longevity; it is still published, once every two years. Before Zap, early
underground comics appeared in such underground newspapers as New
Yo r k ’s East Village Otherand its sister publication, theGothic Blimp Works,
where R. Crumb, Kim Deitch, Gilbert Shelton, S. Clay Wilson, and Spain
Rodriguez launched assaults on convention. To describe the effect of this
work as inspirational would understate the incredible power of such fervent
taboo busting on a generation weary of trite comic superheroes and
superboobs. While these undergrounds looked like comics and read like
comics, in fact they were “com-mix,” a combination of a conventional visual
language (that is, the panel and balloon motif that dates back to the late
nineteenth century) and scabrous story- and gag-lines heretofore banned
from mainstream comic books.
Zapbegan as a co-mix of artists bound together by their collective
contempt for conventional mores, yet their various individual perspectives
allowed them to showcase a number of themes through different forms and
distinct characters. Among Zap’s earliest contributors, founder R. Crumb
was known in the counterculture for his string of bizarre, ribald, and racy
characters, including Fritz the Cat, Mr. Natural, Angelfood McSpade,
Dirty Dog, and Schuman the Human; Victor Moscoso and Rick Griffin
were progenitors of the vibrating, psychedelic rock-concert posters that
took San Francisco and the world by storm; and S. Clay Wilson was known
for living out his perverse fantasies through dark comic figures.
Zap #1featured Crumb’s work exclusively as a vehicle for the
artist to pay homage to pre-code comics and to communicate his
admittedly deranged view of conventional life. Under the caustic advisory
“Fair Warning: For Adult Intellectuals Only,” Crumb introduced a selection
of tales that had spiritual roots in MADmagazine’s irreverent satire. But
while MADeschewed sex and politics, Crumb reveled in it. Among his
earliest stories, we find “Whiteman,” a tale of “civilization in crisis;” “Mr.
Natural Encounters Flakey Foont,” a jab at spirituality; “Ultra Super
Modernistic Comics,” a tweak at high art; and his now classic “Keep on
Truckin’,” an absurdly funny slapstick. In retrospect, these comics seem
tame when compared to later underground raunchiness. But, at the time,
even comical gibes at frontal nudity, recreational drug use, and racial
stereotyping (for example, Angelfood McSpade, a bug-eyed African
cannibal, sold a product called “Pure Nigger Hearts”) tested the tolerance
of accepted standards.
When Zap #1premiered, Victor Moscoso and Rick Griffin were
among the most prominent graphic artists of the San Francisco rock-and-
roll ballroom scene. A year earlier, Wes Wilson, Stanley Mouse, Griffin,
and Moscoso launched a graphic style that undermined prevailing
tuis.
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