Comics Workbook

An online magazine for comics makers

Posted in EssaysTagged captain easy, copacetic comics, Fantagraphics, Roy Crane

Frank Santoro

Posted on April 12, 2016May 15, 2019

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05/11/2016

Juan FernándezMay 11, 2016NewsTatá Timbó; Carolina Rey on Joung Yumi; Cuadernos del Cómic; Angeli spotlight; Aidan Koch interview; Hernandez Brothers appreciation; new books at Spit and a Half distro; Abhay Khosla on Copra; Cole Closser and the Leroy Lettering System; New Statesman open call. ————————————————————————————————— Shop Spotlight: Tatá Timbó Located in the heart of the San Telmo neighborhood of Buenos Aires, Tatá Timbó is a studio space and book store that specializes in the visual arts. It’s a literary arts space that focuses on youth development through the visual arts founded by Mercedes Fox, Verónica Kaplansky, and Guido Amante. By combining the idea of a studio and a book store they seamlessly blend arts with reading and writing for all ages. Visual literacy and verbal literacy. Children get the opportunity to work freely and wildly while also benefitting from arts mentorships that help them hone their craft. This all allows youth to find artistic mediums and processes they enjoy. El Sol de San Telmo offers a good look at Tatá Timbó’s mission and genesis. This past weekend they put together a small zine fair to bring together the publishing energies of their community. It’s cool stuff. Really exciting to see this kind of thing in Buenos Aires. Among the participants for this zine fair: Nicolás Mealla, Jorge Quien, Musaraña Editora, Marcela Oliva, Juan Vegetal, Pedro Mancini, Delius, Pablo Picyk, PowerPaola, Pablo Besse, Fuga Serigrafía, Luz Marchio, Diego Perrotta, Are you a cop or what?, Alfonso Piantini, Daniela Ruggeri, Miscelánea Total, Fuga Serigrafía, Lino Divas, and Hotel de las Ideas. ————————————————————————————————— Joung Yumi Carolina Rey, creative director of Rey+Naranjo Editores appreciates the work of Korean artist, Joung Yumi during Korea day at la Feria Internacional de Libros in Buenos Aires 2016. ————————————————————————————————— CuCo – Cuadernos del cómic Cuadernos del Cómic is a free digital magazine dedicated to the study and critique of comics edited by Octavio Beares and Gerardo Vilches. It is published twice a year in Madrid, Spain. It’s in the vein of old-school academic journals, but in Spanish, with spanish comics coverage. You’ll want to sink your teeth into this one. ————————————————————————————————— Angeli Retrospective – 40 Years at Folha Folha de Sao Paolo has a feature on the cartooning career of Angeli, one of the forefathers of modern graphic humor in Sao Paolo. Whether you need to brush up on your portugese or you just have to smash that translate button, there’s lots of comics for you to feast your eyes on in this feature. ————————————————————————————————— Aidan Koch interview over at BOMB Magazine. CM You set up an exercise for yourself, in which you deconstructed classical paintings. Some of these are in The Elements of Painting. And there’s a recurring interest in deconstructing classical images or classical symbols in your work. AK For sure, and also life and space and other types of images, too. Seeing what’s important, or what you can make important by pulling things in or out. Like using myself for reference—by not drawing in the background, I’m only focusing on character, but if I started drawing other details, then suddenly there’s all this concrete information that’s competing. So being able to choose where the emphasis lies, all the time, panel by panel, seems really essential in learning about pacing and building. And when looking at paintings, it’s often hard to focus. Especially ultra-dynamic ones or ones that have many characters or little actions happening. Medieval paintings are insane because there’s so much going on all the time. I’ll draw in museums a lot because it makes me look at a painting much more than giving it ten seconds and moving on. Because then you miss all these teeny tiny nuanced emotions or gestures. In case you missed the news on Monday, we are currently featuring Aidan Koch’s The Elements of Painting here on the site. These strips were originally created for and featured on Comics Workbook in 2013. The full collection is now a 14pg, b/w offset on newsprint in an edition of 500. You can buy it directly from Aidan Koch on her site. ————————————————————————————————— Abhay Thinks He Can Write About COPRA Better Than You — Nowhere to Hide – Nowhere to Cry – I Sunk Your Battleship Edition: 666 Abhay Khosla with the comics criticism gold over on Savage Critics. Khosla writes like nothing else. Read it and weep. For the last few years, one of my favorite comics to read has been Michel Fiffe’s COPRA. It’s a comic that I really pretty unabashadely love– one of the few being put out right now where I would talk about it in those terms. But for the last few years, one of my least favorite comics to read people talk about has been Michel Fiffe’s COPRA. ————————————————————————————————— BOLD NEW COMICS at SPIT AND A HALF John Porcellino has got the good stuff over on the Spit And A Half distro site. Hanselmann, Ord, Doucet, KUŠ, Irene, Clotfelter, Van Sciver, de Dionyso, Booth, Picukane, Moisseinen, Franz. Won’t last for long. Get it while you can. ————————————————————————————————— Cole Closser and the Leroy Lettering System I’m an advocate for hand-lettering. I think some comics suffer when the text doesn’t come from the same hand as the line art. That inconsistency can be jarring—and usually ruins my immersion in a story. I letter everything in my books, from the dialogue to the page numbers and front matter. I generally use my own handwriting or imitate old alphabets (like in that first picture), but when I was workin’ on Bow White for my last book, Black Rat, I wanted the lettering to look like the story had been translated from another language. I wanted it more mechanical. I wanted Leroy lettering ————————————————————————————————— Love and Rockets appreciated on The Guardian People are waking up to the master work that is Love and Rockets. Nice.It’s a good time to be alive in comics. ————————————————————————————————— New Statesman has an open call for back page cartoonists. Make something witty & make some $$$. Shoot for the stars, hungry cartoonists and send some samples. ————————————————————————————————— See you next time, hasta la proxima 😉 -Juan Share this page: [...]

