Activist Week: World War III Illustrated #44, World War III Illustrated 1979-2014

Issue #44 of World War III Illustrated was one of the quieter, more reflective entries in the long-running magazine's history. Billed as "the Other issue", the stories are about the experience of being made to feel the other,and there are some remarkable stories built around this theme. First and foremost is Sandy Jimenez's piece on growing up in the burned-out South Bronx and being photographed by some art students as a child. Thinking they were friends, he eventually sneaked into their show and saw himself as they saw him: the Other. As a poor, dirty waif. That betrayal set the stage for his later difficulty taking photos when he got to art school and his later, painful understanding that it's not the camera that exploits its subjects, it's the photographer. The way he draws his eyes as black saucers is especially affecting and attention-grabbing. This is a raw, powerful story that I wish had gotten wider recognition when it was published; it's certainly one of the best things I've ever read in WW III Illustrated.

That said, this is an unusually strong and coherent issue overall. Sabrina Jones' account of a young woman caught up in harsh mandatory minimum sentencing laws is notable because of her expressive pencils-only style. A report from activists in Quebec about the student protests is as measured and even an account that I can imagine, as it takes aim at both right-wing scorn toward Quebecois as well as the racist and anti-immigrant tendencies of some from the left. Leila Abdul Razzaq's comics about her father's experiences growing up after his family was thrown out of Palestine are superb; the drawings are lively and expressive and the narratives are personal, detailed and passionate. Carlo Quispe, who's become one of my favorite personal/political cartoonists, uses his expressive scrawl of a line to relate a story about trying to reconcile his dating life with his political life as an activist. Tom Keough and Seth Tobocman have pieces about resisting bullying and the possibility of new communities in the face of disaster, both of which have a more hopeful character than the usual sort of WWW III Illustrated article.

The magazine has been one of the very few places where American readers can gain access to translated work by Middle Eastern cartoonists. In addition to Razzaq, there was work by Egyptian artist Ganzeer (though I found its sentiments rather pat) as well as a dream comic from Barrack Rima. That one was especially interesting, because it was very much about being the other as a foreign immigrant, and the page composition was fascinating. Many of Rima's pages looked constructed rather than drawn, and other pages had drawings with a remarkably sensitive and fragile quality. In an issue where co-founding editor Peter Kuper had a few pieces, they wound up being among the least compelling material in the issue. This speaks to the overall health and vitality of the anthology, as its younger caretakers have done a fine job in maintaining its voice.

Speaking of its founders, PM Press recently published World War 3 Illustrated: 1979-2014. This is the third time in its history that a collection of the best from the anthology has been collected, but this is a definitive and beautifully well-produced 300-page volume. Reading this book is quite a different experience from reading the average issue of the magazine in that the charmingly ramshackle DIY feel of the magazine is not really in evidence here. This is both a good and bad thing, as some of the pieces published in the magazine over the years weren't really of a high enough level of quality to merit reprinting, and the somewhat slapdash nature of the editing and construction of each issue sometimes inhibited the flow as a reader. Of course, that also meant wonderful surprises popping up in each issue as well in addition to the contributors who have been with the magazine throughout its run. The book is well-organized, with fourteen different subsections grouping together different kinds of stories. While there are about forty artists represented, much of the book focuses on a small group of regulars.

Of course, when those regulars include Peter Kuper, Seth Tobocman, Fly, Eric Drooker, Sabrina Jones, Sue Coe, and Nicole Schulman, there's not too much to complain about. There are also oddities like an early Peter Bagge strip, a piece by occasional contributor and cause celebre Mumia Abu-Jamal, and contributions by artists known for their work in other venues like Art Spiegelman and Tom Tomorrow. Still, the regulars do most of the heavy lifting and document thirty-five years of government oppression, police brutality, oppression of women and spirited resistance across the globe. While both Kuper and Tobocman have both clearly been inspired by street art in their use of stencils, bleeding images, etc, Kuper's work has always been more polished and more in the tradition of political cartooning. Even his autobiographical strips, like when he went to testify on Mike Diana's behalf at his obscenity trial, have a slightly amused, detached and self-deprecatory air.  He uses powerful and blunt images and satire as his weapons. Tobocman's work has always been more emotional and on-the-ground, detailing events as he experienced them. It's speaking truth to power in the most direct way possible.

