women in comics: 5 points

 It is impossible to cover the work and wonders female comic artists have done in one simple lesson, however I do see the sad necessity in needing to dedicate and focus on the topic of female artists because of how far into the background they have been pushed. with that out of the way, i read "Pretty ink." I feel as though this is a little harder to analyze because it is more of a collection of comics and a history book with art in it as opposed to a comic itself, but I would still talk to talk about the stuff I read and what I learned about.

i knew a bit about Rose O'Neil before this, but i never realized the uphill batter she had to face to become the artist that she would become, and not only that but how screwed she was once she became that. i also never realized how earlier she was in the history of the comics, coming around at about the same time as the yellow kid. while it wasn't very much, she was still there at the start which is pretty impressive. The creation of the cupies characters is also incredible. reading in-between the lines a bit, it seems as though she was the first person to really understand a form of artistic marketing that wouldn't become popular until star wars in 1970. The way she was able to sell this simple character to all these different companies to make money is incredible.

I also greatly enjoyed learning about the female comic artist from the 1940's, Especially Tarpe Mills. It is interesting because this was a time when women were pushed more into the workforce and starting to get ideas of taking charge (or this first time we really saw it on a massive scale because i'm sure these ideas were prevalent earlier). It's interesting and expected to see these ideas reflected in the comics they create. however there is an element which is sad of how most of them while making these comics about these strong cool female characters, had to hide the fact that they were girls.