Comics: The Negronomicon

We got great feedback when we shared a photo essay by afropunk.com member Albert Frank. Turns out Albert also draws comics! Below are a couple of examples from his 'The Negrocomicon' series. Sometimes plain humorous with no agenda, sometimes laced with social commentary, let us know if you dig it!

Tags: Afro-punk, Cartoons, Comics

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Comment by Philippe on September 12, 2011 at 11:28am: I may be a bad ass metalcore freak, I don't know if I'd be brave enough to stick one of those Michael Ray Charles posters at my house !!...

Comment by Albert Frankenstein on September 10, 2011 at 5:31pm: Michael Ray Charles is a professor at UT, where I work. The other night I was walking across campus and through an open window in a residence-hall office I see these big-assed sambo-faces on posters. It was especially visible because it was dark outside. I remember thinking that:

a) Someone was going to complain.

b) It would be pretty fucked-up if someone didn't complain.

c) If I had those posers in my office and my bosses told me to take them down, how would I respond?

Comment by Philippe on September 10, 2011 at 11:50am: Yes, Michael Ray Charles - I did not know much about this guy, except that he worked with Spike Lee on his film "Bamboozled" (which was one plain movie unworthy of the gifted Brooklyn director). Well, I've just seen some of Charles' artwork online recently and it's really terrific. All the overtly racist caricatures of Black faces wrapped in Pop Art aesthetics... I understand now when you say he's the progenitor of this style.

Comment by Albert Frankenstein on September 9, 2011 at 4:01pm: Philippe, I've only had one negative response on here.

Good point on Robert Crumb! I was just reading some Crumb the other night. The way I figure it, I'm taking Sambo back! If anyone has a right and say concerning Sambo it is black people! Check out Professor Michael Ray Charles online. He's a progenitor of this style.

Just like I'm taking back the word "Negro". Hell, Negro is on my birth certificate!

Comment by Philippe on September 9, 2011 at 9:25am: If white people may sometimes feel not at ease when looking at your strips, how about the Robert Crumb-esque stereotyped "Sambo" you pictured elsewhere ? The cartoon setting the cliché-ed Negro bum with his "African-American" sandwiches is downright excellent - but how did your black friends (or the AP community) precisely react at this ?

Oh, by the way, the title "The Negronomicon" - I find this one very brilliant, too...! !

Comment by Albert Frankenstein on September 8, 2011 at 5:53pm: All of these comics were drawn on the fly at work. The sketchy quality comes from being freehanded in ballpoint. I'm glad I'm getting a good response here. Usually my white friends shy away from this material because it makes them uncomfortable.

Comment by Philippe on September 8, 2011 at 5:48pm: Well, thanks for the info, I've never heard of that site before... But the sketchy cartoons of your own, in the style of the coolest underground comics - man, they still rock !... Just like the "strip generated" ones, anyway. So keep up the good work, Albert...

Comment by Albert Frankenstein on September 8, 2011 at 3:04pm: Phillipe, the precise-looking comics were drawn on a buid-a-comic site. You can find it here- http://stripgenerator.com/

Comment by Philippe on September 8, 2011 at 12:21pm: I really dig those pictograph-like characters - so finely designed, with such a deadly raw sense of humor... Even when it comes to much more "comix" oriented strips, the patent drawing skill and uncompromising tongue-in-cheek mood are still at work... Congratulations, indeed !...