"I just love Yanina! She's so cute and thick!" [From a dear friend]
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| "Yanina as goth punk" pencil |
I was introduced to R. Crumb or for the uninitiated, Robert Dennis Crumb, in the back of the class in junior high.
As I continue to draft my webcomic series, Summer to Winter, I have to hearken to my heroes and sheroes in comics.
Now this was the late 1980s and superhero comics were my jam, but I loved comics enough to step out of my comfort zone to read what others were interested in.
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| "Yanina as goth punk" inked |
Enter R. Crumb... For anybody familiar with his work, he tends to draw beefy, meaty, and hairy people, mostly his women being beefy and meaty.
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| "Yanina as prep goth" final piece |
His women are often tall and curvaceous with imperfections such as moles, an odd angled nose, and exaggerated ethnic facial features. And yes, his earlier works were racist and derogatory, but the volume I viewed opened my mind to how a comic could show a variety of human beings and still make them *seemingly attractive* to take center stage.
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| "Yanina as prep goth" pencil |
Since I was so used to the so-called ideal perfections of the feminine form in superhero titles from DC and Marvel,
Crumb's art took me by surprise to see women, and men, with hair on their thick legs, thick lips, protruding nipples through tight shirts, butt crevices in tight pants, shorts, and micro mini skirts.
In comics, I've noticed that regardless of the woman's height and or shape/body type(and even the shapes were severely limited among feminine bodies), comic women were always 110-120lbs.
110-120lbs. Read that again. 110-120lbs. Regardless of body type, shape, height, and age. 110-120lbs. Now, at the time, I'm about 12-14. I don't know why I'm annoyed by this. I just am.
Even though R. Crumb's beefy, meaty women were not the first outliers I've seen in comic form, they were very rare to me. And certainly not weighing in at 110-120lbs!
Crumb's work is also... A LOT. With such sweaty, hairy, and messy people in these pages came very frank and stark depictions of sexual activity, intensity, and desire. Pun definitely intended that it was naked and raw. With characters fondling, groping, and self-pleasuring...
Comics in the 1980s were viewed through a sexist and prudish lens. I could read comics at home, but outside, it was frowned on for a GIRL to read comics, and more so, such "filth". Male classmates introduced these R. Crumb comics to me, and I remember at the time they thought I shouldn't view them. That they were not for my eyes. Mind you, we were all the same age. I was loud in my demands, and rather than get in trouble for sneaking comics into our school space, they grudgingly let me read over their shoulders.
R. Crumb's comics were everything that adults who hated the comics media on a whole: unsavory, unflattering, grotesque, obscene, and worst of all, sacrilegious. His comics spoke on religion, and especially his version of Genesis was as unflinching as they came.
It is no wonder I depict a variety of body types in my own works, especially when it comes to my women, girl, and feminine characters. For which I have received a lot of negative feedback and criticism.
It is no wonder I draw many of my female/feminine characters the way I do. And write what I write, pushing my own envelope, stretching into unfamiliar storytelling territory, to break out of my own creative comfort zone.
Because I depict my characters in varieties, because no body type is taboo in my stories and illustrations, along with some negative comments, I've received so much more positive criticism and glowing feedback!
If you want to check out more on R. Crumb and his works [I must warn you, if you're easily offended, easily grossed out, and prefer your art/comics to look "clean", "polished", and without blemish, then his artwork may not be for you. Just saying] - Welcome to rcrumb.com - The Official Crumb Site
Until next time, Dear Readers!
