Laura Pérez Vernetti: The Poetic Future of Comics

She orders an orange juice. "I am an abstainer, with the problems that not drinking alcohol entails with friends and colleagues," she explains with a wide smile and blue eyes that are half here and half somewhere else, and she finishes her confession: "I am not a smoker either, another of my unbearable flaws."

Cartoonist and illustrator of recognized international prestige, it's hard to imagine Laura Pérez Vernetti with time for anything other than drawing, illustrating, constantly challenging the limits of the graphic by always daring to take that further step that leads comics to other registers, other possibilities, without losing its essence.

"I started publishing comics at twenty-one in Moda1 magazine, and landed in El Víbora at twenty-three —she sips her drink—, I published during the best era of this magazine, in the 80s."

Some critics consider this Barcelona native to be one of the best Spanish authors of erotic comics, but her contribution goes much further: "In my career I have dealt with all kinds of themes: mythology, eroticism, literature in comics, experimental comics and, in recent years, graphic poetry, a comic genre of which I am one of the pioneers. I have always been interested in exploring new paths."

Not in vain, she has just published the graphic poetry comic La cólera de Baudelaire (Luces de Gálibo), "about this French poet, founder of modern poetry, with a first chapter addressing his biography and a second of poems from his book Las flores del mal. Also, without realizing it, it turns out that this 2021 is the anniversary of his birth!"

--- And then, what will come?

--- In September, Arrabal goes to print, also for the Luces de Gálibo publishing house of the poet Ferran Fernández, with ten of the best poems by Fernando Arrabal, an important creator who has participated in relevant artistic movements such as Surrealism, the Panic Group, the Theater of the Absurd or 'Patafísica.

When talking about this project, the artist's pupil dilates with pure excitement: "Arrabal has always been a creator, a free spirit, who says what he thinks no matter what, like Baudelaire, and I was particularly interested in drawing his poetry, in which a large part of the themes he also deals with in other artistic disciplines appear. Several of my poet friends advised me on his poetic work and I had a blast collaborating with him and drawing him for a year."

Surviving the desert crossing

Laura caught beautiful moments, but also very complicated moments for the practice of comics in Spain.

"The 90s were very hard for cartoonists in this country, because almost all comic magazines closed and several publishers disappeared. But I crossed the desert, I persevered, and with the recovery of the sector in 2000, publishers appeared, especially Edicions de Ponent, who published my albums, even comics I had drawn in solitude in the previous decade. For ten years now, Ferran Fernández has enthusiastically published my graphic poetry comics dedicated to Pessoa, Rilke, Mayakovsky, or Baudelaire."

Of her poetic production, the artist does not want to forget "a volume I published in Reino de Cordelia titled Viñetas de plata, with poems by Luis Alberto de Cuenca, and another edited by the Centro Cultural Generación del 27, Ocho poemas, novela gráfica, with works by contemporary poets such as Jesús Aguado, Miriam Reyes, Luis Alberto de Cuenca, José Ángel Cilleruelo, Isabel Bono, Julia Otxoa, Menchu Gutiérrez, and José Luis Piquero."

All this work has been awarded on different occasions, although Laura speaks with special pride of the Grand Prize for a Career that the Barcelona International Comic Fair awarded her in 2018, "highlighting my commitment for forty years to research new narrative forms in comics. You know how difficult it is, for any author of any art, to dedicate oneself to research, without highly commercial projects, following one's own discourse and walking outside of trends and intellectual gurus."

It is very difficult to dedicate oneself to research, without highly commercial projects, following one's own discourse and walking outside of trends and intellectual gurus

Frankly disgusted by "the horrifying and monstrous sculptures they have made to continue the construction of the Sagrada Familia," and a supporter of having left only Gaudí's work, even if unfinished, Laura feels very identified with Barcelona.

"On a personal and creative level, I have a very Mediterranean, very port-like and hedonistic sensibility. I really like being bilingual and mastering Catalan and Castilian without problems, and I love that this city treats with naturalness, with joy and understanding, thorny issues currently in the arts, or in other places, such as eroticism."

And then, unable to contain the spring of projects that stirs, like the flame of a will-o'-the-wisp, in her soul, Laura gives another scoop: "Next year I will start a graphic novel with the writer Javier Pérez Andújar set in Barcelona, and I love how he describes, in a new and very original way, life, the inhabitants, the bars and the city."

I love that Barcelona treats with naturalness, joy and understanding, thorny issues in the arts, such as eroticism