Not long ago,
you’d have been escorted out with a stifled laugh had you come to the Toronto
Reference Library looking for comic books. Today you’re led into a hushed chamber,
softly lit, where comics are spread lasciviously in glass cases and their artists’
original drawings are hung on the walls like rare insects.
I’ve done my share of North Korea mocking. My favourite story? When I was living in the South Korean countryside in 1996, there had been a recent drama aired on South Korea’s KBS network that characterized North Korea in some way they didn’t like. The North Korean radio […]
Either in their ’40s noir cinema incarnation, or as modern day gumshoes, detectives are pretty low-key and don’t usually announce their presence by yelling out to anyone who will listen about their ability to solve crimes, but a 60 year old Wisconsin man named Ed Lake who is […]
The internet is packed with funny. A clever idea, executed well, can move quickly through the blogosphere. So when I first saw Pac-Mondrian, a videogame that juxtaposes the famous mouth against a famous painting, I wasn’t bowled over. I did like the incongruous old-time jazz soundtrack, however, and […]
“What does an eraser sound like?” The question was floated at a comic jam not long ago by a cartoonist who’d been slipped a panel to complete. It showed an artist rubbing himself out. Sidestepping the picture’s metaphor, the cartoonist instead was racking himself for a sound effect […]
Why people read what they read and watch what they watch has recently been of interest to me. As a cultural consumer and producer both, I know that advertisements and reviews are hardly the overwhelming factors, just the most reassuringly quantifiable. Recommendations from friends have the advantage of […]
Find t-shirts, mugs, totes and more at our new Guttermart location at Teepublic!
The Cultural Gutter 