Comics Workbook

An online magazine for comics makers

Posted in NewsTagged ann telnaes, caleb orecchio, cxc 2017, jack brougham, lynda barry, sally ingraham, tyler landry

Caleb Orecchio

Posted on May 28, 2017May 28, 2017

Explore

04/12/2017

Juan FernándezApril 12, 2017los Cómics / NewsEmpezamos el día con el Fanzine Chileno; Martin Lopez Lam; El Museo Nacional de Japón; El Víbora; Sole Otero; Edd Muñoz; Conxita Herrero; Arturo Porras sobre Jack Kirby; Alexis Ziritt; y los tebeos de Comics Workbook. ————————————————————————————————— Uhu, papel y tijera – Constanza Gutiérrez y el Fanzine Chileno Hace dos semanas, el New York Times publicó un artículo titulado “¿Por qué internet no mató a los fanzines?”, y a los pocos días el diario El País también hizo lo suyo. Actualmente existen plataformas gratuitas para crear blogs y álbumes de fotos, y si la idea es conectar con otros o propagar una idea, se supone que la web es el medio adecuado, pero para un montón de gente no basta. Los fanzines viven hoy una época dorada y en Chile, como en varios otros países, están circulando muchos. Esta es una pequeña muestra. ————————————————————————————————— Alejandro Serrano entrevista a Martin Lopez Lam artista gráfico,editor, agitador cultural. De hablan? De todo. ALEJANDRO SERRANO: ¿Cómo surgió la idea de organizar un festival como Tenderete? MARTÍN LÓPEZ LAM: Surgió de casualidad. En septiembre del año 2010 vinieron a Valencia los portugueses de Chili Com Carne, que estaban haciendo una muestra-gira por Europa y llegaron a Lavakerí, que por entonces la llevaba Susana, con ayuda del Parras y mía. Ahí montamos una muestra, conocimos a los portugueses y éstos nos dijeron que hacían un festival en Lisboa, la Feria Laica. En diciembre del mismo año fui al festival y vi cómo la organizaban, a la vuelta pensé que no parecía tan complicado montar algo así, siempre y cuando hubiera gente interesada. Una de esas personas fue Clara Iris. Al final, fue todo muy improvisado. ————————————————————————————————— Cómics y noticias que me han llamado la atención esta semana: El Museo Nacional de Japón publica en su web casi 70 animes de la primera mitad del siglo XX. Tebeosfera os ofrece una galería con varias portadas la mítica revista El Víbora. Poncho Fue – Crónica de una relación tóxica, magníficamente contado por la argentina Sole Otero. Otero describe magníficamente en su novela gráfica los extremos de una relación sentimental dañina. Edd Muñoz abrió un blog, El Ojo Erratico, donde estara hablando de cómics. La primera entrada está dedicada a The End de Anders Nilsen. It’s Nice That le pone el spotlight a Conxita Herrero. Lanzate dentro su mundo lleno de color y emoción! Arturo Porras celebra el Centenario de Jack Kirby. Analiza y explora la vida y obra del Rey de los cómics en la ZONA NEGATIVA. Get an original page from #SpaceRiders volumen uno!!! Last opportunity to pick up art by Alexis Ziritt!!! Out of Step Arts had taken these SPACE RIDERS pages down, but so many folks asked about them so they’re now back for one last run. ————————————————————————————————— Blinkers – 4-12-2017 – by Jack Brougham ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 4-12-2017 – by Sally Ingraham ————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 4-12-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

