Comix #2: Phoebe Gloeckner

I'm following up the first, more mainstream comix artist profile up with one that's a little more underground. A literal living hero of mine is Phoebe Gloeckner (b. 1960)  and her past cannot be summarized adequately with texts and photos of her work. Her book 'Diary of a Teenage Girl' is an absolutely quintessential read for all women and anyone interested in 60s/underground/SF history. She's currently a professor at University of Michigan and I would absolutely love to be in one of her classes (where they draw Crumb panels and MAD magazine pages). Her father was an artist too although she grew up with her dysfunctional mother and younger sister. Her adolescence and young adulthood in SF, while vividly unreal and insane, set her up for a successful comix career. When she was a teenager, Crumb would come to her house and look at her sketchbooks and write comments in them. She's a freaking amazing comic artist and story teller. As a young artists, her DIRECT influences were The Bunch (Aline Kominsky Crumb) and Diane Noomin etc and she has been published in Wimmin's Comix and Weirdo among tons of other underground mags. She has a medical college background in medical illustration and does amazing anatomical drawings. All of these elements together: artistic influences as a child, her immersion in underground 60s Comix culture, her unbelievable personal experiences and her professional medical education as an artist, make her an incredible influence and her honesty makes her a powerful and real hero.

Early Work, 1976

Later work, 1994  Her semi-autobiographical character Minnie

Untitled, 1990

I seriously suggest checking out her books 'Diary of a Teenage Girl' (Which I hear they're making into a play) and 'A Childs Life'... the latter has a lot of full color medical drawings and some rock posters and that sort of thing. Also the aforementioned Weirdos, Wimmin's Comix, as well as Twisted Sisters, Young Lust and I HIGHLY recommend the Comic's Journal #261 (2004) interview by Gary Groth with her is really great. She was also on PBS' P.O.V. (2006) in response to Hergé's work.

Comix #1: Alex Ross

I have been wanting to do some spotlights on comix artists. I hate the popularity of 'Graphic Novels' and there's of course so much politics revolving around this industry. But I really want to shine some light on some of the great painters. I know this stuff is a little dated but when you say "Comix Painter" the first name that comes to mind is Alex Ross. He's totally famous for his superhero stuff but I think we're all a little bit more familiar with his political work:

(He did that Obama Superman one too)

I guess the thing that stands out the most about Ross' work is that he has a really steady and prolific career in the Superhero industry and his reputation as a quality artist is flawless... is it his wealth and respectable career that allows him the political freedom to say so much in his paintings? In the male dominated world of comix, homosexuality is still "scary" and it seems so rare to see images like this in the industry. It seems like something should have "mysteriously" happened to him already but since nothing has I hope we continue to see this more "edgy" graphic art being released.