So if I go to a museum should I just look at brushstrokes? Or the finished technical product? Shoul I deny the emotional evocativation? Should my emotional reaction be discounted?

I am an outsider and I’m not judging or saying I know the answer it just seems to me that if you want to be rewarded for technical merit that’s great, but it semms by your definition that you would disqualify Picasso, van Gogh, Lissitzky, Pollock, Enrst, Klimnt in the process?

Oh, okay, I guess we were all due a good dose of how it really works! Cheers!

PS – do be careful around those sharp instruments though!

Everybody else, just pretend you didn’t read Steve’s explanation and continue …

Each year, the NCS convenes regional juries of knowledgeable professionals, assigns each jury a category to judge, and then requires them to examine and assess the work of the candidates.

What the NCS doesn’t do is attempt to legislate thought processes. Different jurors may each have a different sense of what makes a creator the outstanding artist of the year in a particular discipline.

In some categories it is readily apparent that the writing is immaterial – the writing plays no part in newspaper or magazine illustration, for example, where an art director will invariably instruct the artist as to exactly what is required to illustrate an article.

In other categories, the lines begin to blur. In Magazine, does the NCS instruct the jury to consider Mort Drucker or Jack Davis inferior to Sergio Aragones because they don’t write their Mad Mag contributions and Sergio does? Of course not.

In the animation categories, the jury may decide to nominate a creator, a lead animator or a particularly gifted director. In comic books, the nominee may be a writer/artist, or it may be someone who works entirely from someone else’s script.

In all cases, the NCS expects that common sense will prevail, and that the work be judged on merits. Which may explain why both Matt Groening, the creator, and David Silverman, the director, have received NCS awards for their work on The Simpsons.

In the case of strips, the lines become even more blurred. Some creators work in partnership with a writer, others buy gags from outside sources, for example, many uses assistants for inking, coloring, etc.

So, in strips, is Jim Borgman to be deemed a lesser artist than Stephan Pastis because he doesn’t write the “Zits” strip? That would be silly. (And both have recently won in the strips category.) Was John Cullen Murphy a lesser creator than Mell Lazarus because he didn’t write gags? Of course not.

So … the NCS cannot instruct jurors to consider the writing in panels and strips, because that would put those who don’t write at a disadvantage. Nor can it insist that the humor be considered, because that would exclude adventure strips, etc.
Instead, the NCS relies on the expertise and common sense of the jurors.

However, we are all well aware that some jurors will prefer a beautiful illustration to a poorly-constructed strip that made them chuckle – and vice versa. Which is why Rick concedes that the subject is food for debate within NCS ranks.

Each jury is composed of professionals, but the individual thought processes may differ wildly. A female juror may be less inclined to admire the penmanship of a Hustler cartoonist when adjudicating Magazine Gags … a Bush supporter may be less inclined to chuckle at a Luckovich Editorial Cartoon … a liberal-leaning juror may be more readily disposed to preferring a Lalo Alcaraz strip over the work ofScott Stantis. That’s just the quirks of human nature.

No two juries are ever the same – which explains why last year’s jury may feel that Marcus Hamilton gets a nomination in the same Panels category as Tony Carillo this year. Their work, their roles, and their features couldn’t be more different – yet both are nominated.

Over the years, I’ve seen nominations that I appluded enthusiastically, and others that made me blink in astonishment. But that’s the nature of the democratic beast – strips that make me consider poking my eyes with a sharp instrument may well be your personal favorite.

In all cases, the NCS can’t legislate aesthetics and individual sensibilities … and doesn’t attempt to.

I’m not really sure why this process would lead “outsiders” to gain “an inside view of what the NCS is really like, and may not feel so bad they’re outsiders” … but perhaps I missed something in the subtext.

Cheers,
Steve McGarry