05/02/2017

Aaron CockleMay 2, 2017NewsAaron here today with Risography!, Kickstarter(s) of Note; Anthologies of Europa; The Necrophilic Landscape; Fax Art; Jacob Khepler. ————————————————————————————————— A p-shop airbrush set to “dissolve” Frank Santoro continues to look at recent use and development of comics printed on Risograph machines. This time around he talks with John Pham: I’ve noticed risograph printers have “meet-ups,” little fairs and conventions. I imagine it is like any other subculture, however this one interests me because of the direct connection to book making. It reminds me of zine culture and comics fandom in a way. Can you speak to how risograph printers are different than other printers, beyond obvious differences in materials? I’ve got a lot respect for the other Riso printers out there, folks like Mickey Z, Colour Code, George Wietor and Sarah McNeil. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a really sloppy and brutal printer. Printing my books is one of the last steps in my process and at that point I’m usually pretty sleep deprived and grouchy. So I kinda just shove the books through the printer and try to troubleshoot as I go along. This sort of urgency probably creates its own aesthetic but I’m definitely not as knowledgeable or precise as a lot of the printers mentioned above. I think the differences between riso printers and other kinds of printers is pretty negligible, but they’re likely to be more inclined to focus on holistic book making than, say, just prints and covers. ————————————————————————————————— Tiny Report and Retrofit Comics 2 contemporary comics institutions are currently Kickstarting publishing endeavors: Robyn Chapman’s Paper Rocket Minicomics continues its increasingly vital small press efforts, with plans to publish the annual micro-press yearbook, The Tiny Report, as well as the second issue of Colin Lidston’s Age of Elves, for its Spring 2017 line-up. Retrofit Comics is gathering funds for another super-ambitious collection of comics: Combed Clap of Thunder by Zach Hazard Vaupen Steam Clean by Laura Ķeniņš How To Be Alive by Tara Booth Iceland by Yuichi Yokoyama Tales from the Hyperverse by Will Cardini TRUMPTRUMP vol. 1: nomination to inauguration by Warren Craghead III ————————————————————————————————— ‘In this context, the works are comics, sequential art, visual narrative, comics-adjacent storytelling, informatics and some other lumpy labels for stuff that tells a story with pictures.’ Elsewhere on the CW site, Matt Rhodes writes about European comics anthologies: Through the 1920s, there was a series of art journals and publications put out by various art groups in Europe: de Stilj, Dada, Cannibale, Le Couer, Cabaret Voltaire. Due to modern advances in printing technology, it is easier to self-publish zines with better production values. But it’s also interesting to note that the impulse to run an amateur publication of random stuff is perfectly normal. There’s a certain amount of debate regarding how and when the cartooning tradition in Western Europe became the comics tradition of Western Europe. Some point to the broadsheets of the 17 century that introduced the twin concepts of anthologies and episodic storytelling as a precursor to modern sequential art. But it’s more likely that comics as we know them grew up during the 19th Century. And anthologies were an important part of that maturation. ————————————————————————————————— “No one would expect that these two figures are in fact a single man: the fearless detective Lucas Barrette.” Greg Hunter reviews Tracy Auch’s excellent The Necrophilic Landscape over at TCJ: Despite being, unrelentingly, an art comic, The Necrophilic Landscape isn’t shy about utilizing genre conventions. Pulpy, ironic narration describes the detective’s quest, the sort that would not have been on a ’40s radio serial: “No one would expect that these two figures are in fact a single man: the fearless detective Lucas Barrette.” (The detective, for his part, bears a sideways resemblance to McGruff the Crime Dog.) The children’s means of infiltrating the adult world echoes the comedy trope of two kids walking one atop the other in a single large coat. And the story’s dystopian trappings provide a context for Barrette’s fantastical procedure. But the most compelling generic element is one the story shares with horror: the protagonist, Barrette, stands for order and orthodoxy, with the story’s antagonists, the children, deviating from that orthodoxy—and readers are likely to empathize with the antagonists to a degree that the protagonist does not. (By the end of the comic, Barrett hasn’t assumed the role of villain, but he doesn’t have much of a defense to offer on behalf of the prevailing order.) ————————————————————————————————— Fax Machines and Their Discontents For those interested in showing dissatisfaction with the recent talk about the National Endowment for the Arts de-funding, and who are also able to access a fax machine, and who also want to be artistic about it, Claire Voon at Hyperallergic has a piece about organizations contacting United States Congresspeople via fax: The process may sound archaic in 2017, but as Kathryn Schulz recently wrote for The New Yorker, faxes do reach congressional representatives. They get entered into a “constituent-management system” like any other message, and staffers will read each one. And as Schulz reported, personalized forms of material communication actually have more sway on a lawmaker’s opinion than a phone call. Faxing a message may take much more time — but that’s why services like Artifax are particularly handy for amplifying your concerns while adding a little creative flair to your political activism. ————————————————————————————————— Jacob Khepler‘s run at the Outline has ended, but he has preserved the column he wrote weekly from Dec. 2016-April 2017 HERE. Never one to lose momentum, he is currently working on editing a Mothers News collection book among other projects. ————————————————————————————————— A Cosmic Journey – 5-2-2017 – by Cameron Arthur ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 5-2-2017 – by Gabriella Tito ————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 5-2-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

03/05/2018

Caleb OrecchioMarch 4, 2018NewsCaleb Orecchio here with, yet again, thoughts on Barry Windsor-Smith and his excellent adaption of Red Nails, plus the usual gang of links. ————————————————————————————————— All images herein are scans from Marvel Treasury Edition #4. Long story short, I think Barry Windsor-Smith’s Red Nails should be considered a masterpiece among the pantheon of comics. Old school fandom has more or less made this claim over the years, but the later “intellectual” generation (particularly the cartoonists and distinguished readers coming up out of the 80s) sees it as “good for the time”—at least, that’s what I sense. I also think many indie comics fans look down on adaptions as if adaptions are not a valid form of expression or something; or that a Marvel sword and sorcery comic simply is not good comics as a matter of principle and should basically be forgotten except when waxing nostalgia or appreciating good inking. I think independent comics and mini comics culture has come far enough to the point where we don’t have to demonize these old mainstream comics anymore. Yes, Red Nails is more or less violent, swashbuckling entertainment for young adults (or young adults at heart), but that’s what it was intended to be. No, I don’t walk away from it with a deep emotional revelation and it doesn’t cause me to rethink my life, but I had a damn good time looking at it. Smith’s images return to my thoughts for weeks on end and I marvel at the visual sensationalism. Is not the basic goal of a cartoonist to make something visually interesting and worth looking at/reading? I’d argue that this is the cartoonist’s most basic goal, and I’d argue that it’s in this manner that Barry Windsor-Smith achieved one of thee great works in comics. ————————————————————————————————— if you don’t know, now you know Good news for Chicago locals and CAKE 2018 attendees! The Monday after CAKE (June 4th) John Porcellino will be “running an All-Day Comics Workshop at the Chicago Publishers Resource Center.” More details are on the way, but save the date fer crying out loud! To raise funds to publish Linework 8, an anthology by Ivan Brunetti’s Columbia College Chicago students, Brunetti and company are holding a silent auction on Facebook from March 5 through March 9. This auction will feature select Brunetti originals(!) and other good stuff. Learn more about the silent auction here. And/or preorder Linework 8 here. Lauren Weinstein is the latest guest on Process Party. She also recently graced the airwaves of The Virtual Memories Show. RiYL has featured an extra dose of cartoonists recently including, Joseph Remnant, Emil Ferris, and Gina Wynbrandt. ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 3-5-2018 – by Gabriella Tito Share this page: [...]

