Yesterday I had the pleasure of hearing a "human representative" of The Pinky Show give a talk contextualizing their work. For the uninitiated, The Pinky Show is an American social justice-focused animated series starring a group of cats. Winnipeg Free Press writer Alison Gillmor succinctly described the web video series as "Noam Chomsky by way of Hello Kitty" and this definition works – each episode tackles heavy issues and carefully considers their complexities in a manner that is both accessible and (morosely) entertaining. Past shows have examined formal education, illegal immigration, the legality of the Iraq War, GMOs and the nuances of these charged topics are thoroughly researched and parsed very finely. The show has an explicit interest in language and watching any of the above episodes will illustrate how attentive the writers are in peeling back dominant cultural narratives and reconsidering definitions that we sometimes take for granted.

Due to a few sharp curators, The Pinky Show has recently popped up on the radar of the Canadian art scene and the team behind the project just launched show at the Toronto Free Gallery entitled "Class Treason Stories". This video project is presented in an exhibition context as a series of large format prints of Pinky, Bunny, Mimi and Kim – the all-feline cast of the series. Yesterday John (no last name given) gave a talk that presented the backstory of the team's foray into web video and how their project has evolved over the last five years.

[Pinky & Bunny / I'M ON UR LAND / MAPPIN UR DEMIZE, from the On Native Land series / 2008]

A recurring theme within the "Class Treason Stories" artist talk was the struggle for financial subsistence. Since The Pinky Show is not a standard publication, art practice or child-friendly animated series, obtaining funding for the project has proved difficult. The project is registered as a non-profit and has two full-time writers/producers, a half-time "organizer" and the only source of revenue has been (meagre) merchandise sales, donations and a few timely grants. A defining moment in the early life of the project occurred when one of their 2007 episodes was featured on the front page of YouTube – this video now has more than 750,000 views and the YouTube channel for the project has reached 7.5 million people. Granted, there are countless videos on the Internet that have reached an audience of a hundred thousand but given that this project deals with touchy subjects like ideology or the definition of war crimes, how has the show managed to cultivate such a large viewership?

[Pinky & Bunny / I'M ON UR LAND / MAPPIN UR DEMIZE, detail]

John confessed that he was still quite perplexed by the success the show had enjoyed in certain countries and networks but was quick to point out that the daily routine at The Pinky Show HQ consisted of being rejected for grants and answering hate mail. He also expressed confusion regarding the fact that the project appealed to the art world but seemed a little more comfortable with the idea of turning the research and iconography associated with the show into "sellable artifacts" rather than strictly relying on merchandise sales to fund the project. It was fascinating to hear the care that goes into the writing of The Pinky Show applied to an on-the-fly contextualization of the project and John concluded that people "accepted" the show precisely because it was animated – nobody demands to know the academic history of a hand drawn cat. While this point was delivered as a punchline, it underscored an intense suspicion of institutionalized education and academic credentialing.

Another reason that the show is somewhat accessible is that it appropriates one of the qualities most valued online—cuteness—and subverts it to serve as a delivery device for cultural commentary. I'M ON UR LAND / MAPPIN UR DEMIZE (shown above) is a brilliant example of a generic Internet meme being redeployed to highlight connections between cartography, power, historical narratives and the plight of the indigenous peoples of North America.

What I found most appealing about this excellent talk was John's description of something he referred to as the "monster institution". During the presentation there were many references to (past) frustrations that The Pinky Show team had while working as educators – they felt that between administration and departmental infighting they had no time remaining to dedicate to their own learning. Rather than continue working in an institution they no longer had faith in, they created their own (the show) where the primary mandate was to spend each and every day researching and bettering themselves while developing quality content. John warned that the danger of the monster institution is that nobody will take you seriously for years but their project is a shining example of how good, self-published content can find an audience.

"We Love Museums...Do Museums Love Us Back?" is probably my favourite episode of The Pinky Show as it skewers museum/gallery culture and all the expertise associated with programming it. I urge you to check out this great video series and if you're interested in learning more about the project you should track down a copy of this month's issue of FUSE magazine (as it has a feature article on Pinky & Co.).