Robert Crumb: From underground comics to illustration pictures of Genesis

Abstract

In 2009, Robert Crumb published a comic-book adaptation of the Book of Genesis,which was widely covered by the international media. Back in 1968, along the streets of hippy San Francisco, Crumb used to sell Zap Comix, an irreverent comic which turned Crumb into icon and model of underground comix, an american cartoonists’ movement linked to the counterculture of the sixties. Crumb survived the underground and has kept on drawing until today. His graphic novel Illustrated Genesis exemplifi es comic books’ path from the margins of culture to cultural prestige. This article aims to understand Crumb’s course from underground comix to graphic novel, i.e. current artistic and adult comic