03/27/2018

Aaron CockleMarch 27, 2018NewsAaron here today with KGB Easter Reading + Paper Rocket Minicomics; Anna McGlynn & Hannah Kaplan; Yvan Alagbé; Comics Appropriation; Protest Comics; Sally Ingraham Birding Comics ————————————————————————————————— Annual Comix and Graphic Novel Night Spring is in the air! Join us for the annual Easter Sunday KGB Comix Night, a free night of live comics readings. Five local cartoonists will offer slideshow readings that are sure to entertain, bewilder, and amuse. Co-hosted by Robyn Chapman and Robin Enrico. Sunday, April 1, at KGB Bar in NYC. Readings by: Emily Flake, Katie Fricas, Alabaster Pizzo, Bishakh Som, Vreni Stollberger ————————————————————————————————— Paper Rocket Minicomics 2018 Spring Line Robyn Chapman is putting out 2 books, issue #3 of Colin Lidston’s The Age of Elves, and issue #5 of the Chapman-edited The Tiny Report. This is our most ambitious issue of the Tiny Report yet, with 60 full-color pages of minicomic reviews, interviews, and bibliographies! We have profiles of two groundbreaking, but very different, comic artists. We start with an interview with Eleanor Davis and an overview of her early minicomic work. And we follow that with Haleigh Buck’s in-depth interview with Mike Diana, the first American artist to be convicted of obscenity. We also have a bunch of minicomic reviews by Robyn Chapman and Robin Enrico. And as always, we chronicle the output of micro-publishers in the Micro-Press Yearbook fold-out. ————————————————————————————————— Anna McGlynn and Hannah Kaplan in Philadelphia. ————————————————————————————————— A Comic Book Artist Who Makes the Invisible Visible Tobias Grey on the newly translated Yvan Alagbé book, Yellow Negroes and Other Imaginary Creatures. France has continued to shape its former African colonies in its own image by erasing the past as it sees fit. In “Yellow Negroes” he reported on a collective of undocumented workers striking in Montreuil who put up a photograph of Thomas Sankara, Burkina Faso’s revolutionary president from 1983 to 1987, in the window of their headquarters. Inserting himself into the narrative, Mr. Alagbé remarked that when he once looked up Sankara’s name in France’s famous Larousse dictionary there was no entry for him. However there was an entry for Blaise Compaoré who led the 1987 coup d’état during which Sankara was assassinated. “I thought that was incredibly violent,” Mr. Alagbé said. “Not only was Sankara assassinated but he was also erased from French history.” ————————————————————————————————— At the Mountains of Madness Austin English continues a strong run of art/comics essays: Let’s make no mistake though: cartooning, artistically speaking, is doing fine without the validation of museums or influential art writers. It’s part of the hard to explain magnetism this medium has for the artists who devote themselves to it. ‘Ok, the offer, as I understand it, is I devote myself to this medium, trying to decipher its complexities, accepting how complicated and demanding it is… and in return, you’re giving… nothing? No money, no acceptance or consideration from the world at large. Sounds good to me!’ As silly as this sounds, this describes countless artists involved in this field, all making work using the full power of their hearts and minds. Is this part of what makes cartooning so beautiful, its lack of prestige or ‘career’ path, thus enforcing an art for art’s sake default mode? Perhaps. But art can provide important things to the public. Cartooning may be doing fine on its own, but I do think those who appreciate art (and whose only understanding of how to experience the story of art is to go to institutions to self-educate) might benefit a good deal from a confrontation with cartooning on the walls of their favorite museum. ————————————————————————————————— Be Heard! A Comic For Student Rights From CBLDF & NCAC “Whether students choose to participate in this national movement or not, whether they walk out into the hallway or march to their Senator’s office, whether they wear orange or write an op-ed for the school paper, this moment is the ultimate First Amendment lesson,” said Abena Hutchful, coordinator of NCAC’s Youth Free Expression Program and Kids’ Right to Read Project. “We hope that teachers will engage with their students in productive ways and we want to make sure that students know what is–and is not–protected protest speech in schools.” ————————————————————————————————— How to Take Pictures of Birding CW News contributor Sally Ingraham has a short comic posted at the American Birding Association blog, a preview of a longer piece in the upcoming issue of Birding. Congrats, Sally! ————————————————————————————————— Vision Box – 3-27-2018 – by Cameron Arthur ————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 3-27-2018 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

