ARTBOUND KCET’s documentary series spotlights overlooked creative souls

  KCET celebrated the 13th season of its original series ARTBOUND with a screening that premiered the documentary “Love & Rockets: The Great American Comic Book.” The event thrilled fans of the alt comic book series ‘Love & Rockets’ who got to meet the groundbreaking creators Gilbert Hernandez and Jaime Hernandez. The brothers were happy to talk about their comic creation, which became a family business. “It grew out of a punk mentality that just wasn’t offered anywhere else,” Gilbert explained. The Hernandez Brothers have been praised for the diversity and nuance they’ve featured in “Love & Rockets.” And its storylines have continued with its characters aging and situations developing in real-time over the 40 years of publishing the comic books. “We intend to keep ‘Love & Rockets’ going for as long we’re able,” said Jaime with no thoughts of retiring. Filmmakers Omar Foglio and Jose Luis Figueroa of Dignicraft also had great insight to the Hernandez Brothers’ creative world, which expressed inclusion before it was trendy.

‘Love & Rockets’ creators Jaime Hernandez and Gilbert Hernandez, October 4, 2022. (Photo courtesy KCET)

The screening took place at the Laemmle Theatre NoHo 7 in North Hollywood. VIP guests previewed the documentary followed by a panel discussion. Attendees also included filmmakers and talent from five more upcoming documentaries that are part of ARTBOUND’s Season 13. Among them– “Arte Cósmico,” a film that follows six artists who are exploring notions of identity, language, immigration, queerness, religious and Aztec iconography, and capitalism; The Artbound episode “Duchamp Comes to Pasadena” looks at artist Marcel Duchamp’s 1963 retrospective in Southern California. Duchamp is considered by many to be the father of conceptual art; “Giant Robot: Asian Pop Culture and Beyond” puts the spotlight on a magazine that created an appetite for Asian and Asian American pop culture and ultimately created a lasting legacy of Asian American artists that achieved worldwide recognition; “A New Deal for Los Angeles” shows the impact resulting from President Roosevelt creating the Works Progress Administration (WPA) as a way to provide opportunities to millions of unemployed Americans recovering from The Great Depression; “A Rubén Ortiz Torres Story” follows artist Rubén Ortiz Torres who has been working as a photographer, painter, sculptor, writer, filmmaker and video producer since the early ’80s, becoming associated with the development of a specifically Mexican form of postmodernism.

All the shows help to feed the creativity in artists’ souls, and KCET President and CEO Andrew Russell said he was proud to launch the 13th season ARTBOUND, along with Senior Director of Production Angela Boisvert. After the screening, Los Angeles Times arts columnist moderator Carolina A. Miranda hosted a ‘Love & Rockets‘ panel. A reception followed at the Federal Bar in North Hollywood where guests celebrated the documentary as well as the 40th anniversary of the comic series.

All six of the documentaries in the new season will air on KCET and PBS SoCal in Southern California, plus Link TV nationwide. “Love & Rockets: The Great American Comic Book plus the other films will also be available on the free PBS app and for streaming at kcet.org/artbound.


Margie Barron has written for a wide variety of outlets including Gannett newspapers, Nickelodeon, Tiger Beat and 16 Magazine, Fresh!, Senior Life, Production Update, airline magazines, etc. Margie is also proud to have been half of the husband & wife writing team Frank & Margie Barron, who had written together for various entertainment and travel publications for more than 38 years.

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