The Four Color Media Monitor

The Los Angeles Daily News reports there's a new exhibition spotlighting Jack Kirby's artwork at the Skirball Center. And wouldn't you know it, something awkward comes up:

“He then, with Stan Lee, created the Marvel revolution of the ’60s,” he says. “And created the Hulk and the Fantastic Four and Iron Man and Thor. Then he did work at DC through the ’70s, creating a whole other universe of characters. So there’s the creative story we need to tell.

As far as I know, Don Heck is the artist credited with Shell-Head's introduction, and while Kirby may have done artwork for IM, he wasn't the co-creating artist as Heck was. It makes me think, when is Heck going to get an exhibition like this? It's always great for Kirby to see attention drawn to his art, but there's plenty of lesser-known artists who deserve the same regard.

Reed, Saunders and Skirball curator Michele Urton agreed early on that Kirby’s art had to lead the way.

“We would allow that to illuminate the story of Jack’s life and his impact on popular culture,” Reed says. “And likewise, how popular culture influenced and informed his work.”

The rooms of the exhibition are full of vibrant color and include all manner of treasures, including a variety of original artwork; a wall of comics featuring the first appearances of Kirby-created characters; a room depicting the evolution of his explosive style and much more.

“The title ‘Heroes and Humanity’ is incredibly apt,” Reed says. “We lead with the art, not only the comic art but the private works, the things that Jack did purely for his own artistic satisfaction, his collages and fine art, his work for animation as a character designer.

Once, Kirby doubtless had an impact on pop culture, but today, much of that influence disappeared, as more PC writers/artists came about, and if you don't see him in discussion much in modern times, that's because too much wokeness has led to a sad situation.

“Captain America Comics No. 1” came out in December 1940, a year into World War II for many countries. In it, Captain America punches Adolf Hitler in the nose, a sign of how concerned its co-creators Jack Kirby and Joe Simon were about the European theater a full year before Pearl Harbor brought the United States into the war.

Which reminds me that years ago, when Simon was still alive, he told that he drew an illustration of Cap smashing Osama bin Laden, something mainstream comicdom has gotten to the point where they would vehemently refuse to publish it, and if it hasn't been published, who knows if we'll ever see it on public display at all? And all because long ago, after September 11, 2001, the industry cowed from the subject of Islamic terrorism.

In the exhibit, the curators walked a fine line not to link Kirby’s personal life too directly to the comics he created, Reed says. But some facts are clear.

“We know from speaking to his family and his loved ones and his friends that he was a lifelong liberal,” Reed says. “He personally fought in World War II. He was a first-generation Jewish American who dealt directly with the threat of Nazism and fascism.

“He famously did stories in the ’60s and ’70s that were quite socially progressive, and he actively opposed Richard Nixon,” he says. “Certain things we can say as matters of historical record. What we can’t do is say what Jack would think or do on any given topic.”

Interesting how they acknowledge that yes, Kirby was a liberal, but it's not like he ever literally supported the kind of narrow visions today's leftism does. Unsurprisingly, they don't make clear that "nazism" was an abbreviation of National Socialism, and socialism is a concept that modern leftism's become more accepting of, which could explain why the newspaper doesn't have the courage to get into that topic. That said, there were valid issues to make against Nixon, who offensively thought abortions were acceptable based on interracial affairs. That was absolutely disgusting of him, and it wasn't the only wrong he'd ever done. So if Kirby ever took issue with Nixon, he had every right to be concerned. Nixon was nothing more than a shoddy example of a so-called "conservative" who really made himself look as bad as the leftists of the 19th century USA.

“You can see, after he got back from World War II, his work shifts,” Reed adds. “Even when you’re looking at the Thor comics or the New Gods comics, you can see that he was directly conscious of the reality and horror of conflict and war when he’s telling these stories.”

Yes, but what they may not make clear in the interview is that totalitarian tyranny is what makes wars against civilized communities, and without better education instead of indoctrination, how are we to mend all the damage and prevent such badness from occurring in the future?

Here's another report from Variety:

According to co-curator Patrick A. Reed, assembling all of the materials needed for such a retrospective was often a tough challenge. “Comic books were a disposable media, so none of this work was preserved by the publishers. None of it was archived,” Reed told Variety. “Original comic art from the 20th century largely exists in the hands of private collectors, and those are because those people collected it. So the difficult thing is finding specific pieces of original artwork.”

And none of those collectors, private or otherwise, ever donated or sold it to museums, private or otherwise? See, this again makes clear what's surely gone wrong with the whole speculator business - do these collectors want the art to be seen and known about or not? So long as they keep hogging it and shutting it all away in vaults, it'll be impossible to escape the feeling that deep down, they're actually embarrassed by the medium instead of impressed.

As a fan of Kirby's work, I think it's wonderful he's getting an exhibition devoted to his contributions as artist and writer. But it's uncertain if in the long run, he's made an impact on pop culture, and lest we forget that, less than a decade after he passed away, Captain America as a storytelling vehicle was largely destroyed by political correctness at the time Quesada/Jemas/Alonso were running Marvel. And that influence of theirs is doubtless still hurting Steve Rogers as a comics creation even today. How can one celebrate Kirby's arts when modern comicdom's contributors let it down?

Labels: Avengers, Captain America, dc comics, Europe and Asia, exhibitions, Fantastic Four, good artists, history, Iron Man, marvel comics, msm propaganda, politics, Thor