Serbian comics

Serbian comics are comics written and produced in Serbia. During the 1970s and 1980s many comics have been published, several in languages other than Serbian.

History

The history of Serbian comics began in the 19th century in the form of caricatures in children's magazines. The war period stopped the development of comics during the 1930s when Russian aristocrats fled from their communist government and came to Serbia. In that time the so-called "golden age" of Serbian comics began. The pioneers of the time were Đorđe Lobačev, Sergej Solovjev, Konstantin Kuznjecov, Nikola Navojev, Ivan Šenšin, Aleksije Ranher, Sebastijan Lehner, Đuka Jovanović, Moma Marković and odhers. The first Serbian comic edition was published on January 7th 1932.

In the newspapers, comics gained popularity through the children's edition of Politika. Others followed soon. On the 21th of October 1934 in the newspaper "Politika" a whole page of Secret Agent X-9 appeared just a month after the American premiere.

Micky Mouse was the first long term comic publication lated from 1935 until the war in 1941. After the war comics were soon banned because of the negative view they gave on the communist government until the end of the 1960s.

Unfortunately many of comic pioneers ended tragically, some of them died during the war and some were banished by the communists.

The government in Yugoslavia didn't forbid western comics like many other former communist countries. In the beginning of the 70's and during the 80's the second golden age of Serbian comics took place. Most of them were world war II story's like "Mirko and Slavko". They sold in more than one hundred copy's. Politikin Zabavnik sold over 200'000 copies. Comics like Cat Claw and Tarzan (Serbian Version) where translated and published in many other countries.

After the breakup of Yugoslavia and the economy crisis in the 90's, comics were almost forgotten. Most of the magazines which published comics were shut down. Most of the authors went on to work for Franco-Belgian comics. In 1995 "Luxor comic" published two superhero comics Generation Tesla and Borci Sumraka (Twilight Fighters), but both projects where shut down after one year due to low sales.

Over the past few years the market for comics in Serbia has grown. There is an increasing number of Serbian comic books and magazines. Notably since 2006 "Luxor comic" is publishing superhero comics Faktor 4 and a fantasy comic based on Slavic mythology called "Divlja Magija" (Wild Magic). In the future those comic will be probably included in the child magazine "Boomerang".

List of Serbian comics

* Cat Claw
* Kobra
* Tarzan (Serbian Version)
* Billy the Spit
* Technotise
* Generation Tesla
* Faktor 4

List of Serbian comic artists

* Branislav Kerac
* Aleksa Gajić
* Zoran Janjetov
* Dražen Kovačević

List of films based on Serbian comics

* "Billy the Spit" (1986)
* "City Cat" (1991), from Cat Claw
* "Technotise Edit & I" (2008), from Technotise
* "Factor 4" (TBA)

External links

* [http://www.bds-forum.com BDS GRUPA: EX-Yugoslavian scan and scanlation group - The best & only] sr iconhr iconbs iconsl iconmk icon
* [http://www.upps-sajt.com UPPS - Udruženje za promociju i produkciju stripa / Comics publishing and promotion society] sr icon
* [http://www.rastko.org.yu/strip/60godina/index.html Slobodan Ivkov] sr icon