09/29/2017

Sally IngrahamSeptember 28, 2017NewsSally here with Edwina Dumm, Tove Jansson, Sophia Foster-Dimino, Carol Tyler, and plenty more…! ———————————————————————————————— Once again I am writing from on the road, as the Comics Workbook team is in Columbus, OH, for Cartoon Crossroads Columbus. I really enjoyed this show last year, and look forward to a rewarding and profitable venture again this year. We pulled into Columbus around 2 PM yesterday and rushed straight to the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum to catch Kevin Huizenga‘s “Talk and Teach” (above). He dug into the ideas about deep time in his series Ganges. It was a nice way to kick off the show. Afterward I went to the BICLM gallery to check out the two shows on display. One is a history of the BICLM itself, detailing the founding acquisitions and how they came about. The other exhibition pulls unique comics from the collection and shares the stories behind them – whether they were groundbreaking strips, or controversial, or by an innovative creator. Everything caught my eye, each comic or strip was totally fascinating and a few brought me to tears (we’re talking original Peanuts strips here, pencil smudges and all). I’ll just share one thing with you today (all stops will be pulled next week!) I was delighted to find about 5 of Edwina Dumm‘s editorial cartoons on display (pictured below). She was the first woman to work full-time as an editorial cartoonist in the US. Her cartoons ran from Dec. 1916 to July 1917 in the Columbus Monitor. The newspaper folded, and she moved to New York City where she went on to create the nationally syndicated strip Cap Stubbs and Tippie, which ran for 60 years. An early version of Tippie seems to appear in the comic below – the dog sitting next to the money bag. Tippie morphed into a more terrier-like dog later in the strip, but at the beginning he looked quite a lot like that odd little fellow! This second strip delighted me due to the glorious “before” picture hanging on the wall. Poor little NEWS! Okay, I can’t resist, here’s one more thing – a drawing by Hal Foster (of Prince Valiant fame) that he made as a child (below). The BICLM has a bunch of his sketchbooks from 1901-1904, and as any great future cartoonist should, he busied himself copying the comics he enjoyed as well as coming up with his own. Hilarious. Today I am zipping out the hotel door to make it back over to the BICLM by 10 AM to catch Leslie Stein talk watercolor techniques, and then hear Signe Wilkinson review her career (she’s the first female Pulitzer prize-winning editorial cartoonist), and Jamaica Dyer discuss autobio comics. The reading room at the BICLM will be full of items from the archive picked out to be displayed by some of the CXC special guests, and tours of the archives themselves will be happening every hour. Oh yes, and around 3 PM the entire Comics Workbook crew at the show will be sure to attend the keynote spotlight on Chris Ware. PHEW! What a day. Obviously there will be plenty more to report on in the next few days – follow CW on Instagram (@comicsworkbook) and Frank Santoro (@santoro.frank) and my own Instagram feed (@sally_ingraham) for “live” updates. Once again, check out the full CXC schedule of events HERE. For the moment, however, I’ll turn my eyes to other parts of the world. ————————————————————————————————— There’s a lovely little article in The Guardian about Tove Jansson and the female characters that populate the world of the Moomins, which were often based on the women in Tove’s own life – her mother, friends, and lovers. She never spoke of herself as a feminist, but she was one in the truest sense. “In part thanks to the support of these women and the characters they inspired, Tove’s entire life was filled with bold decisions: selling satirical cartoons mocking Hitler; opposing war; choosing not to marry or have children; and turning down Walt Disney’s offer to buy the Moomin brand. She was the writer, illustrator, designer and controlled the business side of her creation, not trusting anyone else to do it justice. “She wasn’t willing to compromise on her beliefs,” says Sophia. “Her work says: ‘This is me. This is who I am. Take it or leave it.’ ” “ Read the whole article HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Sophia Foster-Dimino‘s Sex Fantasy (Koyama Press, Sept. 2017) was reviewed on Publishers Weekly. “Each tale is intimate and mysterious, the fantasy of the title often a denial of the harmful effects of desire. With her deceptively simple line, Foster-Dimino has captured deep, dark places where the conscious mind rarely goes.” Read the whole review HERE. Get a copy of Sex Fantasy HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Carol Tyler, ladies and gents. ————————————————————————————————— Okay, what else – let’s see here…. Vice celebrates Annie Koyama and Koyama Press on the occasion of their 10th anniversary – read the article HERE. Sara Lautman has a strip called Spelunking up on Kenyon Review – check it out HERE. Hilary Brown takes a look at Tillie Walden‘s Spinning on Paste Magazine – review and interview HERE. Over on The Comics Beat Rob Staeger interviews Mimi Pond and talks The Customer is Always Wrong. The Comics Journal has a length interview with Brigitte Findakly, who wrote Poppies in Iraq along with her husband Lewis Trondheim, who did the artwork. Read it HERE. Rob Clough reviews Meghan Turbitt‘s How to Eat Chips, and Whit Taylor‘s Fizzle #1. ————————————————————————————————— The fall semester of thee Santoro Correspondence Course for Comic Book Makers starts October 1st 2017. 8 weeks of comics instruction that will bang your practice into shape – 500 bux. Full details about the course and how to apply can be found HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Frank Santoro made a comic book about his parents and now he needs help making a handbound copy of the book for each of them. It’s a good story. Check out the Indiegogo campaign HERE – or if you want to contribute via PayPal, look at the campaign HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 9-29-2017 – by Gabriella Tito Share this page: [...]

06/18/2018

Caleb OrecchioJune 18, 2018NewsCaleb Orecchio here with a brief discourse on the fundamental prowess of Steve Ditko, and more! ——————————————————————————— This Ditko spread is breathtaking. To me at least. It’s so simple. Simple and balanced colors, simple shapes, strong silhouettes, and I love the way he uses hatching to convey the foggy atmosphere. I understand the action immediately. It’s beautifully structured like a painting. Fundamental. Every comic student should be made to copy it. Consider the left page. Notice how the top and middle tiers make an “X” so to speak. They correspond or “rhyme.” You see what I mean? And look, that bottom wide panel opens it up while maintaining the flow of images. And that’s just the obvious stuff I notice! It is not terribly complicated, but it’s smart comics. Ditko is like a good quarterback. He patiently stays in the pocket – he waits he waits – then bang – right in the bread basket! He’s not resorting to hail marys or 180 degree flipping of perspective. The entire page is essentially from the same camera angle, he just pulls it in and out to create tension. Then, on the next page, he flips the perspective to show spacial relations and to keep the action moving towards the center of the page. The result is great sequencing on top of the fact that the spread itself is pleasing to look at as a whole. I can’t stop looking at it. Oh yeah, also check out the Pat Boyette strip in this issue of Haunted #14 (1973) if you can find it – – it’s really good too. ——————————————————————————— if you don’t know, now you know Did you see the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum announcement for the 2018 Lucy Shelton Caswell Research Award winners? One of three recipients was our own Frank Santoro! Go read all about what Frank and the other cartoon researchers will be getting into. Scott Cederlund takes a look at the newest Love and Rockets over on Panel Patter. Elijah Brubaker is the latest guest on Inkstuds. ——————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 6-18-18 – by Gabriella Tito Share this page: [...]

