Category: Cartooning

If you missed American Masters this week, here you go.

https://www.pbs.org/video/art-spiegelman-disaster-is-my-muse-kqfn5y/

A book that I resisted at $100, and couldn’t resist for half off.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/3836592657

Books are seen in many if not most of the scenes in Art Spiegelman: Disaster is My Muse. I spotted some that I have here at home, along with an album box set that’s seen in Bill Griffith’s studio.

Robert Crumb, Art Spiegelman, and Bill Griffith — the three leading names in what used to be called Underground Cartooning — each had a difficult childhood in dysfunctional families, with Griffith’s being the closest to normal.

I can state this with some confidence, because they have been unflinchingly autobiographical in their work. It’s perhaps no surprise that Griffith achieved the most conventional level of success, in the form of a syndicated comic strip.

I’m starting to watch last night’s American Masters. In an early scene, Robert Crumb appears with his wife Aline, who died in November, 2022.

This song seems appropriate here.