Drooker and Coe's best-known work consists of single images on covers or as illustrations, using rich colors and lots of ink to get their points across poetically but bluntly. Jones and Schulman are superb storytellers with naturalistic styles. Fly has always been the secret MVP of the magazine whenever she's appeared; there are few artists who are as adept at writing biographical details with as much visceral punch as she can, and her own street-level approach to life and art give her comics a powerful sense of authenticity. The nice paper and use of full color makes this book an eye-popping read, and the editors do a great job of using interesting interstitial material to stitch together the differing chapters. Sandy Jimenez notably updated one of his old stories, "Skips", in full color, and it added a lot to the reading experience. Reading this book is reading a history of opposition and of artists grappling with their role in that resistance. It must be noted that there's a solid representation of artists who are women and artists of color, and this was so long before that was a commonplace event in alternative comics. There's little in the way of self-congratulation; instead, their helpful timeline at the end of the book just underlines how it's simply time to get back to work.

Activist Week: World War III Illustrated #43

For thirty-five years, World War III Illustrated has been the standard-bearer for comics activism. Its existence predated and to some extent presaged the more precise comics journalism of Joe Sacco. It's always been somewhere between political cartooning, comics storytelling and in-your-face agit-prop. Tomorrow, I'll examine the recent hardcover collection from throughout the magazine's history as well as #44. Today, I'm going to examine #43, an issue from 2012. (I haven't seen a copy of the most recent issue, #45, which debuted a year ago).

#43's theme is "Expression Repression Revolution", and its pages are stuffed with reports from the resistance in Egypt as well as the ramifications of the Wikileaks reveal of brutal war crimes perpetrated by the US in Iraq. The editorial collective for the issue, which includes Rebecca Migdal, Hilary Allison, Carlo Quispe and co-founder Seth Tobocman, notes that the magazine has a commitment to pluralism even in its hard-left approach. That manifests in how Wikileaks founder Julian Assange comes up for both praise and criticism, and the same is true for Barack Obama. The issue was published in 2012, when Occupy and attempts to silence the movement were more active and the revelations regarding the more sinister aspects of the Obama administration were revealed. In a broader sense, the issue is about the idea of free speech and censorship, especially given that the left often seeks to ban certain kinds of speech.

That's explored in Jordan Worley's "Violent Praxis", which follows a group of anti-racist activists who seek to jam and interfere with racist groups like the KKK and skinhead organization. It's a fascinating read, given that it captures the debate between those who would justify violence as part of resistance and those who see the use of force as coercive and counter-productive. The issue leads off with a new Mike Diana story, which is fitting given his status of being charged with obscenity for drawing his comic over twenty years ago. I never thought Diana was much of a cartoonist; his claims of trying to reflect the violence of society in his comics may have been true, but his crude grasp on both drawing and language made those comics a slog. That said, there's an interesting rawness to his work that's only become more interesting after the ridiculous circus he was put through.

One of the more interesting things about this issue is that it prints work by Egyptian cartoonist Magdy El Shafee. There's brutally hilarious work about Egypt's position regarding foreigners as well as an interesting story about him trying to preserve old works from rioters. Walking the line between resistance and total chaos is something that's little discussed in activist circles, and his line drawings are exquisitely funny. Tobocman and Worley collaborate on a fairly straightforward account of the brutal US assault on random, unarmed civilians in Iraq.(ostensibly, as a kind of pressure-valve revenge for soldiers killed by an IED) that's typically blunt. There's an excerpt from a graphic novel simply titled Julian Assange that starts with the incident and then delves into Assange as a cultural figure. That's countered by Bill Weinberg's piece accusing Assange of ignoring a Wikileaks operative in helping a brutally repressive regime, although the art supporting this piece is impossibly small and blurry.

That's part of the package with WW III Illustrated sometimes, alas. It's printed on mostly cheap paper (though there are color sections), and almost no copy-editing is done. The Diana piece was rife with spelling errors, for example, and that wasn't the only piece with that problem. On the other hand, this makes a piece like Allison's "Bad Words" stand out, because its rendering is so precise. This is a great piece about the author's relationship with things she shouldn't say, finding the right audience for her words and respecting those who don't want to hear certain words, realizing that her opposition to certain words makes others treat her differently and rethinking the negative connotation of words entirely. It's a lively, funny strip that's a highlight of the issue.

