By: Ray Garcia
“If an object moves too quickly or becomes too complex, existence forgets what the former form was.”
Dame Darcy’s “Meat Cake Bible” is a collection of her most prominent comics spanning from 1993 to her recent pieces.
As this quarter quickly comes to a close, we are reminded of the changes that have occurred over the past few weeks. Those changes – whether they be changing the color of our hair or redefining ourselves in a whole new light – are inevitable.
This neo-Victorian anthology exemplifies such drastic changes as Darcy takes you into the ever-changing, romantically twisted world that she has created.
In each comic, there is a grim fantasy land that reads like a fairy tale gone wrong- emphasizing the broken beauty within our own minds. The artwork is exquisitely done, best described as a collaboration between Tim Burton and Margaret Keane.
Although the works are erratically poetic, I must warn that the content is not for the faint of heart. Within some of the comics, there are characters who reach bloody and violent ends- leaving no room for the imagination. Although Darcy’s use of the beautiful and the gruesome works toward creating a reality that is beyond our cultural norms, this collection of comics is very graphic.
If you are ready to descend into a goth-like version of “Alice in Wonderland”, join some of Darcy’s notable characters like Effluvia the Mermaid, Wax Wolf, and Strega Pez in their world of aesthetic madness.
The book can be checked out at Western Libraries.
