Comic Power: Independent/ Underground Comix is a massive traveling exhibit chronicling 30 years of underground and independent comix. For the uninitiated, comix are not about superheroes. They venture into territory that aboveground comics rarely acknowledge: relationships, politics, angst, and sexuality. The content and format of comix are constrained only by the imagination of the cartoonists, not by the blue pencil of corporate censors.
This show is remarkable for its number of artists and amazing array of styles and subject matter. Included are over 90 artists and 250 pieces, ranging from single panels to full stories. Among these are the famous: Robert Crumb ("Zap"), Bill Griffith ("Zippy the Pinhead"), Art Spiegelman ("Raw" and "Maus"), and Matt Groening ("Life in Hell"). But there are also many lesser-known but destined-to-become-famous artists such as Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez ("Love and Rockets"), Chester Brown ("Yummy Fur"), and Julie Doucette ("Dirty Plotte").
Also included are two historical sub-shows: one of blacklisted political artists, curated by hyperpolitical painter Sue Coe; and one of newspaper strips from 1898 to 1945 that includes early comic art geniuses Windsor McKay ("Little Nemo") and George Herriman ("Krazy Kat"), among others.
The sheer size of the show (running at the Vancouver Art Gallery from April 15, 1994 through June 15,1994, then at the Dunlop Art Gallery in Regina, Saskatchewan, September 7-18, 1994) is daunting. There is very little filler, and Comic Power requires many hours of viewing to digest. That said, the show effectively demonstrates that comix really can be art and literature, still maintaining that precious ability to rot our brains.
ELECTRIC WORD
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