Sunday, July 11, 2021

Black Kirby presents: In Search of...The Motherboxx Connection by John Jennings and Stacey Robinson

 

(Urban Kreep Enterprises, 2013) I saw a modest exhibition of the work in this catalogue back in the day and was very impressed but seeing so much of it here I am just enthralled. Jennings and Robinson pay tribute to Jack Kirby's legacy of explosive graphic power and creativity by basically making hundreds of visual and verbal puns to relate his vast array of characters and concepts and stylistic quirks to make bold, loud declarations about Black culture, Afrofuturism, and America's core problems. Some are obvious (Black Panther = Black Panthers), some are deeper cuts (OMAC as Marcus Garvey, which can read about 2001 different ways), some are just profound adaptations ("The Unkillable Buck"). But the love and knowledge of Kirby's work and the graphic magnificence of the execution and the timeless boldness of the appropriation and the righteous politics of these statements are all as powerful as a Wakandan science fair.

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