golden gate publishing
golden gate publishing
golden gate publishing (1972-1974)
Golden Gate was a small retail shop and publishing company owned by Terry Zwigoff, who was also in Crumb’s band, a columnist in Weirdo, and later the Director of the highly acclaimed film Crumb (plus Bad Santa and others). Zwigoff sold his publishing rights to Artistic (+ People’s Comics) to Kitchen Sink Press.
Artistic COMICS
Golden Gate Publishing Company
7″ x 10″ 75¢ 68 pages
It’s also not surprising that many men who didn’t grow up like Crumb still identified with (and supported) the sexism and chauvinism presented in comics like Big Ass. The two-issue set proved to be one of the most popular titles in underground comics history, perhaps only outsold in the early ’70s by the first issue of Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers.
But it’s too easy to dismiss Crumb’s work during this era as mere pandering or sexism when he bares his soul and conscience with such clarity and ferocity, and yet simultaneously with such beauty, humor and elegance. Crumb’s purgative rants about women (and all manner of societal issues) through the 1970s, which began in earnest with Motor City and Big Ass in 1969, seem more like his own form of primal therapy than a treatise on the nature of humanity. Given his background and his own nature, it would take a lot of therapy to even come close to re-setting his sails (his relationship with Aline Kominsky certainly helped him with that).
NOTE: In those days companies, at least underground comic companies, seemed very unconcerned with logos. The name of the publisher often doesn’t even appear on the cover, let alone a logo, which were unstandardized and usually added by the artist, who might interpret a logo any way he pleased or leave it out altogether. In the big big internet I cannot find an example of Golden Gate Publishing’s logo (in fact, I can hardly find any information about them at all) and the logo only existed on the title The People’s Comics, just to the left of the P in People’s, very small and blurry in the biggest resolution I could find of the cover. Therefore, I have recreated it clean and offer it to them free of charge should they like to use it for any reprints.
