"Those who can, do. Those who can’t, bitch about it on the Internet." -Simon, from The Book of Simon
Some bios list credentials, such as: Education BFA in Illustration, Massachusetts College of Art Occupation Former Production Slave, Ballantine Books Comics Credits Columnist, Writer, Artist, Editor Etc…
And some bios tell a story, such as: I can remember sitting in front of my television one morning, watching the old Batman show, when Julie Newmar appeared in that skintight black leather outfit as Catwoman. It was my first boy/girl thing. >A year later I was in kindergarten telling Katherine Burke that I loved her. It’s pretty much been a string of stupid mistakes ever since…
Still other bios state an intent, such as: This is a series of essays illustrating the life of one particular struggling artist as he plods through the world and occasionally bumps into some interesting shit.
But most bios just sit to the right of the column and are never looked at. So ignore this space and just read the damn column already…
This week I try to shut my mouth and listen. The Monkey House traveled out to Brooklyn to have a sit down with Jessica Abel about the subject of women and comics. I chose Jessica for this subject because, on her website, www.artbabe.com, she mentions how she hates being asked this question. I figured someone who felt so strongly about it must have something to say. To my surprise, she agreed to the interview.
SM: Do you think that women comics creators tend to be grouped together because of their gender instead of the content of their work?
JA: In some senses yes. I think over the years there have been some anthologies that have been exclusively female. It's the natural impulse of women who want to promote other women and publishers to promote women creators as collectives. That can result in ghetto-ization.
A few years ago I went into a comics store to buy Zero Zero, Blab, and Drawn & Quarterly, the three main anthologies for alternative comics at the time. They contained zero women. You can fill up an entire book of Twisted Sisters but why aren't women showing up on an individual basis? Twisted Sisters is labeled a women's anthology, but Drawn & Quarterly isn't labeled a men's anthology. I know that there are exceptions. It's just something I see and wish it were another way. I don't think there's any intention of sexist practices on the part of any of their editors. It's just who comes to their minds first.
SM: What is the biggest misconception that men make when trying to appeal to women readers? What kind of generalizations do you see men thinking will attract women?
JA: I think someone who says "I am doing this to appeal to women" is already making a mistake. I think what appeals to women is good comics. The vast majority of women are not attracted to heroic fantasy. I don't see any reason why they should be. It's like action movies. Plenty of women go to action movies. But it's still mostly men. I think if there were better action movies with more than just things blowing up than you would see more women going to them.
One mistake people make is to create a harsh line between what men like and what women like. The overlap is huge. It's the fringes that go more towards either side. Most superhero comics are extreme. They're just not interesting and that's why I don't read them. Boys can relate to it because they want to have the powers and be on the team with the other X-men. It's their power fantasy. They appeal to boys and men who need that part of their fantasy life fulfilled. It's not that women don't have power fantasies, it's just different. As a kid I did like superhero comics, but I was unusual in that way. I just don't find them interesting anymore.
It's also the difference between children and adults. I think most children can enjoy something from hero comics. As long as it's something that's not too violent or too sexy. But as they get older, for whatever reason, boys seem to fixate on the superhero and just get more baroque versions of it. The whole sex divide happens as children. One thing boys do is read comics. It's sort of the normal thing to do. As a girl you just don't. I didn't have any friends who read comics. I read them whenever I could get my hands on them. But it never occurred to me to go somewhere and buy them myself. When I could get them I was really excited. They just weren't something that was in my sphere. And I think that's sad.
SM: Would there be a larger female readership if there were more comics that appeal to young girls, beyond Barbie and Betty & Veronica?
JA: There's two halves to that. If there were more comics that were appropriate for girls and more comics that they liked. More importantly, if their parents would buy them comics. The sociological aspect of this is huge. Girls don't read comic books because girls don't read comic books. It doesn't have anything to do with liking comics or being attracted to comics. Virtually every child I've met has enjoyed comics when they get them.
SM: I remember reading that the Powerpuff Girls are big with little girls. And I think, something like that, parents would be more likely to buy for a girl. Whereas something like Batman Adventures they would look at and not think a girl would like.
JA: Their prejudices would be that the girls wouldn't like the Batman stuff but the boys will. That's true. But you also have to put books like Powerpuff Girls in places where the parents will see them. There's a lot of questions with distribution having to do with developing the readership. And that has to do with the relative numbers of comic book creators being male or female. It has a lot to do with who read them as a kid. More women than men come to comics as adults. Some were working in the painting department of some art school and they suddenly realized they wanted to tell stories with words and pictures side by side. Then the light bulb goes off in their head and they start doing comics.
But the vast majority of people who do comics do them because it was something that interested them as a kid. And there's just not enough women, girls, that happens to.
But in terms of attracting more female readers you just need more good comics. The more important piece of the pie is the sociological aspect. You need to put them in the stores women feel comfortable going into. You have women who are embarrassed by 'Bad Girl' comics, and who wouldn't be? You stand in front of a rack and you have Lorna Miller's Witch next to Witchblade. And you have to stand there and worry that no one thinks you're buying this thing. I don't care about it, because I'm in this world. But a lot of women are just plain embarassed by someone thinking they're looking at something like Witchblade.
Comic book stores have a big, big image problem. They need to put comics that are for non-fans in the front of the store. Their regular customers are hardcore. They're not going to be put off by a Tin Tin display at the front of the store. They're not going to stop coming in for their weekly comics because of that. The new customers are going to see a big Batman display and think "this isn't the store for me."
SM: Do you think working in a male dominated field has effected your work at all or have you been able to ignore it?
JA: The part that I'm in, it's male dominated in terms of numbers. But there's no bad vibes about being a female. In fact, I really think it's helped me. It makes me stand out. The reason you're talking to me is because I'm female. If I did the exact same comics and I was male, you wouldn't have thought to call me. And that happens all the time. I'm a token representative of a group. And I get on all kinds of panels, people pick up my book and read it because I'm female. It's a bad reason for it to happen but I'm not going to say no. It's perversely an advantage.
It's also a historic accident that this has happened. It has to do with the fad of romance comics dying out before they had a chance to grow up a whole generation of female readers. In every other art field women dominate. Comics is the only one where women don't.
SM: You say that you're comics are implicitly feminist not explicitly. Do you think stories with obvious agendas tend to be less effective because of a lack of subtlety? That preaching scares people away.
JA: I think that's true to an extent. People can get turned off to politics. Some politics. Like somebody who is overtly socialist, or overtly environmentalist. People don't really get as excited by that as they are straight fiction. That's just people's taste. As a reader I just don't like to read things that are specifically political.
Some people like that stuff. There are a lot of women readers who want that obvious statement. It's a way for women to communicate to other women. They look for that kind of work.
SM: What kind of comics appeal to you and would they be perceived as 'women's' comics or as having a more universal appeal?
JA: I just like good comics. My favorite book that I've read recently is Safe Area Gorazde. It's an unbelievable work and there's nothing 'women's' comics about it. Joe [Sacco] is just an incredibly sensitive writer and artist who perceives the situations around him and records them with such subtlety. That's a book I wouldn't hesitate to recommend to anybody. It's heartwrenching.
There are a lot of fiction comics I like. There just hasn't been a really great one in about six months. David Boring and Jimmy Corrigan are both really great works.
But on my list of favorite comics ever, the Hernandez Brothers, certain parts of their work. As they started to do more extended stories, especially Jaime. As highly rated as he is, he is one of the most underrated creators out there. I think Jason Lutes is doing amazing stuff with Berlin. Tom Hart [Hutch Owens] is a little bit politic, but he does it really well. Dylan Horrocks is an incredible creator. Hicksville is a really great work.
One of the new people coming up who's going to be a phenomenon is Craig Thompson. Goodbye Chunky Rice had some major flaws in it. I don't think it qualifies as a great work. But it was his first. Unbelievable. He is just crazy. He is so good, every time I see him I just want to strangle him.
But to answer your original question, there are comics among the ones I like that people identify with women readers. But the reason they do is because they're good comics that can appeal to anybody. Like Love & Rockets. Everyone thinks women read that. But men read it too. They read it just as much as women do. And the thing with my comics is that I have a lot more female readers than most comics, but I still have more male readers because there are more male comics readers.
SM: What is it that bothers you the most about discussing the topic of women and comics?
JA: Just that I'm the only one who's asked to discuss it. Reporters always want to ask me about being a woman in comics. They always want to ask me about women readers. Not always the exact angle you're taking, like how to get women to read comics, but always something about women and comics. Male creators? Never asked about it. It just gets annoying to me that I have to be representing all the time. And I think this is a completely appropriate conversation to be having with any comics creator, male or female. But men are never asked it. What's the problem here? If we all agree we have a problem, then why isn't everyone talking about it?
SM: I was going ask if you if you had any interest in doing mainstream work and I was going to ask if you had any new work coming out. From what I've read you have a story coming out in DC's Bizarro Comics.
JA: I don't have anything against working in the mainstream except that they don't pay enough. They pay more than alternative comics but those are a labor of love. And I don't mean to denigrate DC, they definitely paid their top rate for this. But it's still so much work for so little money compared to magazine illustration, which is the thing I do for money.
I have nothing against the mainstream. It just isn't inherently interesting to me. People used to ask me this question when I was in mini-comics and I used to say, "Yeah as if they'd ever ask me. As if they'd ever want me." At the time mini-comics was a much bigger phenomenon and so it was a political question. Like, "would you work for The Man?" But I never thought they'd want me, so I figured why bother.
The reason I did this thing for Bizarro Comics is because it's specifically alternative cartoonists. I still don't think anyone would ask me to do a mainstream comic.
Dylan Horrocks wrote it and I drew a segment of it. Most of the stories are around 7 pages. The story I did, Supergirl and Mary Marvel go to a café and hang out. They just talk for a few pages. But then Supergirl has to go off and save the world again at the end.
Other than that I have another Artbabe collection coming out called Soundtrack. It collects a lot of the early stories including the Xeric Grant issue #5. The full title is Soundtrack: Collected Stories 1990-1996.
SM: Every week in my column I give a reading suggestion and I thought since the rest of this column is all your opinions, maybe you'd like to recommend something.
JA: I would recommend Berlin by Jason Lutes. I think the first collection just came out.
Thanks to Jessica Abel for taking the time to sit down with me. This is a subject that a lot more people should be talking about and not only on my message board, but everywhere else (do it on my message board first though). Next week it's back to the usual madness.
