To celebrate the opening of the “Aliens, Monsters, and Madmen: The Art of EC Comics” exhibit, the the Jordan Schnizter Museum of Art will host an exhibition opening on Friday, May 13, 2016 from 6:00pm-10:00pm in the Jordan Schnizter Museum of Art. The opening is free to all UO students and faculty. There will be food, drinks, and a DJ!

Entertaining Comics (EC) was the most aesthetically ambitious and politically radical commercial comic book publisher of the 20th century.  Primarily active between 1950 and 1955, the company produced such sensationalist, satirical, and subversive titles as Tales From The Crypt, Weird Science, Frontline Combat, and Mad.  At odds with the ideological conservatism of the era, EC rebuked racists and warmongers, critiqued the paranoid state, and mocked commercialism and consumer culture — provoking the ire of parents, schoolteachers, politicians, and cultural critics alike.  In fact, the company was ultimately forced out of business by the forces of reaction — with the notable exception of Mad, which survived the 1950s anti-comics backlash by becoming a magazine (and is still in print today).

The exhibition will feature over 120 original art pages on display, including several complete stories.  Every major EC artist and title, including Mad, will be represented by key works.

This exhibition is sponsored by the Coeta and Donald Barker Changing Exhibitions Endowment; The Harold and Arlene Schnitzer CARE Foundation; a grant from the Oregon Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the arts, a federal agency; Oregon Humanities Center’s Endowment for Public Outreach in the Arts, Sciences, and Humanities; Philip and Sandra Piele; UO Comics and Cartoon Studies Minor; UO College Scholars Program; and JSMA members.

A Public Lecture by Bart Beaty, Professor of English, University of Calgary.
February 6, 2015
3:00 p.m.
Lillis 112
Free & Open to the Public