10/10/2018

Juan FernándezOctober 10, 2018NewsJuan here. It’s been a while since we talked. Here’s hoping you’re having a good day so far. I’m here in Pittsburgh getting ready for what is looking to be like a fun, doozy of a weekend. Before I dive back into that work I’d like to step back and reflect on this year’s Cartoon Crossroads Columbus (CXC). For anyone wondering about CXC, it was a blast. I’m not one to write much, but as I’ve mentioned before, CXC is on track to becoming America’s Angoulême. A festival that uses the entire city as campus. Accessible, free and intergenerational. Sales and the marketplace, while important, take a back seat to human connection. Something that I love about this show is that amidst all the programming, there’s time for you to get what you need from Columbus. I knew of people hitting the bars, going to nature preserves, visiting nearby family. I got to do my thing and celebrate the new release of a new Magic the Gathering set, Guilds of Ravnica by playing in two, that’s right TWO, tournaments, On the educational front, Comics Workbook led three workshops. Each workshop was packed, a full house. We handed out our new workbook zine and led attendees through the activities therein. We couldn’t have asked for a better host than CXC. They promoted our work really well, provided us with a great workshop space and they brought out Columbus’ aspiring comics makers in droves. At our table I played around with folks making some jumbo sized jam comics on easels. Through playful activities, each person who stopped by to draw was getting a free comics fundamentals lesson. I love being able to use play to invite reluctant or shy makers to open up and see what they can do. I couldn’t have asked for a better table mate than Caleb. He led his own workshop, got me some food when I was famished, sold our comics and zines left and right and collaborated with attendees at our activity table. Here’s the nitty gritty: I drove in Friday evening and drove back to Pittsburgh Sunday night with Caleb Orecchio. SATURDAY: Friday night I slid into Columbus at 11:55pm, after driving straight from work in Pittsburgh. I arrived just in time to register for the midnight prerelease at lovely gaming store, the Guardtower. I played magic until 6:45am, 5 rounds of matches, 4 wins, 1 loss. It was a blast. As the sun was rising I zipped over to the hostel where I was staying, freshened up, got some breakfast and then met my trusty sidekick for the weekend, Caleb Orecchio at the Columbus Metropolitan Library. We set up our spots, one table for sales and another for collaborative drawing activities with attendees. I downed some coffee, caught up with Caleb and in no time the library filled up with attendees. We were off to the races. The day zipped by, a sea of new faces and a welcoming stream of old friends from across the country. It was nice to catch up with folks left and right. I had the pleasure of meeting Maggie Umber, Feña, Breena Nuñez Peralta and Annie Koyama and catching up with Iona Fox, Whit Taylor, Kat Fajardo, and Kurt Ankeny on the expo floor. The day raced by and we wrapped up by 5pm, I wolfed down a salad from the library cafe and debated going to sleep or playing in another magic tournament. Of course, I went to play in another tournament. That one, didn’t go so well, as the lack of sleep was really getting to me. Thankfully it was a team format where two players collaboratively built decks and faced off against another teams. Thanks to Carl from Columbus for holding my hand through the crazy combat math at the end of the night. Tournament over, I drove home to the hostel, slightly delirious, and konked out. SUNDAY: I was up and at ‘em at 8:30 and I got ready for Richie Pope’s talk with William Evans at the Columbus Museum of Art. Great venue, great talk and a great crowd. I have to admit that I’ve been sleeping on Richie. What a fool I’ve been. Through the internet I’ve seen comics by him here and there and his work has come through Copacetic enough for me to read and appreciate. I had recently read “The Box We Sit On” and had slightly lost my mind for how great of a comic it was. It was a joy to see this conversation where strands of his work were woven together to create this portrait of a complex, inviting body of work. To see Richie’s calm, fluid and excited way of talking about all of it, what a gift. What a titan. What an excellent maker. The way that he weaves personal symbology, playful lines, smart color palettes, humor and poetry… A Richie Pope appreciation post is to come in the near future. What an inspiring guy… After that, it was back to the library for day 2 of sales and workshops. After that, it was time to wrap up and head back home to Pittsburgh. But not without getting a drink with Ron Wimberly. to catch up and weave together a bunch of ideas. There’s few people I have more fun talking to in comics than Ron. People flowed in and out of our conversation and it was nice to feel the flow of it all. We talked about the greatness of Richie Pope, food as the highest art form, language/ guilt symbol transmission stuff, personal comics making processes, art and labor, 9/11, memes, the French origins of critical theory, tumblr and more. it was really nice to talk with everyone, together. Caleb and I hit the road and we were back in Pittsburgh around 1am. Thank you as always to Tom Spurgeon for directing yet another great show. Thank you to the Board and everyone involved at all the different venues. And of course thank you to Lucy Caswell, without whom none of this would exit. You make cartoonists feel appreciated which is hard to do. Thanks. So, what’s coming up in Pittsburgh? Well, in between the the constraints of time imposed by my day-job I’ve been trying to get all the ducks in a row for the Pittsburgh Zine Fair and the IDEA FACTORY, a fun concept that will be part of Rube Fest, the festival to celebrate the opening of the Children’s Museum’s new exhibit, Rube Goldberg™: The World of Hilarious Invention! Artists are taking over parts of the Museum where guest inventors, artists and activities will inspire visitor’s vision and put their problem-solving skills to the test. I was asked to come up with a performance style workshop that playfully celebrated the limitless capacities for invention that paper and pencil allowed. To this effect we will be having a wacky patent office where children will be invited to work with local cartoonists to turn inventions that they’ve drawn into jumbo sized blue-prints that they’ll be able to take home. It’s been fun wrangling a crew of regular Pittsburgh Comics Salon attendees to run this activity. Come Sunday, zines will be pouring out of the Union Project! That’s right, it’s time for the Eighth Annual Pittsburgh Zine Fair. I’ll have a recap of that next week. As one of the primary organizers of the fair I have to make sure things go smoothly so I need to hop to it. Photos of Rube Fest and the Zine Fair to come. In the meantime check out that poster by the great Christina Lee! Perfection. For now, I’m off to get all those ducks in a row! over and out, juan 10/10/2018 – by Niall Breen 10/10/2018 – by Fifi Martinez Share this page: [...]

