Presented by Kim Munson, San Diego Comic Con, 2009Revisiting The Comic Art ShowWhitney Museum of American Art, Downtown Gallery, 1983

Firstart exhibition produced by a major new York art museum to display comic art, graffiti, pop art and the post-modern art of the East Village art scene together as equal works of art.Co-curated by John Carlin (Masters of American Comics, Imagining America) &Sheena Wagstaff (Comics Iconoclasm, currently Chief Curator at Tate Modern London).The show concept was inspired by a class Carlin was teaching as a grad student at Yalecalled Popular Iconography and his deep involvement in the new generation of pop and underground artists creating a big stir in the East Village.Downtown gallery at Federal Hall (26 Wall Street), NY

Opening & Events - July 18, 1983.Chester Gould (1900-1985),Dick Tracy, 1957John Wesley,(b. 1928). Bumstead, in a Strait Jacket, 1975.These two graphics served as invitations to the opening reception and later dance party.The opening became a media event, covered by the New York Times, WABC TV, WNEW TV, the Village Voice, Newsweek, and others. There was also a week long animation festival.

Who was in the show.Comic ArtistsErnie BushmillerMilton CaniffAl CappR. CrumbWill EisnerLyonel FeiningerH.C. FisherRube GoldbergChester GouldHarold GreyBill GriffithMilt GrossGeorge HerrimanBill HolmanRobert Kane Walt KellyFrank KingHarvey Kurtzman & Wally WoodStan Lee & Jack KirbyWinsor McCayRichard OutcaultGary PanterAlex RaymondE.C. SegarJoe ShusterArt SpiegelmanCliff SterrettGarry TrudeauPainters & SculptorsRoger BrownRonnie CutroneStuart DavisOyvindFahlstromJohn FawcettVernon FisherSteve GianakosKeith HaringJessJasper JohnsRoy LichtensteinJim NuttClaes OldenburgSuzan PittLee QuinonesMel RamosRobert RauschenbergAd ReinhardtDavid SalleKenny ScharfAlexis SmithSaul SteinbergAndy WarholJohn WesleyKarl WirsumRay YoshidaAnonymous (2)Richard Outcault. The Yellow Kid 1896Art Spiegelman. Two-Fisted Painters, 1982Stuart Davis. Lucky Strike, 1924Keith Haring. Untitled, 1981Plus additional works by Henry Chalfant, The Hairy Who & C. Comics

Exhibition photosGary Panter (b. 1950). Jimbo, 1981Suzan Pitt (b. 1943). Untitled, 1983 (Sculpture)Jess(1923-2004). The Truth Shall be Thy Warrant, 1976Ronnie Cutrone (b. 1948). The Price of Liberty is Eternal Vigilance, 1982.John Carlin: “I hung the show myself,intuitively with no hierarchy, in a way meantto give the viewer an intellectually and emotionally moving experience.” (5/09)A wall of drawings by R. Crumb (b. 1943), Frank King (1883-1969), Cliff Sterrett (1883-1964) &Art Spiegelman (b. 1948). The small sculpture in thecenter is Untiltled, 1974 by Roger Brown (b. 1941).All exhibition photos courtesy of the Frances MulhallAchilles Library at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Exhibition photosGeorge Herriman, Krazy Kat, June 11, 1936Roy Lichtenstein (1923 - 1997). Bugs Bunny, 1958.David Salle (b. 1952) Untitled. 1961.Jphn Carlin: “The thing that motivated me was this: here you are in the most media saturated culture in human history, and you have this form of expression, like comics, that's constantly on the verge of being literally unaccessible.Americans really don't preserve their own culture. It's a real tragedy, because we have this kind of fear of the things that we like. If welike it and it's popular, then it can't be significant.”(5/09)George Herriman, Krazy Kat, June 11, 1936Winsor McCay (1869-1934)Little Sammy Sneeze, 1905 (Sunday)Anonymous (American Hopi Indian) MickeyMouse doll. painted wood, c. 1950.Anonymous (Alaskan Eskimo) Olive Oyldoll.carved ivory. c. 1940.

The Comics CollectorsSpiegelman, who was working on Raw and just beginning Maus, became Carlin’s mentor on this project, introducing him to many collectors.John Carlin: “Rick Marschall, Pete Maresca and Bill Blackbeard, are the three people that saved printed newspaper comics from oblivion at a time when they were being thrown away and no institution in America saw any value in them. They preserved them. They bought the bound volumes and kept them. Now they're all in Ohio. If those three men hadn’t kept them, they wouldn't exist. It's really kind of a heroic story, it would be a great documentary. .”(5/09)Winsor McCay (1869-1934)Little Sammy Sneeze, 1905 (Sunday)Ink, crayon, wash on paperCollection of Ray Moniz

The critics have their say…“Cartoons and Comic Strips fall into the general category of folk art. They entertain and poke fun, tickle our funny bone, and satirize, but they do not concern themselves with the broader formal or thematic dimensions of reality that are the basis of more serious forms of art.” -Theodore Wolff, Christian Science Monitor, 9/27/83“Clearly, cartoon characters have transcended their identity as mass-produced disposables, emerging as pictorial icons and psychological symbols .“-David Keeps, Heavy Metal, 11/83“What the Comic Art Showreveals is a strong impulseto valorize the comics bytreating them according toa methodology derived frommainstream art history.” -David Deitcher, Art in America, 2/84“The show is perhaps most successful in its attempt to make us see cartoons historically and critically in their hugely satisfying richness, to have us appreciate the special kind of verbal/visual genius necessary to create an enduring comic strip.“-Roberta Smith, Village Voice, 8/23/83“The Comic Art Show seemed to be trying to hard to prove that comics are art.”-Jim Salicrup, quoted in Comics Journal 1/84“What a delight! The cartoon become artoon.” -Nicholas Moufarrege. FlashArt, 11/83

A Success ! … but wait…Carlin: “One thing I was always proud to say, was at the time, and I haven’t checked this since, at the time it was the only profitable exhibition that the Whitney had ever done. It made a lot of money. Because I talked Keith Haring into doing the very first commercially available T-shirt that he ever did. He was afraid it was going to ruin his reputation. He was afraid no one would take him seriously...The T-shirts were probably only 10 bucks, but we might have sold, like, 10,000 T-shirts and 10,000 catalogs. Somebody uptown at the Whitney got the idea that this was a show that was so successful that they should've brought it uptown and re-presented it. And it got me into a lot of political mess, and basically, there were some powerful people that just didn't want to see that happen. Which I always thought was a shame. I think it's great that the Whitney did this, but I think it would've been more important, if they had really made it part of their uptown main museum exhibition schedule.” (5/09)Catalog with 7 extensive essays printed by Fantagraphics in black & white on inexpensive paper and sold for $2.95 (or $6.95 by mail).