Underground comics pioneered adult content with casual racism.

Evidence

Until then, the two forms the underground press pioneered were comix and porn. In February 1969, with circulation figures at 65,000, EVO inaugurated a monthly all-comix tabloid, enigmatically named Gothic Blimp Works, which, marked “Adults Only,” was notable for baroque violence, voluptuous naked women, and casual racial stereotypes. The first three issues featured covers and stories by the form’s greatest exponent, R. Crumb. There were also multipage stories by EVO’s star cartoonists Spain and Kim Deitch, who then shared a sixth-floor walk-up on Eighth Street east of Avenue B, a block so menacing that after he got mugged Deitch began carrying a gun. — J. Hoberman, Everything Is Now, 1472

Categorization

• XREF: Cheap rent on a menacing Avenue B block enabling artists connects directly to the book’s core claim that material conditions — cheap real estate, dangerous neighborhoods — produced the density of invention.