PopSmart

It’s obviously the best way to get readers attention, and this time we here at PopSmart would like to walk the walk, so to speak, and offer free sex — or, more accurately, the new cartoon anthology Sex and Sensibility: Ten Women Examine the Lunacy of Modern Love … in 200 Cartoons (Twelve) (released April 2). Email us at davidlee.simmons@cln.com, and I’ll be happy to provide free copies of the coffee-table book to the first 10 who contact me.

The collection, edited by frequent New Yorker contributing cartoonist Liza Donnelly, is a far-ranging offering of female artists’ takes on women and sex in the New Millennium. Often insightful, usually funny and sometimes downright strange, Sex and Sensibility proves that when it comes to sex, the fairer sex gets the last laugh more often than we think. It’s a breezy slice of feminist empowerment.

The phenomenon of female cartoonists is a relatively new one, Donnelly writes in her introduction: “While women can — and have for generations — painted and sculpted in the privacy of their studios, women cartoonists have had a tough road. The cartoonist has to be aware of what others find funny, and work with that while staying true to the cartoonist’s voice. And, to be published, the cartoonist has to be aware of the editor’s sense of humor. Historically, magazine editors have been men, who upheld tradition in most cases.”

But as this collection proves, women are getting in on the act, most notably the ubiquitous Donnelly. My particular favorites in this book include Marisa Acocella Marchetto and Ann Telnaes, whose drawings feel a bit more fleshed out and filled in than those that skew closer to the New Yorker minimalist style. Marchetto’s style borders on the street ’zine mood, with lots of brooding frowns, lines filled in with dark shades. In one cartoon, a mini-skirted, long-haired blonde stands disaffected while holding her cell phone to her ear. Her gaze is away from the phone and right into the barrel of her balding partner’s pistol. “Oh shit,” she laments to her friend on the other line, “my husband wants to have sex.”

Telnaes, by contrast, seems heavily influenced by the sharp, almost-thick and often broad lines of Al Hirschfeld with a dash of Art Deco thrown in for good measure. In one scene, a middle-age man dining with his lady friend spies a pregnant peer walking by their cafe dining table, all smiles. The man harrumphs: “HAVING A BABY AT AGE 60 — HOW RIDICULOUS. CAN’T SHE JUST ACCEPT GETTING OLDER??” His companion, all fake-boobed and coiffed, sips on her martini with a shirt that brags “ARM CANDY.”

Again, feel free to email us for your free copy. You’ve just got to love generous publicists. Thanks, Twelve!

Bookmark It

Posted in Books, Humor, Pop Culture, Sex | Leave a comment