Gilbert Hernandez is one of the founding figures of the American alternative comic, co-creator with his brothers Jaime and Mario of the seminal serial Love and Rockets (Fantagraphics, from 1981). His Palomar cycle — a multi-generational saga of a Latin American village — is a consensus landmark of the literary graphic novel. His work is characterised by a bold, sensual brush line in the tradition of Crumb and Toth.