05/29/2017

Posted on May 28, 2017May 28, 2017 by Caleb Orecchio

Caleb Orecchio here with a speed round of links, news and announcements for Memorial Day 2017.

—————————————————————————————————

The major awards at the National Cartoonists Society’s 71st annual Reuben Awards, which were presented Saturday, May 27th 2017, went to Lynda Barry, who received the NCS’s Milton Caniff Lifetime Achievement Award, and Ann Telnaes, presented with the Reuben Award for outstanding cartoonist of the year. Congratulations! More on the awards and other winners HERE on The Washington Post.

—————————————————————————————————

Tyler Landry’s complete Shit and Piss, published by Retrofit/Big Planet, is available from his store, Clavicle Cocoris. Tyler is a master drawer and a furiously singular cartoonist, and I recommend anything he puts out. Check out Tyler’s recent TCAF 2017 Recap here.

—————————————————————————————————

Next, Cartoon Crossroads Columbus has announced their line-up for 2017, and it’s going to be a really interesting, eclectic group to say the least. In fact, it’s mind-boggling how good this lineup is, as Tom Spurgeon writes over on The Comics Reporter:

“That’s Derf Backderf, Peter Bagge, Kyle Baker, Darrin Bell, Howard Cruse, Lilli Carré and Alexander Stewart, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Kat Fajardo, Emil Ferris, Ann Marie Fleming, Matt Fraction, Jennifer Holm, Kevin Huizenga, Nilah Magruder, Ann Nocenti, Laura Park, Dav Pilkey, Mimi Pond, Dana Simpson, Chris Sprouse, Leslie Stein, Tillie Walden, Connor Willumsen and Judd Winick.”

More about the lineup HERE. Very exciting. I can’t wait.

—————————————————————————————————

Yesterday, Fantagraphics officially announced their new anthology, Now. The first issue is scheduled for a 2017 September release. Tom Spurgeon talks to the editor, Eric Reynolds on The Comics Reporter. Seems that Now will more or less be picking up where Mome left off.

—————————————————————————————————

Today is the last day to take advantage of the “40% off (mostly)” sale at Drawn and Quarterly.

—————————————————————————————————

The latest cartoonist to be interviewed on the RiYL podcast is the great David Lloyd (who did the artwork on V for Vendetta by Alan Moore). Lloyd is very opinionated and has a practical point of view on the business of comics, and Brian Heater is always such a good interviewer. Get into it. (A little bird told me to keep an eye out for an interview with Frank Santoro on RiYL soon!)

—————————————————————————————————

Last, but never the least, Kevin Huizanga’s masterpiece Ganges recently ended with its 6th issue. Though it is a triumph of modern cartooning, it seemed to me to be overshadowed by counterpart and simultaneously released Cricket 6 by Sammy Harkham. I think it has to do with Crickets being more accessible than Ganges, yet both titles hold a heavyweight belt. Anyway, Scott Cederlund reminds us how great Ganges is over on Panel Patter.

