The Library of Congress currently has an exhibition called Comic Art – 120 Years of Panels and Pages. The exhibition is both a physical exhibition and an online exhibition.
Comic art – 120 years of panels and pages has five sections. Those sections are early years, mid-twentieth century, late twentieth century, web strips and comics and beyond! Each section has a small collection of comics on display. Each item that is shown is accompanied by a brief explanation of what is being displayed and why it is remarkable.
Applications for education
What I find interesting about this exhibition is the evolution of comics from the late 19th century to the early 21st century. The evolution of comics could provide an interesting investigation into changes in the art form as well as changes in the audience’s perception of comics.
Maybe it’s the history teacher in me, but I enjoyed the early comics more than the modern examples. Talking about history, last fall the National Archives organized a webinar about teaching with political cartoons. That webinar recording is available here.
[Embed] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTrbO0mT0rU [/ embed]