Art Spiegelman

Art Spiegelman was born on February 15th, 1948 in Stockholm, Sweden. Spiegelman's parents were from Poland but were forced out by the Nazi's after being taken to Auschwitz, the most famous and deadly Concentration Camp in existence. Spiegelman came to America as a young boy with his parents in 1951 and his name was changed from the Hebrew Itzhak Avraham ben Zeev to the Americanized Arthur Isadore. The family first moved to Norristown, Pennsylvania but later moved to Queens, New York City in 1957.

As a young boy in 1960, Art began drawing comics by imitating the art styles of some of his favorite comics at the time. He began selling his artwork by the time he was in high school and was brought to the attention of the United Features Syndicate who offered him a syndicated comic strip which he turned down because he felt that it was too commercial.

Art attended the High School of Art and Design in Manhattan and began submitting to a local newspaper. Art's parents urged him to attempt to find a more secure and lucrative career after his high school graduation in 1965 but he continued to work freelance jobs and began working as a staff cartoonist for his college newspaper, Harper College.

In 1968, Art suffered a mental breakdown during which he was admitted to Binghamton State Mental Hospital. Shortly after he was released, his mother, Anja committed suicide. In 1971, Art moved to San Francisco and began contributing to the then burgeoning counterculture of "underground comix". The underground comix scene was mostly concentrated on sexually explicit material and Art created work for this scene from 1970 to 1977, publishing in men's magazines and underground magazines. It was during this time that he began to conceptualize his most well-known work, "Maus" as he was asked to draw a comic for a magazine called "Funny Animals".

In 1976, Art moved back to New York City where he met his wife Francoise Mouly and the couple was married the next year. The two have two children a daughter, Nadja born n 1987 and a son, Dashiell born in 1992. In 1980, the couple decided to begin publishing a new magazine together which later became "Raw" the monthly magazine in which "Maus" was first published.

Vladek Spiegelman did not live to see the end of "Maus" being published as he died only 2 years after it was started in 1982. In 1991, after "Raw" had ended, Art began trying to find a publisher for the collection of the "Maus" comic strips that would become a graphic novel. He was successful and the graphic novels were published in a collection later that year.

For the next ten years, Art worked as a contributing artist for 'The New Yorker' and in 1997 he published his first full-length children's book. He currently lives in New York City with his wife.