Remembering Harvey Pekar: Cleveland’s Favorite Illustrator

[caption id="attachment_1885" align="alignleft" width="335" caption="Cleveland's Harvey Pekar"][/caption]

Harvey Pekar was the visionary and eccentric cartoonist who brought the city of Cleveland into his very popular comic American Splendor. Harvey passed away one year ago today in his hometown Cleveland. If you were a fan of American Splendor, be sure to check out this great article from Juxtapoz.

On July 12, 2010, one of the most revered comic book artists of his generation, Harvey Pekar, passed away in his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. As it turned out, Juxtapoz interviewed Pekar a few weeks earlier for a feature in the July 2010 issue of the magazine, talking to Pekar about his newest collaborative endeavor, the Pekar Project.

I remember Harvey being very upbeat in our talk, excited about collaboration, new work, and being able to talk about his career. Today, we would like to honor Harvey's memory by posting our entire talk from that day, in hopes that everyone get a chance to read one of his final interviews. —EP.

There is an illuminating opening scene in American Splendor, the 2003 autobiographical film in which American comic book artist Harvey Pekar, as portrayed by Paul Giamatti, deliberates the peculiarity of his own name. The monologue proceeds to describe the oddity of three Harvey Pekars in the phone book, all simultaneously living in Cleveland in the 1970s, with Giamatti (Pekar) wondering aloud how shared owners of such a singular name could possibly live in the same city. The pondering leads to the core of the Harvey Pekar comic: “Who are these people? Where do they come from? What do they do? What’s in a name? Who is Harvey Pekar?”

Read more at Juxtapoz