—————————————————————————————————

Blinkers – 5-29-2017 – by Jack Brougham

—————————————————————————————————

Suzy and Cecil – 5-29-2017 – by Sally Ingraham

—————————————————————————————————

Joanie and Jordie – 5-29-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio

Share this page:

Comics Workbook

An online magazine for comics makers

Posted in NewsTagged ann telnaes, caleb orecchio, cxc 2017, jack brougham, lynda barry, sally ingraham, tyler landry

Caleb Orecchio

Posted on May 28, 2017May 28, 2017

Explore

08/18/2016

HarrisonAugust 17, 2016NewsAugust 18th, 2016 comics news from wolves. ——————————————————————————————————————— Care Package Skuds McKinley sent the Rowhouse a package today, full of recent stuff for us to check out – things like his Plunder series with Swifty Lang (Boom Studios, pictured above) and the first Red-Eye Comics story, Dead Days in Kowloon (below). Keep up with Skuds on Instagram (@skudsink). Here’s a video of Frank Santoro interviewing Skuds in Philly back in 2012 – he’s been making great comics for bit. ——————————————————————————————————————— Pay Up http://auction.comicsworkbook.com/2016/08/18/portraits-by-connor-willumsen-pre-order/ ——————————————————————————————————————— Get Smart Columbus College of Art & Design is launching a new major dedicated to the study and practice of comics. In CCAD’s Comics & Narrative Practice program — accepting students starting in fall 2017 — students will work with comics professionals to learn how to write, illustrate and publish their own sequential art. The program is a perfect fit for Columbus, which is quickly gaining a national reputation as a comics hub. “Columbus is in a unique position to become a major center of comics study in the country, thanks to the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum, the Cartoon Crossroads Columbus festival and our strong tradition of illustration at CCAD,” said Stewart McKissick, Chair of CCAD’s Comics & Narrative Practice and Illustration programs.” Read Up. Lessons “I got the chance to actually live the dream of being a comics artist myself when one of my best friends, Al Simonson, sent some of my ballpoint drawings to DC for a critique—and a form letter returned, with a handwritten note to “drop by if you’re ever in the neighborhood” at the bottom. Two seconds later (just kidding…it was actually five… ? I appeared at the Midtown Manhattan reception desk of the DC Comics offices, which were conveniently 45 minutes away by subway, from my home in the Bronx (back in those pre-9/11 days, anyone would just walk into DC Comics, right off the streets.) They noticed the color of my skin, along with the quality of my 16 year old scribblings, and decided to have me pencil the adventures of their first ever original black super-hero, Black Lightning—” Trevor Von Eeden speaks out. ——————————————————————————————————————— Knowledge ——————————————————————————————————————— Share this page: [...]

Staple! Austin 2016 Report

Sally IngrahamMarch 11, 2016Festivals and ShowsSally Ingraham here! I went to Staple! this past weekend as part of the 7000 B.C. team – my local New Mexico comics group – and on partial assignment for Comics Workbook. It was my first large comics expo, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. “This show will ruin you for other ones,” I was told repeatedly. Staple! is now 12 years old, and is still pretty unique for being devoted to small press and independent comics. There were no mainstream comics publishers casting deep dark shadows across tables of handmade zines, and no cos-players or Hollywood faces. The entire expo was set up to be a place for independent cartoonists to find support and appreciation for their work – right down to the workshops, which were about crowdfunding through Patreon, publishing web comics, and dealing with legal issues, among other things. There was a panel on diversity in comics, and a mixer on Sunday morning for LGBTQA, POC, and female creators (hosted by Joon Comics). The folks who attended knew what to expect and I had great conversations with many of the people who stopped by the 7000 B.C. table. My own comics got a lot of love, and my fellow exhibitors were incredibly welcoming. I met rad folks like Red Angus and Sara Goetter and Jeanne Thornton (follow the links to check out their work!) and of course Chris “Uncle Staple” Nicholas himself. On Saturday night after a long (hot…) day at the expo, the exhibitors got to enjoy a catered BBQ dinner at Dragon’s Lair. I ended up sitting across from Uncle Staple – in one of the brief periods when he actually sat still… I asked him how much of his life was devoted to Staple!, and as I suspected, he said “150% of it.” Then he shared his two spirit animals – Omar Sharif, in Lawrence of Arabia (”I am a river to my people!”) and Harry Dean Stanton as Carl in Fire Walk With Me (”It’s just, like, more shit I gotta do now.”) No one who heard him shouting encouragement through that megaphone all day could doubt that Uncle Staple is still happy to be running the expo, however, and I couldn’t have been more delighted when he made his final rounds on Sunday and picked up one of my own comics. It was cool to chat with Sophie Goldstein and Carl Antonowicz (above), and harass Ben Marra into drawing something for Comics Workbook (below). I also enjoyed meeting Inés Estrada and Edwin Sandoval. They had a whole table full of comics by Mexican cartoonists, most of which were published by Inés’ label Gatosaurio. I got to step away from the 7000 B.C. table long enough to check out the zine-making workshop that Inés ran on Saturday, which was awesome! I could go on – and I will, when I finish reading all the new comics and zines I collected… – but for now I’ll wrap this up by saying Staple! is fantastic and if ever you needed an excuse to go somewhere warm in the winter, this is it! Head to Austin, support and be supported by the independent comics community, and maybe I’ll see you there next year. 🙂 – Sally Ingraham Share this page: [...]

