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Graphic novel depicts the life of Mies van der Rohe

A comic where modernism counts as a superpower

Illustration of Mies in front of the Farnsworth House Illustration by Agustín Ferrer Casas

The lives of architects aren’t typically the stuff of gripping comic books, unless that architect happens to be Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. In a new graphic novel titled Mies, Spanish artist Agustín Ferrer Casas depicts the life of the famous architect in 176 pages of illustrated storytelling.

Cover of comic book Illustration by Agustín Ferrer Casas

Casas explains. “And I say fiction because in this book, I try to show not only part of his work but [also] life, the personality of the architect.” The comic traces Mies’s life and work from his early days in Berlin to the Bauhaus to his eventual move to Chicago. Casas, who started working on the comic in 2015, says it’s a slightly embellished historical take. “It is a fictional biography of his life, based on numerous writings by many other authors and Mies himself,”

Illustration of people in living room next to modern chairs Illustration by Agustín Ferrer Casas

The comic is in Spanish, but even if you can’t read it, there’s plenty of Mies’s modernism to soak in. According to Dezeen, the book includes dozens of architectural drawings that depict the architect’s most famous buildings including the Farnsworth House and Chicago’s Lake Shore Drive apartments. You can pick up a copy here.