From B-Boys To X-Men: Alt-Comics' Ed Piskor Goes Mainstream

With X-Men: Grand Design, Ed Piskor pulls off a feat very few cartoonists ever manage: He takes his unique aesthetic from the scruffy fringe of alternative comics to the world of mass-market superhero publishing. In this, the first of a planned three volumes, Piskor offers his own interpretation of the famous mutants' origins and adventures.

It's not a gig anyone would have seen coming, even if Piskor did spend a year at the Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art (Kubert as in Joe Kubert, the artist behind DC Comics' Sgt. Rock and Hawkman). Piskoras well as 2007's and 2010's Then came the series that would make his name: . Beginning as an online serial, Piskor's passionate tribute to the early days of hip hop grew to hundreds of pages in four oversized volumes. The books became bestsellers and garnered much acclaim, leading to an Eisner Award in 2015. And as Piskor tells me, that award provided an unusual stimulus for his current project.