09/11/2018

Aaron CockleSeptember 11, 2018NewsJason Lutes; Sharad Sharma; Dash Shaw; Comics Carousel; Brooklyn Book Festival ————————————————————————————————— ‘Otherwise it’s all just a bloodbath, right?’ Josh Kramer talks with Jason Lutes about the new Berlin collection: What were your main narrative inspirations for Berlin? From a straightforward, mechanical, storytelling perspective, the comics of Herge, right? All of my basic “Comics 101” self-education that I got was from studying Tintin both growing up and then as an adult. And then once I sort of figured out the conventions that Herge was applying, then tinkering them and changing them and making them my own in a lot of cases. In terms of like tone, for Berlin specifically, tone and technique, I think I was I was thinking a lot about Wings of Desire by Wim Wenders, which I had seen in my early 20s, which was very affecting. And the novel Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Döblin which takes a very kind of impressionistic view of the city at the time. And both of those works do a lot of drifting in and out of the consciousness of various people on the street. So those had a big effect on how I ended up telling the story. And then beyond that I would have to say it’s probably a combination of any number of indie films that I absorbed when I was in art school or after. I remember I watched a lot of Jim Jarmusch. Then I remember there was this one year at the Seattle Film Festival where I had press passes. I would just go walk into a movie theater and sit down and watch movies for four hours, not knowing what they were going to be. I think there was a period there where I kind of just immersed myself in cinematic visual storytelling. I think Herge, Alfred Döblin and Wim Wenders would be the three big ones that were the obvious influences. ————————————————————————————————— The 222nd meeting of the NY Comics & Picture-story Symposium will be held on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2018 at 7pm at Parsons School of Design, University Center, 63 Fifth Avenue, room UL 105 (lower level). Free and open to the public. Skype presentation. Sharad Sharma on Grassroots Comics: By the people, for the people. Via Skype, Sharad Sharma, will share hundred of stories of common people using Grassroots Comics that tell a local story. They are a communication tool for all citizens that can transcend the barriers of language, literacy, media access, social classes and even resources. For these reasons, grassroots comics have been extremely successful in both rural and urban, remote and low literacy areas widely in Indian subcontinent. The simple format and participatory methodology made the grassroots comics popular worldwide. In last 20 years his organization World Comics has conducted more than 1200 comics workshop in most remote and disturbed areas of the globe and trained over 1,00,000 common people. He will also share the impact of his work. www.worldcomicsindia.com ————————————————————————————————— “My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea” Screening and Q&A As part of After School Special: The 2018 School of Visual Arts Alumni Film & Animation Festival, we are pleased to present graphic novelist, animator, writer, director, and SVA alumnus Dash Shaw’s first feature-length animated film, My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea (2016). Shaw will be on hand following the film for a Q&A. The feature will be preceded by the short film series Makin’ Things and the world premiere of the short film Noise by another multi-hypenate artist/director and SVA alumnus, Jim McKenzie. The Q&A will be moderated by current student Stephanie Kim (BFA 2019 Illustration). Tuesday, September 11, 2018, 7:30-10PM SVA Theatre 333 West 23rd Street New York, NY 10011 ————————————————————————————————— Comics Carousel at Society of Illustrators A special Carousel at the Society of Illustrators for the Brooklyn Book Festival. Presentations of graphic novels and comics as read by the artists: Jordan Crane (We Are All Me) Maria Hoey (COIN-OP Comics Anthology) Paul Levitz & Tim Hamilton (Brooklyn Blood) Connie Sun (@cartoonconnie) Ngozi Ukazu (Check, Please!) Kriota Willberg (Draw Stronger) and more! The event will be followed by a book signing. Hosted by: R. Sikoryak (Terms and Conditions, The Unquotable Trump) THIS IS AN OFFICIAL 2018 BROOKLYN BOOK FESTIVAL EVENT Society of Illustrators 128 East 63rd Street NY, NY 10065 Monday, September 17, 2018, 7-9pm Tickets: $10 General Admission ————————————————————————————————— Brooklyn Book Festival Comics-related Panels: September 16, 2018, 12pm Find Your Family Brooklyn Historical Society Library, 128 Pierrepont St Refugees, outcasts, inheritors of hard history — whoever we are, we all struggle to find the human connections that make us safe. Caldecott Award-winning illustrator/author David Small (Home After Dark), New Yorker cartoonist Liana Finck (Passing for Human), and anthropologist Bessora (Alpha) explore the universal yearning for defining and keeping what we think of as family. Moderated by agent and editor Anjali Singh, Ayesha Pande Literary. September 16, 2018, 1pm TV vs. Reality Brooklyn Historical Society Library 128 Pierrepont St When on-air celebrity and imagery shape your earliest memories, how do you reconcile it all with the hard realities of adulthood? Catch the wide-ranging experiences, from quiz kids to musicals to stand-up comedy, of comics creators Michael Kupperman (All The Answers), Box Brown (Is This Guy for Real?), and Rina Ayuyang (Blame This on the Boogie). Moderated by Joan Hilty, Comics Editor at Nickelodeon. September 16, 2018, 2pm Two-Ways — Weird Romance Brooklyn Historical Auditorium, 128 Pierrepont St Two astoundingly accomplished team-ups of authors explore their many attractions to weird romance and speculative fiction, and all the things that happen when you create genre-bending graphic novels in collaboration! Audrey Niffenegger and Eddie Campbell (Bizarre Romance) and Alex de Campi and Katie Skelly (Twisted Romance) . Moderated by Tor Books editor Diana Pho. September 16, 2018, 4pm The Graphic City Brooklyn Historical Auditorium, 128 Pierrepont St In alternately gripping, funny, and tragic graphic novels about urban history, Julia Wertz (Tenements, Towers & Trash), Peter J. Tomasi (The Bridge), and Jason Lutes (Berlin) take us high up to skyscraper views of two great cities flanking the Atlantic — and beyond. Moderated by Publishers Weekly senior news editor Calvin Reid. ————————————————————————————————— Cement Mixer – 9-11-18 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