09/25/2018

Aaron CockleSeptember 25, 2018NewsJulie Doucet; L. Nichols; Best American Comics; Richard McGuire; Everything is Connected at the Met Breuer; Art in Brussels ————————————————————————————————— Dirty Plotte—The Complete Julie Doucet by Austin English By the end of Dirty Plotte, the panels become increasingly dense and claustrophobic—beautifully so, but a trap all the same. The imposition of the rules of comics come to a head: clear, pure storytelling, the same character over and over, refine-refine-refine your style—a far remove from the infinitely open plane Doucet grafted onto the medium when Plotte began. An author of endless skill, she observed these principles and easily mastered them. Could the wide canvas of the early issues have been similarly exhausted? ————————————————————————————————— L Nichols: Day One ————————————————————————————————— The Best American Comics 2018 Panel discussion at Strand Book Store, NYC, Wednesday, October 3, 7pm “I love comics. Comics is (Comics ARE?) a perfect language, robustly evolving and expanding like any other living language,” writes Phoebe Gloeckner in her Introduction to The Best American Comics 2018. This year’s collection includes work selected from the pages of graphic novels, comic books, periodicals, zines, online, and more, highlighting the kaleidoscopic diversity of the comics language today. Join us as panelist Bill Kartalopoulos, Julia Gfrörer, Julian Glander, Kevin Hooyman, and Julia Jacquette talk about this year in comics. ————————————————————————————————— Richard McGuire: Art for the Street – 1978-1982 September 27 – November 4, 2018; Opening: Thursday, Sept. 27, 6-8 pm Alden Projects, 34 Orchard Street, NYC “A shadow is a strong and simple graphic,” McGuire explains. “The titles evolved from a Burroughs-esque cut-up method — just grabbing selected phrases that caught my ear. I would make lists. Later, I made a stencil. I would see what worked best with that image as a ‘sound picture’.” Incorporating cryptic phrases such as “Moved Then Set on Fire” (1979); “Holes and Corners” (1980); “Doubles are Inevitable” (1980); and “Different Nervous Rhythms (1981); McGuire’s Ixnae Nix drawings transmogrify the layout and content of quotidian newspapers into personalized tabloids in which the central silhouette appears with “a crypto-mystical graphic style, a great touch,” to borrow Glenn O’Brien’s 1981 praise in Interview magazine. The stream-of-consciousness poetics of McGuire’s Ixnae Nix drawings share explicit aesthetic dialogue with Basquiat and his early poetics, but later, these conversations arguably go both ways. McGuire’s Incident Instantly Becomes Memory , to name one, shared a pivotal stage with Basquiat, Haring, and others at the New York / New Wave show, curated by Diego Cortez at P.S. 1, Queens in 1981, and clearly anticipates some of Basquiat’s later pictorial developments. The Ixnae Nix drawings also confabulate with Keith Haring’s early street-based work, particularly with the latter’s Xeroxed collages of cut-up newspaper headlines, which he began in 1980. McGuire stopped his wheatpasting activities in early 1981—around the same time that Haring first began making chalk drawings in the subway. ————————————————————————————————— Everything Is Connected: Art and Conspiracy The first half of the exhibition comprises works by artists who hew strictly to the public record, uncovering hidden webs of deceit—from the shell corporations used by New York’s largest private landlord, interconnected networks encompassing politicians, businessmen, and arms dealers. In the second part, other artists dive headlong into the fever dreams of the disaffected, creating fantastical works that nevertheless uncover uncomfortable truths in an age of information overload and weakened trust in institutions. ————————————————————————————————— 09-25-2018 – by Niall Breen Share this page: [...]

09/20/2018

Caleb OrecchioSeptember 19, 2018NewsCaleb Orecchio here with a few strips by Alex Toth and Cory Adams ————————————————————————————————— Cory Adams is one of the great American comic book colorists. She is right up there with Lynn Varley and Klaus Janson as far as I am concerned. She may even top them all. She was a maverick of coloring. The most famous book she colored was probably “Superman vs Muhammad Ali” working closely with her then-husband Neal Adams. She would continue to work with Neal and other great artists on various comic books including title’s Neal’s Continuity Comics. The other day I came across issues of Echo of Futurepast no. 6 and 7 from 1985 (a Continuity Comics anthology) where she colored two excellent Alex Toth stories. Torpedo is comic written by Spanish writer Enrique Sánchez Abulí and originally drawn by Alex Toth until he dropped out and was replaced by Jordi Bernet that was first serialized in 1981 in a Spanish horror comics magazine Creepy (I know ). Torpedo, like most great noir, is a black and white comic. According to the introduction of Torpedo’s debut in Echo of Futurepast, Continuity wanted to run Torpedo starting with its two initial Toth stories in Echo in color despite the author insisting the strip should be black and white. Then Continuity brought out their slugger, Cory Adams. She colored a sample page, someone from Continuity submitted the colored page in person, in Spain, and got the rights to print Torpedo in their magazine. The Abulí, Toth and Adams combo was a dream team I didn’t know I had. Abulí’s first Torpedo story, which I had never read before, was violent, sexy and grimly humorous. Toth’s art requires no description I trust but I must say that I am smitten with his use of the six-panel grid. Ever the minimalist, each panel is worth its own weight in gold, and the pages are pleasurable to look at an arm’s length away I think due to the pattern of square panels that make up each spread. You can hold it away from your face, squint and still enjoy the marks he’s made. Yet, it is Cory Adam’s colors that breathe a helluva lotta life into this comic. If you don’t pay that much attention her color won’t call attention itself, in a good way. It’s not intrusive. She makes it harmonize with Toth’s art in a way that feels natural, but obviously innovative to the keen reader’s eye. Adam’s colors add a layer of realism and drama that elevates the comic to a place slightly above the simple noir pastiche I think. Like I said before, and I’ll say it again, her colors give life and vibrance to dark and demented stories of murder-for-hire and jealousy and infidelity. Bright oranges and deep purples invigorate the images. Airbrushed gradients add depth and texture. Look at the page below’s bottom right panel. Ignore the brash language of a jealous mobster, but look how Adam’s makes use of the lamp to intensify Luke Torpedo’s anguish and isolation. Waiters and patrons look on in icy cool blue while our “hero” only has the lamp to keep him warm. And observe Adam’s subtle shading of the hands and face, it’s nothing short of masterful. Compare it to the black and white version I found floating around the internet, below the below image. Obviously, the black and white art is a masterpiece unto itself, but Cory Adams’ coloring transcends the black and white and I almost can’t consider the original art complete without the color now. ————————————————————————————————— 09-20-2018 – by Niall Breen Share this page: [...]

