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Glamour, Sleaze, and Other People's Obsessions
12 years ago
General
EROTIC COMICS: A GRAPHIC HISTORY FROM TIJUANA BIBLES TO UNDERGROUND COMIX [VOL. 1] by Tim Pilcher
http://www.amazon.com/Erotic-Comics.....ref=pd_sim_b_1
EROTIC COMICS 2: A GRAPHIC HISTORY FROM THE LIBERATED '70s TO THE INTERNET by Tim Pilcher
http://www.amazon.com/Erotic-Comics.....ref=pd_sim_b_1
reviewed by Roochak
EROTIC COMICS [VOL. 1]
"It makes me laugh to imagine anyone finding my comic work erotic," states Aline Kominsky Crumb, "and in general I can say the same thing about most Underground comic art." She's got a point. Other people's erotic fantasies and obsessions are ridiculous, unless they happen to turn you on, too.
If Sturgeon's Law is true, then ninety per cent of all the erotic comics drawn, then and now, are crap. Tim Pilcher's brief but informative history of the remaining ten per cent revels in the allure of that minority of comics, those drawn with a powerful personal style. What's weirdly consistent about powerful personal styles (and this is an observation Pilcher never quite manages to articulate, though he comes close) is that going public with one's sexual fantasies means going public with one's fascination with the grotesque as well. It's as if artists can't choose which boundaries not to cross in their work, not if they're being honest with themselves as well as dedicated to cartooning as a professional pursuit. That dedication, and society's expectations of us, however hypocritical, may explain why the history of erotic comics (at least up to this volume's cutoff date of the early 'seventies) is a history of artists getting screwed -- by their publishers, usually, but also by the police and the courts.
This is a picture book, and Pilcher's selection of images is very good indeed. The first of five chapters covers the prehistory of underground comics, from the bounty of the 18th century (Hogarth, Rowlandson, Japanese shunga prints, and illustrations for the Kama Sutra), through saucy postcards, Tijuana Bibles, pin-up paintings, and risque comic strips for servicemen. Chapter 2 covers the rise of Playboy magazine and its low rent competitors, but it's too bad Pilcher couldn't get the rights to reproduce any of Kurtzman and Elder's delicious "Little Annie Fanny" panels.
Chapter 3 focuses on bondage comics, followed by the underground comix of the 'sixties, dominated by the Picasso of the counterculture, R. Crumb. The final chapter is a brief survey of the rise of the French and Italian erotic comics industries, with their daunting standards of draftsmanship, as well as a glimpse of the Mexican sensacionale, which sells twenty million copies a month while satisfying what seems to be a national taste for erotica that's both gratuitous and moralistic -- rather like American sitcoms, now that I think of it.
EROTIC COMICS 2
The most intelligent question I've ever known anyone to ask about sexually explicit comics comes from writer Alan Moore, who's spent his professional career leading the way for his peers. "Is there a way," Moore asked in 1993, "of doing pornography that is sexually arousing, is not offensive politically, aesthetically, or in all those other ways, that can speak to women as well as men, that can have characters, meaning, and a story the same way as ordinary literature?" The answer is yes, but proving it in a finished comic is another matter entirely, which is why most artists don't try and most readers don't seem to care. (Moore and artist Melinda Gebbie may have accomplished that difficult task in their epic porn comic, LOST GIRLS, which I plan on reading now that it's in an affordable edition.)
The second volume of Tim Pilcher's history of erotic comics covers the mid 'seventies to the present, and the theme that emerges in this survey is that while depictions of hardcore sex have become commonplace, the average sex comic is as stupid and boring as the average porn video; only the fetishes have become increasingly fractured, and more extreme in their presentation.
Chapter one covers the USA from the deathblow that Stan Lee, with the backing of the Nixon administration, dealt to the Comics Code Authority, through the mid 'nineties, when competition from the internet made it increasingly difficult for erotic comics publishers to make a living. In those years, nothing was off limits, unless you made the mistake of drawing or selling porn comics in the Bible Belt, which necessitated the birth of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. Elsewhere, things were going so well that even mainstream publisher DC Comics got into the act with such pioneering Vertigo titles as ENIGMA and THE EXTREMIST.
Chapter two covers the rise of gay and lesbian comics, from Howard Cruse and Tom of Finland to Alison Bechdel. The next chapter celebrates European erotica, a class act in terms of its draftsmanship, at least until we get to Spain: for some reason, Spanish porn comics look amateurish next to their French, Italian, and Argentinian competition.
Chapter four is Pilcher's ambivalent look at Japanese hentai, which he seems to find disgusting and/or boring in equal measure. (Curiously, the yaoi [gay male] panels are better drawn than anything else reproduced in this chapter.) [NOTE: Mr. Pilcher took the time to write me a message assuring me that he was neither disgusted nor bored with hentai, but that "there is a vast amount of 'rape fantasy' manga that I do find very dubious, verging on pernicious."]
The book concludes with a brief look at erotica online, a field in which we are all experts.
