Aquatlantic

Atlantis exists, and is immersed in a sea not as deep as you might think. Among its inhabitants is a comedic actor who enjoys great success by interpreting the most indefensible and lowest of low characters: the contemporary, surface-dwelling earthling. The Aquatlantic society that champions his persona is a self-identified 'original humanity' of purity and happiness that is only able to coexist with its less virtuous and crude 'surface brothers' thanks to one crucial condition: that Atlantis (aka Aquatlantic) and its people remain considered a myth. But what would happen if this fictional stage character of the 'indefensible Earthman' all cynicism and vulgarity, gradually took possession of the actor who plays him? The answer sets off a chain reaction that jeopardises the entire kingdom and the uneasy peace between the two species. Giorgio Carpinteri's sheer graphic brilliance - featuring aspects of Futurism, Cubism, Russian Constructivism, and German Expressionism with echoes of Bauhaus and distinct whims of Art Deco - would be enough to carry this brilliant fantasy, but Aquatlantic is also a lyrical, allegorical masterpiece exploring the relationship between the conscious and unconscious, the known and the unknown. Aquatlantic is a bold return to comics by Giorgio Carpinteri after a lengthy absence from the field. One of the sharpest nibs in Italian and international comics, Carpinteri was discovered in the 1980s by Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly and first published in RAW magazine. He then co-founded (With Igort, Lorenzo Mattotti, Daniele Brolli, Marcello Jori, and Jerry Kramsky) the Valvoline group, a radical artistic collective that revolutionised Italian comic art.