07/14/2017

Sally IngrahamJuly 14, 2017NewsSally here today with Rachel Masilamani, Joyce Farmer, Eleanor Davis, Zoe Taylor, Katie Fricas, and much more news and comics! ————————————————————————————————————— Rachel Masilamani offers a new comic on the LA Review of Books, one of a series of 20 ” “literary addresses” commissioned by the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center and the Association for Asian American Studies, as part of the Center’s 20th anniversary celebration and its July 2017 Smithsonian Asian American Literature Festival.” It’s pretty gut-wrenching, swiftly bringing into focus the realities of an interracial family in a post-Trump world. Read the rest of the story HERE. ————————————————————————————————————— The incredible Joyce Farmer joined the Virtual Memories show recently and talked about her experiences as an underground comics legend – “The ’60s were a time of explosive interaction and learning of radical ideas. The thing was, I thought they were sensible, not radical.” She’s been involved in comics since 1972, and was instrumental in game-changing works like Abortion Eve, and Tits and Clits Comix. Always controversial but uncompromising, Joyce talks about her adventuresome life and her latest comic, Special Exits – listen HERE. ————————————————————————————————————— Eleanor Davis has been working with the Bronx Freedom Fund (which pays bail for folks who can’t afford it) and StoryCorps, adapting interviews with some of the BFF’s clients into comics. You can see the rest of the story above and two other stories she did HERE. ————————————————————————————————————— Philippe Leblanc reviews Zoe Taylor‘s Joyride on The Comics Beat – “I loved how this comic made me work to untangle its mystery, how I had to read it multiple times to make sense of its ambiguity, its ending and its meaning. It’s like watching a David Lynch film and piecing it’s meanings only to have it crystallized on a second viewing. It’s about escaping, multiple types of escapes, whether from the personal, the social or the emotional. Our protagonist flees from herself, flees the constricting social norms of a party, flees friendship. It’s about finding something through that escape, revenge, love, or a purpose. There’s also an exploration of how time flows in a moving vehicle and how this can be displayed in comic format. There’s a lot to unpack in this comic. This comic looks gorgeous. Taylor’s art is minimalist, using only a handful of lines are enough to depict a woman, or a car and yet, it’s all you need. It’s enough details to give you all the details you need, a woman’s slight look of disdain, the party guests look of confusion, the tears of a woman after an accident. The paper stock also contributes to this minimalist style. It’s a very lightweight paper, not quite newsprint, but not much heavier either. It gives the whole book a feeling of lightness.“ Read the rest of the review HERE. ————————————————————————————————————— Katie Fricas reports via comics on Rei Kawakubo’s new show for Comme des Garçons – “possibly the punkest show ever put on by the Metropolitan Museum’s Costume Institute.” Check it out on Hyperallergic – HERE. ————————————————————————————————————— Also On the Spider Web Alex Hoffman of Sequential State has been speaking to Laila Milevski this week about Enter, Holy Pilgrim, her comic with Ley Lines, and other work – more HERE. Francoise Mouly and Nadja Spiegelman are on Episode 222 of the RiLY podcast, talking about Resist!, the importance of print, and forging your own kind of patriotism – listen HERE. Vanessa Davis has a new comic on Topic, titled Customer Service – read it HERE. Keiler Roberts talks Sunburning with Smash Pages – HERE. Tom Spurgeon via The Comics Reporter keeps turning me on to new comics makers – just yesterday, Margreet de Heer, and Nicky Minus. ————————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 7-14-2017 – by Sally Ingraham ————————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 7-14-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

Leave a Reply Cancel reply