04/21/2016

HarrisonApril 21, 2016News Daily News returns for April 21, 2016. In the classifieds we’ll hear conversations about careers in comics, near the editorials we examine new formats in web comics, and near the back page ads we traverse the Aquazone. True + Real Talk Julian Lytle and Martheus Wade delve into the topics of fandom, career decisions, industry mire, Decepticons, and haters in this episode of Ignorant Bliss. The discussion about fandom and popularity is one that I hope gets explored by other artists in the future. Memories Check out this web comic from Australian artist Sutu about his grandfather. Wear some good headphones if you can, and make sure to keep scrolling downwards. Experiments with interactivity are areas that I hope other comic artists explore more in the future. Samir and Dunia al-Ahdath “Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum has recently added first year print-runs of two important Arab comics magazines: The Egyptian magazine Samir (founded in 1956) and the Lebanese magazine Dunia al-Ahdath(founded in 1954). Both collections reflect early articulations of mass print culture for children in Egypt and Lebanon and reveal intriguing intersections between popular culture, nationalism, mass education, and gender in a period of early postcolonial nation building.” – Caitlin McGurk. Here. Archives “ZINES OF THE ZONE is a traveling library dedicated to self-published photo books, photo zines, fanzines using photography (even as a document) – any DIY printed matter related to photography. Since January 2014, we traveling across Europe by van – in order to show our collection to people, organize pop-up events, collect new books and meet local publishers. More than a library, it is a traveling zine-exhibition.” Not comics (I know), but going along with the digital archives of zines from earlier in the week, these guys in Europe have an interesting collection practice going on. Look through the rest of their collection, and if your curious check out the submission guidelines. Detroit vs. Everybody Read up here, and enjoy your Thursday. Share this page: [...]

