Art Spiegelman

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Itzhak Avraham ben Zeev Spiegelman ( ; born February 15, 1948), professionally known as Art Spiegelman, is an American cartoonist, editor, and comics advocate best known for his graphic novel ''Maus''. His work as co-editor on the comics magazines ''Arcade'' and ''Raw'' has been influential, and from 1992 he spent a decade as contributing artist for ''The New Yorker''. He is married to designer and editor Françoise Mouly and is the father of writer Nadja Spiegelman. In September 2022, the National Book Foundation announced that he would receive the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters.

Spiegelman began his career with Topps (a bubblegum and trading card company) in the mid-1960s, which was his main financial support for two decades; there he co-created parodic series such as ''Wacky Packages'' in the 1960s and ''Garbage Pail Kids'' in the 1980s. He gained prominence in the underground comix scene in the 1970s with short, experimental, and often autobiographical work. A selection of these strips appeared in the collection ''Breakdowns'' in 1977, after which Spiegelman turned focus to the book-length ''Maus'', about his relationship with his father, a Holocaust survivor. The postmodern book depicts Germans as cats, Jews as mice, ethnic Poles as pigs, and citizens of the United States as dogs. It took 13 years to create until its completion in 1991. In 1992 it won a special Pulitzer Prize and has gained a reputation as a pivotal work.

Spiegelman and Mouly edited eleven issues of ''Raw'' from 1980 to 1991. The oversized and graphics magazine helped introduce talents who became prominent in alternative comics, such as Charles Burns, Chris Ware, and Ben Katchor, and introduced several foreign cartoonists to the English-speaking comics world. Beginning in the 1990s, the couple worked for ''The New Yorker'', which Spiegelman left to work on ''In the Shadow of No Towers'' (2004), about his reaction to the September 11 attacks in New York in 2001.

Spiegelman advocates for greater comics literacy. As an editor, a teacher, and a lecturer, Spiegelman has promoted better understanding of comics and has mentored younger cartoonists.