Mark Beyer is a comic artist known for his bleak storylines, often featuring death, disfigurement, depression, and humiliation, which contrast with his childlike, geometric drawing style. Most of his stories are about the adventures of a codependent yet resentful couple named Amy and Jordan.

His work was prominently featured in RAW Magazine

RAW (magazine)

RAW was a comics anthology edited by Art Spiegelman and Françoise Mouly and published by Mouly from 1980 to 1991. It was a flagship publication of the 1980s alternative comics movement, serving as a more intellectual counterpoint to Robert Crumb's visceral Weirdo, which followed squarely in the...

. In fact, he was the only artist aside from founder Art Spiegelman

Art Spiegelman

Art Spiegelman is an American comics artist, editor, and advocate for the medium of comics, best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning comic book memoir, Maus. His works are published with his name in lowercase: art spiegelman.-Biography:Spiegelman was born in Stockholm, Sweden, to Polish Jews...

 to be published in every issue during its run. He has also been published in New York Press

New York Press

New York Press was a free alternative weekly in New York City, that was published from 1988 to 2011. During its lifetime, it was the main competitor to the Village Voice...

and New Musical Express

NME

The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...

. Beyer also had a recurring animated short series on MTV

MTV

MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....

's Liquid Television

Liquid Television

Liquid Television is an Emmy Award–winning 1990s animation showcase that appeared on MTV. The first season of Liquid Television also aired on BBC Two in co-production with MTV. Ultimately, MTV commissioned three seasons of the show, which was produced by Colossal Pictures...

(The Adventures of Thomas and Nardo), and a 1995

1995 in film

-Top grossing films:-Events:* March 22 - The Dogme 95 movement is officially announced in Paris by Danish directors Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg.* March 28 - Actress Julia Roberts and singer Lyle Lovett announce their plans for separation....

 movie by Gregg Araki

Gregg Araki

Gregg Araki is an American independent filmmaker. He is involved in New Queer Cinema.-Early life:Araki was born in Los Angeles but grew up in Santa Barbara, California...

, The Doom Generation

The Doom Generation

The Doom Generation is a film by director Gregg Araki. Released in 1995, it stars Rose McGowan, James Duval and Johnathon Schaech as two teenagers and a 21-year-old punk drifter who become involved in a ménage à trois. It is the second of a trilogy of films known as the Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy,...

, was loosely based on the Amy and Jordan

Amy and Jordan

Amy and Jordan is a comic book by Mark Beyer, featuring a dysfunctional couple who are victimized by each other and by blind circumstance. The characters Amy and Jordan appear in other works by Beyer, including Agony . It was listed in Time Magazine's "Best Comix of 2004"....

strips.

He has also produced cover artwork (X Man and X in Paris for Michael Brodsky), T-shirts and posters for John Zorn

John Zorn

John Zorn is an American avant-garde composer, arranger, record producer, saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist. Zorn is a prolific artist: he has hundreds of album credits as performer, composer, or producer...

 and the New York Downtown avant-garde

Avant-garde

Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....

 music scene. In particular the cover and inserts for Zorn's tribute to Ornette Coleman

Ornette Coleman

Ornette Coleman is an American saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s....

 Spy vs Spy (1989) and a popular Naked City

Naked City (band)

Naked City was an avant-garde music group led by saxophonist and composer John Zorn. Active primarily in New York City from 1988 to 1993, Naked City was initiated by Zorn as a "composition workshop" to test the limits of composition in a traditional rock band lineup...

 T-shirt.

Although he mostly works solo, Beyer has collaborated with writer Alan Moore

Alan Moore

Alan Oswald Moore is an English writer primarily known for his work in comic books, a medium where he has produced a number of critically acclaimed and popular series, including Watchmen, V for Vendetta, and From Hell...

.

He is originally from Allentown, Pennsylvania

Allentown, Pennsylvania

Allentown is a city located in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is Pennsylvania's third most populous city, after Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and the 215th largest city in the United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 118,032 and is currently...

, in the state's Lehigh Valley

Lehigh Valley

The Lehigh Valley, known officially by the United States Census Bureau as the Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton, PA-NJ metropolitan area and referred to locally as The Valley and A-B-E, is a metropolitan region consisting of Lehigh, Northampton, Berks, and Carbon counties in eastern Pennsylvania and...

 region.

Books

• A Disturbing Evening and Other Stories (Self-published, 1978)
• Dead Stories (orig. 1982, reissued Sudbury, MA: Water Row Press, 2000) (ISBN 0-934953-72-4)
• Agony (New York: Raw Books, 1987) (ISBN 0-394-75442-5)
• We're Depressed (Sudbury, MA: Water Row Press, 1999) (ISBN 0-934953-65-1)
• Amy and Jordan
  Amy and Jordan
  Amy and Jordan is a comic book by Mark Beyer, featuring a dysfunctional couple who are victimized by each other and by blind circumstance. The characters Amy and Jordan appear in other works by Beyer, including Agony . It was listed in Time Magazine's "Best Comix of 2004"....
  
  (New York: Pantheon, 2004) (ISBN 0-375-42270-6)