“Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.” Then as the crowd looks towards the sky they exclaim:
“Look, up in the sky!”
“It’s a bird.”
“It’s a plane”.
“It’s Superman!”
We all heard this famous introduction at least once in our lives, which describes one of the most famous superheroes of all times, Superman. In 1996 in response to the California Proposition Act 187, that would ban immigrants from services, artist Laura Molina introduced to the world, Cihualyaomiquiz, The Jaguar. Molina years earlier submitted some art pieces to Detective Comics or DC Comics (twitter image). Similar to other print groups in the Chicana/o her work was self printed and published. The cover image of the issue features the main character in a fierce pose facing the viewers and readers. By looking directly at the audience she rejects the notion of women not looking at men, like the class discusses with the picture of the brown beret with the bandaleras around her chest. As talked about in the chapter Book Art of Chicana Art: The Politics of Spiritual and Aesthetic Altarities by Laura E. Pérez, the image of the Jaguar “…overturns stereotypes of the Latina as passive, subservient, and for that matter, less intellectually and culturally sophisticated….” (Pérez, 241).
Similar to Superman whose secret identity was mild manner news reporter Clark Kent, the Jaguar was a lawyer by day whose identity was Linda Rivera (Pérez, 238). The heroine in the comic embraces her culture and history. Much like the Reclaiming of Aztlan as a way to reconnect with their culture and claim it, her powers come from embracing her ancestors’ gods. The cover image shows our heroine with a “don’t mess with me” expression with two clench fists and a fierce stance as if she was ready to pounce. Sadly, I couldn’t find a copy of the entire comic online, so I had to rely on summaries of what happened. In the comic she faces neo-Nazi along with far right-wing politicians. Through the story, the character’s actions and portrayal sheds the dominant thought as Latina as being passive and soft-spoken. Instead of standing by, she does what she needs to get the evidence for her clients. For the soft-spoken part, the cover displays the main character shouting, “¡Watchate, I resist!” for all those that pass by to read. I think an interesting part of the comic is that is based on actual real life events. I think that it adds to the overall experience of the readers. Publishers have taken up this sense that some aspects are grounded or connected to real life events in recent comics.
The comic book world is dominated by male superheroes with a few sprinkles of female superheroes. Of those sprinkles of female superheroes there was probably only a handful that were widely know to the public. Most of these heroines were aimed to appeal to the male audience with their sex appeal and skimpy clothing. Among being among the line up of the handful of female superheroes, the character also is among the few characters of diversity. In the comic book world is dominated by white males. Yet in the issues we are introduce to a woman praised for her intelligence first, rather than aiming and trying to meet the male readers standards of sex appeal in their comics.
Currently Molina has put aside working on her art projects to run for US Congress in California 25th District 2012.
Reference:
Letter from DC Comics
Chicana Art: The Politics of Spiritual and Aesthetic Altarities by Laura E. Pérez
Pérez, Laura E. Chicana Art: The Politics of Spiritual and Aesthetic Altarities. Duke University Press, 2007.
Campaign Site:
Artist’s Site and Twitter:
http://twitter.com/#!/Laura_Molina
This is really cool! Comics are not known for respectful gender/ethnic diversity, so it is really comforting to know this exists