There are features on a former Disney caricaturist whose status as a person of color was a driving force in his frequent difficulties playing his trade, as well as a correspondent in prison whose mail has been repeatedly censored or held back. Other highlights of the issue include a typically satirical Kuper piece about the Tea Party and their benefactors the Koch brothers, a piece by Tobocman and Jessica Wehrle about the first days of the Occupy movement, a searing personal piece by Jenny Gonzalez-Blitz regarding her complicated experiences regarding sex and sexuality, and a piece exposing the hypocrisy regarding the Smithsonian banning artist/activist David Wojnarowicz's video from an installation. While World War III Illustrated has never been short on material, it seems like worldwide activism and turbulence has made for a richer and more diverse magazine on the whole.

Anthologies: World War III Illustrated #42

The takeaway from World War 3 Illustrated #42 is the sheer enthusiasm on the part of the editorial staff and the contributors. For over thirty years, WW3 has been a staunch leftist, activist voice, becoming one of the longest-running comics anthologies of all times in the process. While regulars like Peter Kuper and Seth Tobocman make their mark in this issue, it's the publication's willingness to seek out and publish new voices that's long been one of its trademarks. The theme of this issue is liberation, "from the mid-east to the mid-west", and it focuses in on the "Arab spring" uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt as well as the Wisconsin protests against governor Scott Walker. What we get is a compelling series of on-the-ground reports of the experience of being part of a movement, complete with both the thrills of making a difference, the doubts that arise when things don't seem to change, and the terror experienced when the forces of the state crack down.

Regarding the latter, the comics from the Middle East are especially charged. Malik Sajad's harrowing story of having to dodge the police after posting a video proving their complicity in beating innocents in Kashmir really boils things down to their essence. By simply speaking out, he becomes a target of the law, who can warp reality to suit their ends. Sajad is a terrific young artist with a lot to say about that region's with totalitarianism. Mazen Kerbaj's "Flap Flap Blues" is a poetic take on the resistance, with a particular focus on the role of women. Magdy El Shafee's "The Anonymous" gives another ground-level view of the action in Cairo's Tahrir Square, which was ground zero for the Egyptian uprising. Ethan Heitner's story lays out some of the facts about the uprising and makes sure to discuss the fact that the struggles are not over.

Indeed, the issue leads with Edd Baldry's "Freedom", a debate between two people about the viability of political action. Even the most jubilant and upbeat of stories in the issue contains a caveat that a moment of revolutionary fervor is not the same thing as lasting, systemic change. Existing power structures are built to last and do not give up their statuses easily, and it's frequently surprisingly easy to ride out a rebellion.  That's especially true in the west, where a revolutionary moment can get glossed over by celebrity news. Still, one can't help but get caught up in the excitement of strips like "The Cheesehead Rebellion of 2011", "What's So Funny 'Bout Beer Brats And Cheese And Unions" and "Walk Like An Egyptian". These are all accounts of the mass protests in Wisconsin against Walker, who enacted a union-busting agenda and reaped a whirlwind of protest. As a comic qua comic, the first story (Written by Mike Konopocki & Kathy Wilkes, with art by Konopocki) is the best of the three, setting up and summarizing the events as a coherent narrative. The story includes a delicious tidbit that I hadn't heard: Walker was fooled into thinking that billionaire Tea Party supporter David Koch was calling him; in reality, it was a left-wing blogger playing a prank but getting all sorts of fascinating information about Walker's true intentions.

What has always made WW3 more than a simple series of polemics and rants against the right is the personal nature of so many of its stories. Sandy Jimenez' "Beyond The Lighted Cage" is a fascinating account of one man's attempt to deal with grief, anger and hate by way of the boxing ring, until one day he pulls a dirty trick on a friend because he was being beaten so badly. The searing honesty and pain on each page is palpable, even as Jimenez casts a damning eye on himself as much as he does the city and its power structures. Sabrina Jones' "Whatever Happened To The Eight Hour Day", an account of the ways in which certain kinds of workers in the entertainment industry are essentially forced to work ten-hour days, is also fascinating. Carlo Quispe's "Besame Mucho", an account of the struggle for gay rights in Peru through public kissing events, is at once painfully local and profoundly international in its scope. Jennifer Camper and Marguerite Dabaie's "Hummus Wars" is an absurd and funny account of the ways in which Israel and Lebanon fought over who created hummus in ridiculous and elaborate ceremonies over who could create the biggest bowl of hummus. The work of both artists is some of the most attractive in the book in terms of visuals, along with color sections featuring Kuper and Tobocman. Still, even if some stories lack a strong visual punch, there's a power and immediacy to every story in this book. These are stories that desperately needed to be told by their authors and quickly. This comic is a potent snapshot of a particular exciting, turbulent time across the globe by people who participated in as well as observed it all.