The front dust jacket illustration, a typically gorgeous nude by Giovanna Casotto, is worth the price of the book by itself.
http://www.amazon.com/Erotic-Comics.....ref=pd_sim_b_1
EROTIC COMICS 2: A GRAPHIC HISTORY FROM THE LIBERATED '70s TO THE INTERNET by Tim Pilcher
http://www.amazon.com/Erotic-Comics.....ref=pd_sim_b_1
reviewed by Roochak
EROTIC COMICS [VOL. 1]
"It makes me laugh to imagine anyone finding my comic work erotic," states Aline Kominsky Crumb, "and in general I can say the same thing about most Underground comic art." She's got a point. Other people's erotic fantasies and obsessions are ridiculous, unless they happen to turn you on, too.
If Sturgeon's Law is true, then ninety per cent of all the erotic comics drawn, then and now, are crap. Tim Pilcher's brief but informative history of the remaining ten per cent revels in the allure of that minority of comics, those drawn with a powerful personal style. What's weirdly consistent about powerful personal styles (and this is an observation Pilcher never quite manages to articulate, though he comes close) is that going public with one's sexual fantasies means going public with one's fascination with the grotesque as well. It's as if artists can't choose which boundaries not to cross in their work, not if they're being honest with themselves as well as dedicated to cartooning as a professional pursuit. That dedication, and society's expectations of us, however hypocritical, may explain why the history of erotic comics (at least up to this volume's cutoff date of the early 'seventies) is a history of artists getting screwed -- by their publishers, usually, but also by the police and the courts.
This is a picture book, and Pilcher's selection of images is very good indeed. The first of five chapters covers the prehistory of underground comics, from the bounty of the 18th century (Hogarth, Rowlandson, Japanese shunga prints, and illustrations for the Kama Sutra), through saucy postcards, Tijuana Bibles, pin-up paintings, and risque comic strips for servicemen. Chapter 2 covers the rise of Playboy magazine and its low rent competitors, but it's too bad Pilcher couldn't get the rights to reproduce any of Kurtzman and Elder's delicious "Little Annie Fanny" panels.
Chapter 3 focuses on bondage comics, followed by the underground comix of the 'sixties, dominated by the Picasso of the counterculture, R. Crumb. The final chapter is a brief survey of the rise of the French and Italian erotic comics industries, with their daunting standards of draftsmanship, as well as a glimpse of the Mexican sensacionale, which sells twenty million copies a month while satisfying what seems to be a national taste for erotica that's both gratuitous and moralistic -- rather like American sitcoms, now that I think of it.
EROTIC COMICS 2
The most intelligent question I've ever known anyone to ask about sexually explicit comics comes from writer Alan Moore, who's spent his professional career leading the way for his peers. "Is there a way," Moore asked in 1993, "of doing pornography that is sexually arousing, is not offensive politically, aesthetically, or in all those other ways, that can speak to women as well as men, that can have characters, meaning, and a story the same way as ordinary literature?" The answer is yes, but proving it in a finished comic is another matter entirely, which is why most artists don't try and most readers don't seem to care. (Moore and artist Melinda Gebbie may have accomplished that difficult task in their epic porn comic, LOST GIRLS, which I plan on reading now that it's in an affordable edition.)
The second volume of Tim Pilcher's history of erotic comics covers the mid 'seventies to the present, and the theme that emerges in this survey is that while depictions of hardcore sex have become commonplace, the average sex comic is as stupid and boring as the average porn video; only the fetishes have become increasingly fractured, and more extreme in their presentation.
Chapter one covers the USA from the deathblow that Stan Lee, with the backing of the Nixon administration, dealt to the Comics Code Authority, through the mid 'nineties, when competition from the internet made it increasingly difficult for erotic comics publishers to make a living. In those years, nothing was off limits, unless you made the mistake of drawing or selling porn comics in the Bible Belt, which necessitated the birth of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. Elsewhere, things were going so well that even mainstream publisher DC Comics got into the act with such pioneering Vertigo titles as ENIGMA and THE EXTREMIST.
Chapter two covers the rise of gay and lesbian comics, from Howard Cruse and Tom of Finland to Alison Bechdel. The next chapter celebrates European erotica, a class act in terms of its draftsmanship, at least until we get to Spain: for some reason, Spanish porn comics look amateurish next to their French, Italian, and Argentinian competition.
Chapter four is Pilcher's ambivalent look at Japanese hentai, which he seems to find disgusting and/or boring in equal measure. (Curiously, the yaoi [gay male] panels are better drawn than anything else reproduced in this chapter.) [NOTE: Mr. Pilcher took the time to write me a message assuring me that he was neither disgusted nor bored with hentai, but that "there is a vast amount of 'rape fantasy' manga that I do find very dubious, verging on pernicious."]
The book concludes with a brief look at erotica online, a field in which we are all experts.
The front dust jacket illustration, a typically gorgeous nude by Giovanna Casotto, is worth the price of the book by itself.
Matt Baker (1921 - 1959), a gay, African-American comic book artist who specialized in drawing sexy women, defined the Good Girl art of the 1940s and '50s. He was a prolific artist, drawing such features as Phantom Lady, "Sky Girl," Canteen Kate, "Tiger Girl," "South Sea Girl," and a variety of Western and romance comics. His last confirmed work, before dying of a heart attack at the age of 38, was "I Gave Up the Man I Love!" for My Own Romance #73.
You can't make this stuff up.
This is all quite fascinating, especially the bit about fetishes. I have seen some that make me wish my eyes could crawl out and kill themselves. Especially when ponies are involved in them. Bonus points on the author for noting the dull ubiquity of the bog-standard rape stories in hentai, with the basic bad-end bull-puckey.