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THE BLOG AT THE CROSSROADS
Comics at the Courtauld Institute
Posted: January 7, 2011
Who would have thought it? As further evidence that comics in Britain are literally getting everywhere these days, the illustrious establishment The Courtauld Institute of Art on the Strand in London is hosting a whole-day conference on the interrelationships between Surrealism, Science Fiction and Comics on Saturday January 22nd 2011. Among the speakers will be the acclaimed graphic novelist Bryan Talbot, presenting his two Grandville masterpieces and I will be speaking too. Here’s the abstract of my paper:
Rarebit Fiends, Bizarros and Fat Furies: How American Comic Strips and Comic Books Relate to Surrealism and Science Fiction
My paper will explore the connections and relationships of certain key writers and artists working in the American newspaper strip and comic book mass-market industries with the fields of Science Fiction and Surrealism during the first sixty years of the 20th century. It will also appraise the roles of these mainstream media in disseminating and popularising an accessible form of Surrealism and Science Fiction to a broad public. It will start by examining certain striking imagery in Winsor McCay‘s Dream of the Rarebit Fiend (1904-13) which anticipates the Surrealist film L’Age d’Or from 1930 written by Dalí and Luis Bunuel and directed by Bunuel. Iconic scenes such as those of the cow found in a woman’s bed or a man stuck to the ceiling appeared years earlier in McCay’s work. Starting in the Fifties, editors Julius Schwartz and Mort Weisinger came to DC Comics from science fiction and introduced many writers to the comics medium, resulting in a blend of the populist and fantastical in Strange Adventures and Mystery in Space. These same writers under Weisinger’s tenure on Superman and its related titles created an unprecedented imaginative outpouring, enriching the Man of Steel’s appeal and mythos. Finally, writer-editor Richard Hughes with the deadpan artististry of Ogden Whitney achieved a highpoint in surreal comic books in Herbie, an odd, overweight boy whose lollipops endow him with extraordinary powers as The Fat Fury.
More details and the full programme of the Conference organised by Dr Gavin Parkinson are available here. Tickets cost £15, or £10 for concessions and Courtauld staff and students, and include coffee and reception.
It’s going to be a fascinating, ‘interdisciplinary’ and ‘transmedial’ exchange of ideas and perspectives. I do hope some of you can join me, Bryan and the other speakers and public talking part.
Read The Blog At The Crossroads here.
