Color and Not

When I figuratively walk away from Asterios Polyp and ask myself what is the first thing I remember, I answer color, and lack thereof. My first tweets about this graphic novel were along the lines of “Does anyone else feel calm reading this work? Maybe it’s something about the colors…” Looking back at the book, I see so much white space, and what is colored is colored in faded yellows, purples, and washed out blues. It’s like I was looking at the story through a muted lens, and for whatever reason, this made me feel calmer about the work, even when meteors were crashing down in the pages.

Before I looked back at the work, I would have said that the all of the book was colored in the manner of muted hues. I would have said that every page was done in a similar palette to the next, nothing too jarring, nothing too saturated. But when I actually do look back at the pages, I find that that assessment is wrong. There are several portions of the book where the pages are drenched in color. Pages into the graphic novel, we have wall to wall purple as Asterios and others run down the stairs and as yellow fire trucks fight back yellow flames. No, there’s not the eye-gouging red and dripping blue, but color dominates the page in a way that I didn’t immediately call to mind.

The next saturated segment tells us Hana’s story. The pages are soaked in red, with the exceptions of the page literally being folded back to show us Asterios and Hana talking in the present, against the background of her past. I like Lindsay’s assessment of Hana and Asterios as complimentary colors, red and blue respectively, and I do believe that works in regards to these pages as well.

Hana’s often colored with red. From glimpses into her life story (as shown mostly by the red pages), we know that Hana is quiet, if not shy, and prone to avoid the spotlight either by it literally not being shined on her by her family or by choice as we see her avoid speaking engagements. As her “flower” name implies, Hana still has a thirst for life and in enjoyment for it, while Asterios is shown as seeing the world in dichotomies.

At first I thought where Hana can see the world saturated with color (like red), Asterios would have more binary color choices, which makes me first literally think of black and white. But, as the graphic novel (and the beginning of my post) shows you, the graphic novel operates in muted colors, seemingly negating my neatly packaged color metaphor. However, I still think it could apply because instead of trying to look for the world through Asterios as being just black and white, I see it rather as being pages of white and color, the absence of color and then the presence. Much of the graphic novel operates in colors portioned against consuming white space.

An example of this can be seen early on, following the “Here’s your coffee, Professor” panels. Hana is shown at the bottom of this page awash in red shadow. She’s etched onto the background, her portion of the panel blending into the page with no clear ending between her and the white of the page. Contrasting her is Asterios, shown in hard lines of blue. His portion of the panel is clearly defined; not blending into the page, although Hana’s red encroaches on his neat lines. While Hana is saturated with red, Asterios is still a practice in binaries, defined by the areas where his harsh blue lines take up space and the white areas where the lines do not.

~Kelley