This is a piece of artwork from a new Canadian visual art/literary journal called Pistol, published by PistolPress. I don’t know much about them except that the sample artwork on their site is amazing. I just ordered a copy of their first issue. John recently had a comic published in another Canadian art publication called Carousel. Seems like there’s a lot of cool, experimental art endeavors cooking up in Canada. We were discussing why this would be. John says it may have to do with more government funding for this kind of thing, compared to the US. He also pointed out that there seems to be a wider acceptance of experimental art, like in Europe. I think Americans may be too commercially focused for much that is experimental. In America, difficult art is often dismissed as devious or snobbish. Others just give up on it - not hard to do, given that there’s so much other stuff to entertain us. I certainly find that, when I get home from work, I’m happier to turn on HGTV than read a literary magazine. We asked Nina for her thoughts. Here’s what she had to say:

“The stereotype of American crassness is pretty valid. Mainly because worldwide ‘broad’ or ‘mainstream’ culture is American driven. Being on top of the capitalist pile means that Americans are encouraged to support things that support that system - Hollywood, Disney, etc.”

Hmmmm…Nina sounds like she’s had a few too many one-on-one conversations with Dad.

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