced a large number of strips, and illustrated Don Marquis' book of poetry Archy and Mehitabel. Newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst was a proponent of Herriman, and gave him a lifetime contract with his King Features Syndicate. This guaranteed Herriman a comfortable living and outlet for his work, despite its lack of popularity. Upon his 1944 death, a week's worth of Krazy Kat strips lay unfinished on the drawing table in his Hollywood home. His work has been a primary influence on cartoonists such as Will Eisner, Charles Schulz, Robert Crumb, Art Spiegelman, Bill Watterson, Patrick McDonnell and Chris Ware.