How Comics Animate Culture with Jeff Benham

May 4 is FREE COMIC BOOK DAY (and Star Wars Day! Ultimate nerd day!).

All who attend this program will receive a free graphic novel!

Truth, Justice, And the American: How Comics Animate Culture

Including 2024 Santa Fe Reads themes, mythology in comics and Marvel's Sersi (based on Circe from Greek Mythology)
 

Modern comics are generally considered to have risen from sociopolitical cartoons around the turn of the twentieth century. Despite their "grown-up" inception, comics quickly came to be considered merely "kid stuff." Reflection on their actual history reveals comics to not only offer up a mirror of our fears and beliefs, but to in fact be an active force in the evolution of our culture. Delight as the limits of creativity are shattered! Escape with the unexpected monsters of our dreams! Thrill as the Captains of America tackle the Axis! Tremble as Congress contemplates comics' delinquency! Raise a fist as The Man pulls comics underground! Celebrate as comics unloose the broad American voice! Squirm as comics struggle to define "created equal!" Look! Up in the Sky! It's not a bird! It's not a plane! It's comics fighting for us all! (And we don't always agree!)

Jeff Benham has been using words and images to tell stories for decades, through comics, theatre, and a variety of other arts. Stylistically chameleonic, his work evokes worlds unique to each project. He is also Education Coordinator for New Mexican arts non-profit 7000 BC and a speaker with the New Mexico Humanities Council.

This program is made possible by the New Mexico Humanities Council.

2024 Santa Fe Reads

2024 Santa Fe Reads, part of the NEA Big Read, is presented by the City of Santa Fe Public Library with the support from the National Endowment for the Arts, Arts Midwest, Friends of the Santa Fe Public Library, local sponsors, and community partners.

NEA Big Read is a program of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest.