El Gusto del Cloro, Bastien Vives

http://www.diaboloediciones.com/bastien-vives/

http://www.diaboloediciones.com/el-gusto-del-cloro/

A graphic novel set in a swimming pool which captures, by snap shots, the intimate encounters between the ‘hero’ and the other visitors, primarily a young woman who used to swim competitively and helps him with his strokes.

The cover caught my eye in the library because I do have ‘a taste for chlorine’, swimming regularly in the municipal pool and have wondered how to depict it, or elements of it artistically.

It has an air of sadness about it, perhaps because of the muted and limited colour palette, the almost clinical surroundings of the pool and conveys the loneliness of the hero, who is advised to swim by his physiotherapist and must slowly and gradually confront and overcome his scoliosis.

He spots the girl on his first visit but doesn’t speak to her until introduced by his more gregarious friend who goes with him once on a subsequent visit. He waits for the girl each week and is visibly disappointed on those occasions when she comes with a male companion, or worse, doesn’t show up at all.

The drawings can at times feel crude and deceptively simple, but the attention to perspective through the angles of the tiles and the roof, despite being drawn in a loose freehand, and the way the artist captures the complex postures and anatomical contours of the expert swimmer show this to be a device to accentuate her physical superiority over the other swimmers.

There is some humour though; the reference to the ‘flavour of hide of the old folks and the wee of the kids’...many is the time I’ve tried really hard not to think about that while churning out the lengths. And the scene when the hero weaves through a crowd of bodies rings true too.

This is a beautiful little book, really well observed and skilfully drawn- in a loose way, a lesson in ‘less is more’.

I would (will?), however, add touches of orange and red to the pool scenes to depict the life ring, lane dividers and bunting and compliment the blueness of it all.