Ethical Artistic Codes
by Arto Juhani Heino (c) 2018
I was preparing to write an article about “Rusty Ryan and the Boyville Brigadiers” and the similarities with “Captain America” and its history, but was side tracked by the current online war called “comicsgate”, which is really a battle between an ideology of some narcissistic comic professionals and SJW comic shops against common sense fans and independent creators. It is where an independent creator Richard C Meyers and his “Jaw Breakers” graphic novel, somehow is flipping the lids on a industry full of SJW’s and their leftists ideologues. I can see that the success of his efforts is trouncing many titles by the corporate efforts of Marvel, DC and others, where sales have been dropping due to the unpalatable content. Whether it is professional jealousy or an ideologically fueled hate campaign smearing Mr Meyers efforts, who knows but with evidence of Torturous Interference by comic shops and some comic professionals, it might become a legal problem as well.
I gave up comic reading/collecting sometime in the late 1970’s, when the stories and characters were becoming a strange admixture of fake experiences, fantasy that was less rooted in real life events, while it also becoming political. It was apparent even back then, that the writers were spinning political narratives. Steve Ditko was the only comic creator and proud independent who was creating in this vein of ideologies and different philosophies, with his well defined and unusual characters (Static, Mr A, The Mocker), much to the surprise of many, he is still creating today at 90.
I picked up and read a small amount during the 80’s, 90’s, 00’s and was not surprised to watch it morph into a full propaganda machine for leftist ideas. Comics were always fighting a good fight against the powerful and the demented individuals who did nasty things, now this was extended into a strange minefield of Marxists identity politics and political correctness while also attacking a sitting President in a nasty but veiled manner, Anti-Americanism at the core.
During my investigations in those years I found many interesting titles, and lots of independent Artists and writers, it was starting to look like Silver age was moving towards Platinum status, with the promotion of movies from comics and such. To my expectations some of the sicker undergrowth that was still attached to comics from the “Underground” of the 50’s and 60’s was resurfacing into the main stream comics, where is the comics code when you need it. As a science fiction underground and Fanzine artist myself in those days, I was not surprised to see it actually happen, the culture precedes the politics.
Promoting New Standards
As I am still editing my current book “Talking to the Birds” Volume II, I have extracted my writing about the “Ethical Artistic Codes” (EAC), a new set of codes I deemed necessary for Illustrated works to apply, so the public are not misguided by the fake and inappropriate illustrations and works created by artists of lean conscience that are motivated by political, narcissistic, psychopathic and some destructive identity politics, SJW and Cultural Marxist agendas. It was an interesting idea that I thought I would explore after seeing too much propaganda from the Leftist ideologues in print and screen.
So here is a set of codes that could be placed in a back corner of each comic to indicate where we are.
IF – Illustrated Fiction
This is by far the most popular category that Artists work in. It covers:
Murals, Comics, Graphic Novels, Books, Magazines, Cartoons
IN – Illustrated Non-Fiction
This is the essential art used by Academia to understand the past and present.
History, Journalism, Archaeology, News, Biographies
IT – Illustrated Technical
The mainstay of Architecture and used by Engineers to design their machines, electronics and chemistry models.
Instructions, Manuals, Engineering, Architecture, Chemistry, Electronics, Labeling, Road Signs
IP – Illustrated Propaganda
Most graphic artists make a reasonable and pedestrian living from creating advertising.
Fliers, Pamphlets, Advertising, Political Logo, Company Logo, Manifesto, Politics, Ideological
The Illustration Codes
Refer to the News Codes, the problems only arise when NP or NF is disguised as NN. This has been duly noted in the election of 2017, where CNN and many other News outlets used their Media over reach to create Fake Propaganda News.
You could change the first letter I to other form:
I = Illustrated Art, Drawing, Painting, Computer Graphics
V = Video CGI, Movies, Cartoon, TV Opinion
S = Three dimensional solid Sculpture, Object, Furniture, Building, Machine
Through my years of reductio ad absurdum, I have found you only need to use four categories to keep a simple graphical order that will be of great benefit to the massive visual chaos that modern society has flung us into.
Imaginary, Witnessed, Measured, Opinion
These four I figured can be written in forms such as:
Fiction, Non-Fiction, Technical, Propaganda
Emotion, Intellect, Experiential, Imaginary
To use another set of four for food production:
Industrial, Traditional, Organic, Non-Organic
Many things in the Arts can be labelled in at least a couple of categories, but not all four. The main reason is that there will have a conflict of perceptions, if you cannot differentiate these four with your material, it will most likely be only “opinion” or best known as “propaganda”. This might seem simplistic, but the greatest wrongs in history have been carried out by mistaking witnessed reality from destructive opinions when they are taken to their bitter and sick finality.
Here are other codes of vital differences that can assure a complete system that will be easy to recognize and can be put into practice without much effort.
The News Codes
The Music Codes
The Food Codes
Artojh's Renderings 