I think it has most to do with the way in which a story is told, whether it feels real either via the music of the telling or the honesty of the story.
Chris WareComic strip is almost like music on a page that you perform in your mind. It's not just pictures. There's a particular rhythm and structure to it that is unlike anything else. It literally is like music. You hear it in your mind as you read it.
Chris WareEven the disappointing diffusion of a sheer curtain can suggest the most colorful bouquet of unspeakable secrets.
Chris WareI guess I consider myself a cartoonist first, though I was "trained" as a painter/printmaker/sculptor. If there's still any resistance to cartooning in the nuts-and-bolts world of acquiring the means of survival, it's probably mostly on the pay scale. If graphic novels are selling really well and are "growing the book market" or whatever it is a businessman would say about them, I don't see it in the remuneration offered by some of the publishers.
Chris Ware