Terminal Exposure: Comics, Sculpture, and Risky Behavior

The first-ever collection of comics and assorted artwork by Michael McMillan—not only a legendary underground cartoonist, but also a sculptor, painter, printmaker, filmmaker, animator, poster designer, and an avid rock climber.

Michael McMillan has said he’s “not really a cartoonist,” but the evidence suggests otherwise. Born and raised in California, he was a draftsman and industrial designer by trade before he plunged into the burgeoning San Francisco underground comix scene of the early 1970s. He drew for legendary publications such as Weirdo, Young Lust, Lemme Outa Here!, Arcade, and produced his own one-issue wonder, Terminal Comics. But just as often he drew for himself, playing with the form of comics out of the sight of readers.

He reimagined the kinds of stories single-panel, two-panel, and many-panel strips could tell and blended favorite genres from his childhood (horror, sword-and-sandal, science fiction) with more mature themes (autobiography, dating, sex) to create new and striking forms.

Terminal Exposure brings together McMillan’s comics for the first time, alongside a selection of his electrifying sculptures, his eye-popping paintings, and stunning pages from his rock climbing journals. With an introduction by Dan Nadel, this volume offers a comprehensive portrait of an exceptional artist, sculptor, climber, and—yes—cartoonist.

Michael McMillan was born in Pasadena. While attending San Francisco State University for a master’s degree in sculpture in the late 1960s, he saw an exhibition by the Hairy Who at the Art Institute of San Francisco. That exhibit, together with Zap Comix, spurred his career as a comic book artist. He went on to produce his comic book debut, Terminal Comics, and contributed to publications throughout the 1970s such as Young Lust, Arcade, Weirdo, and Lemme Outa Here. A fine artist as well as a cartoonist, McMillan has worked in many mediums over the course of his career, including film, animation, sculpture, and printmaking, which he currently pursues full-time. McMillan lives in the Bay Area.

Dan Nadel is the Steven and Ann Ames Curator of Drawings and Prints at the Whitney Museum of American Art. He is the author most recently of Crumb: A Cartoonist’s Life. His previous books include Peter Saul: Professional Artist Correspondence, 1945–1976; The Collected Hairy Who Publications; Art Out of Time: Unknown Comic Visionaries, 1900–1969; Gary Panter; Art in Time: Unknown Comic Book Adventures, 1940–1980; Dorothy and Otis: Designing the American Dream; and the New York Review Comics collections Return to Romance: The Strange Love Stories of Ogden Whitney and It's Life as I See It: Black Cartoonists in Chicago, 1940–1980. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.