Katharina Greve

Katharina Greve was born in 1972 in Hamburg and today lives in Berlin. She has made a name for herself both as a comic illustrator and cartoonist. In some of her works, she deals with social and political themes with humour, while other stories tend to be filled with surrealist fantasies and bizarre and funny situational scenes. Before she took up comic illustration, she studied architecture at the Technical University in Berlin and this influence is apparent in many of her works, which are marked by a clear, reduced imagery and an almost technical drawing style combined with an unusually dry sense of humour.

In her first graphic novel »Ein Mann geht an die Decke« (2009; tr. A man hits the roof) she plays with the architecture of Berlin’s television tower, both in content and form. The story deals with an elevator operator who discovers a parallel universe in the tower shaft where gravity does not exist. The book received unanimous praise in the press and the »Tagesspiegel« described it as »a treat for architecture fans and an ode to the possibilities offered by the comic«. One reviewer from the architecture magazine »Bauwelt« wrote that it »doesn’t always have to be misfortunate when an architect decides against practising her learned profession«. Greve’s second longer comic story »Patchwork. Frau Doktor Waldbeck näht sich eine Familie« (2010; tr. Patchwork. Doctor Waldbeck sews herself a family) combines fantastical elements with commentary on current political and economic debates. The book deals with a transplant researcher who puts together a family from the leftover box in her laboratory and in doing so sets of a chain of unexpected events. »Patchwork« was praised by the »Frankfurter Allgemeinen Zeitung« as »evilly good«, and the magazine »Strapazin« lauded Greve’s unusual imagination and wrote that she brings together various elements from very different genres and themes »with clean strokes of the pen and fine humour«. Greve’s third graphic novel, »Hotel Hades« (2014), is a surrealistic tale of three people who are shot at the same time, setting them off on a strange journey. They stumble about in a bureaucratic afterworld which has grown into a megacity and which contains many absurd surprises for the dead.

In addition to her work as a comic author, Greve regularly publishes cartoons on current political and social topics, which have appeared in magazines lie »Titanic« and have received many awards, such as the German Cartoon Prize and the Sondermann Award for Comical Art. Here, Greves received praise for her »art of graphic reduction as well as her narrative expansion of a material into the grotesque and satirical«.

Ein Mann geht an die Decke

Die Biblyothek Leipzig, 2009

Patchwork

Frau Doktor Waldbeck näht sich eine Familie

Gütersloher VerlagshausGütersloh, 2011

Eigentlich ist Wurst umgestülptes Tier Cartoons & Comicstrips

Eichborn Köln, 2013

Hotel Hades

Egmont Grapic Novel Köln, 2014

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