Week 5 Readings

The article I found the most interesting this week was "A Beautiful Pandemonium" by Steve Barilotti.  This article chronicled the life of comic artist Rick Griffin.  Griffin found success with his cartoon Murphy but he still felt as if he needed more out of life.  While on a journey to discover what he was missing in life, Griffin was in a serious car accident that nearly killed him and left him severely disfigured.  After his brush with death, Griffin's art style changed to incorporate the drugs he was using and the hardships he was undergoing with his personal life.  He eventually went to school to further study art, and was commissioned to make posters for artists like Jimi Hendrix.  My favorite part of the article was the section talking about how Griffin submitted a "grown-up" version of Murphy (on his knees at the gates of Heaven) to Surfer magazine, and died only a few weeks later due to a motorcycle crash.  It seemed poignant that that particular cartoon was one of his last;  to me, it symbolized Griffin's growth as a man and that he finally seemed to find peace with his life.