Robert Crumb. 2004. Carnegie International. Poster. 22 x 17 inches.
Crumb did the exhibition poster and and had a small retrospective of drawings, strips, and notebooks. The depressing machine people descend from Crumb's 1975 Snarf cover of a happy guy with a self-propelled vehicle (used for the cover of Underground Classics). However unlike the optimistic Snarf cover, the world has turned sour with the machine people vomiting from pollution. The irony of the drawing could not have been lost on the exhibit organizers. Here Crumb pokes fun at steel magnate Andrew Carnegie who the museum is named after, inferring that the hellish scene is a result of the environmentally destructive policies of big business. According to the Crumb Print site, there were 100 copies of this poster made. The drawing is also reminiscent of a sketchbook drawing dated 11 Nov. 2001 entitled "Draw Thru The Pain" that appeared on p. 27 of Mineshaft, #10, January 2003 as well as "We're Lost!" on p. 68 of the Whole Earth Review, #10, Summer 1993.
