Contribution to the representation of diversity? Case study analysis of the comic book ‘The Adventures of California Sweetheart’.

Abstract

This paper deals with the artistic production of Herminio Molero, focusing on the comic strip Las aventuras de California Sweetheart. It contextualises and highlights the peculiarity and contributions of the comic, analyses the keys to its presentation at the Buades gallery during the artist's second solo show there, entitled Mi nombre es... Molero (1975), and formulates its reasons and intentionality. It calls for a greater openness to academic research into comics and reveals Molero's artistic identity and the reasons for its fragmentation, trying to solve the usual historiographical lack of information about Molero. It also attempts to contribute to the genealogy of the comic in Spain, doing so from a genre perspective in which the transition of the main character is contextualised with the moment in which he emerges, his idea, and decontextualised outcomes a posteriori.
Keywords: Herminio Molero, visual poetry, intermediality, comic, Buades gallery.