CHANGE MY LOCATION
Exhibit offers new view of Crumb’s comics
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SAN FRANCISCO (Map, News) - On exhibit at Rena Bransten Gallery are nine small drawings on colored paper place mats by Robert Crumb. The modest presentation might seem insignificant if not for the notoriety Crumb has achieved by creating iconic figures such as Fritz the Cat, Mr. Natural, Devil Girl and the Keep on Truckin’ guys, and at the request of Janis Joplin, the album cover art for Big Brother and the Holding Company’s “Cheap Thrills” — images that defined counter-cultural aesthetics and values of the 1960s and early 1970s.
Crumb’s connection to the Bay Area is well-known, as is his reputation as an anti-establishment cultural renegade, which he earned while developing images and running around the streets of the Haight. Crumb moved to San Francisco in 1967; by 1968, he published the first issue of Zap Comix. The magazine was radical, charting and speaking a visual language that was antithetical, in form and content, to the political, cultural and sexual repression of the 1950s.
Crumb’s satirical comics also were reactions to the Comics Code Authority implemented in 1955, which forbade violence, sex, drugs or social relevance in comics to ensure they were commercially viable.
Conversely, “underground comix” such as Zap were sexually explicit, or they commented on the Vietnam War, civil rights struggles, cultural anarchism and drugs.
Through the years, criticism of Crumb’s work has been varied. Some praise it, while others have called it racist, or immature misogynistic pornography.
No matter how one weighs in on Crumb’s artistic production, the work for which he is best known isn’t really in evidence in this display. To a certain extent, it’s what makes the exhibition interesting. It alludes to Crumb’s significance as much by what is absent as by what’s represented.
On display are what appear to be portraits of people captured at particular locations, or remembered by the artist. These drawings render individuals, often at a table, arranged together in seeming isolation — in what might be described as “being alone together.”
These free-floating renderings operate without the clear narrative that usually characterizes comics. In the end, these drawings raise more questions than they provide answers.
R. Crumb Drawings
Where: Rena Bransten Gallery, 77 Geary St., San Francisco
When: 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays; 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturdays; closes Feb. 24
Admission: Free
Contact: (415) 982-3292 or www.renabranstengallery.com
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12:05 AM MST on Tue., Aug. 26, 2008 re: "Skinny Puppy is back, making myths"
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Gnome said:
Why is everyone obsessed with comparing Nine Inch Nails and Skinny Puppy? Who the hell cares if one was influenced by the other? They're completely different by now.
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Concerning Truth my A**! said:
Let's clear up this NIN "conspiracy" before this "genius" goes out and blows up his school: the phrase at issue is "putting this Puppy right back at the head of the Nine Inch Nails pack it originally whelped." Look up any dictionary and you will see that "whelped" means "gave birth to" or slight variations thereof. You therefore are railing against the writer who you agree with. Good job!
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Truth my A**! said:
Get your facts right! All Reznor did was glamorise industrial music by making it more accessible (which Puppy weren't out to do). NIN opened FOR Skinny Puppy in 1988, Skinny Puppy had already formed in 1982, and if you were such a big fan of NIN you would already know that they released "Pretty Hate Machine" in 1989...AFTER Puppy released their first Album "Back & Forth" in 1984! It doesn't take a genius to work out who came first!
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TRUTH said:
If this comment is implying that "Skinny Puppy" helped create/start NIN then this article is a "Mythmaker". The one and only member of NIN, from the beginning, is Trent Reznor. He was/is a fan of Skinny Puppy, leave it at that!
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