Captain Easy

Posted on April 12, 2016May 15, 2019 by Frank Santoro

Frank talks about Captain Easy, Roy Crane’s seminal comic strip.
Available at Copacetic Comics: http://www.copaceticcomics.com/comics/captain-easy-volume-one

Video by Michael Pisano | www.michaelpisano.com

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Comics Workbook

An online magazine for comics makers

Posted in EssaysTagged captain easy, copacetic comics, Fantagraphics, Roy Crane

Frank Santoro

Posted on April 12, 2016May 15, 2019

Explore

06/05/2017

Caleb OrecchioJune 4, 2017NewsCaleb Orecchio here with thoughts on recently read comics by Mickey Z, Matthew Thurber, and Jillian Tamaki, and enough links to make a cat bark. ————————————————————————————————— Below are some thoughts on some recent comics I’ve read. Three very different comics by three very different cartoonists. Mostly, I’ve been thinking about how people draw so that is reflected herein. RAV 2nd Collection by Mickey Zacchilli (Youth in Decline)–buy it here As is always the case with a Mickey Z comic, 2nd Collection is hilarious. She shares comedic DNA with Rumiko Takahashi. Often it is the aside remarks and the contrast of character personalities that take you off guard and make you laugh out loud. Michael DeForge writes in the introduction, “Mickey’s comics always feel as though they’re about to come apart at the seams, but they never do.” This is true on many levels. First, my copy of RAV 1st Collection is literally falling apart at the seams of the binding (when I talked to Youth in Decline proprietor, Ryan Sands, at CXC 2016 he assured me this would be less likely to happen for the 2nd Collection. So far so good!) Second, Mickey’s drawings are thin, scratchy and chaotic, she uses the digital gray zippatone effect to strengthen and hold up her loose drawings. The gray layer allows for the drawings to keep their first-take raw energy and act as the concrete for the scaffolding—the lines. The product of such an alchemy that is unabashedly manic and energized. I imagine sparks flying off her pen when she draws, and her hair standing on end due to the effect—like Goku going super-saiyan or something. Art Comic #1-5 by Matthew Thurber (Swimmers Group)–buy issues here Art Comic is a satirical fairytale of contemporary art. Thurber is achingly smart. Every comic he’s done—including this one—are just filled to the brim with intelligence and rarely unparalleled whit that harmoniously blends with his traditionally-minded cartooning to make an intellectual’s dream comic. Thurber’s drawings feel like actual drawings rather than “inked drawings.” There is almost no embellishment to his lines which creates an intimacy many comics lack (Noah Van Sciver is another cartoonist who I think fits this bill). To me, having embellished inking, digital color, etc., can be like adding a drum kit to a band—everything else has to be turned up and some of the camaraderie between performer and audience is lost. I’m not trying to put down any other way of cartooning or music—Highway 61 Revisited is one of my favorite albums; but Thurber, as a cartoonist, is the lone musician on the stage singing to his attentive and perceptive audience. Simple chord changes and finger picking, with astute, biting lyrics allows us to listen and think. Boundless by Jillian Tamaki (Drawn & Quarterly)–buy it here You may know her from many things. Most notably, you may know her from Caldecott Honor winning graphic novel she drew in collaboration with her cousin Mariko Tamaki, This One Summer. A skill, I think that is underrated these days is the ability to be just the drawer AND the author—and the part that goes under appreciated is the ability to do both very well. I’m trying to keep this post brief so I’ll get to the point, Tamaki’s drawing is among the best in the business among or better than such cartoonists as David Mazzuchelli, Connor Willumson, Jaime Hernandez–you name ’em! I am especially taken with what I call her “children’s book” style of drawing. Strings of squiggles and shifty lines come together in perfect harmony to create simple, plump people, animals and plants that seemed to be ripped right out of my childhood subconscious. At first the drawing reminded me of Sendak—Little Bear specifically—but less stiff. Then I think more and I think of all the little drawings and illustrations I saw in old kid’s nature magazines, craft magazines, story book anthologies, songbooks, etc. I guess what I’m trying to say is that this children’s book drawing style feels new, old, elusive, and familiar at the same time, and I’m left baffled by Tamaki’s prowess of craft. ————————————————————————————————— if you don’t know, now you know Whoa! NY Times does a “New York Issue” as an all-comics issue where cartoonists collaborate with NY Times reporters that you can read online here. I’m personally most excited about the Mazzuchelli strip! Noah Van Sciver has an interview over at Fumettologica on the occasion of his book, Disquiet, being published in Italy by Coconino Press. Please read this particularly good strip by Noah, featuring Simon Hanselmann! John Porcellino has an interview on Study Group’s Process Party. Chris Ware writes about Saul Steinberg’s drawing over at The New York Review of Books. Paste Magazine has a preview of the upcoming Street Angel book. Two days after Drawn & Quarterly announced that they were publishing Berliac’s graphic novel Sadbøi, the publisher took it off their publishing schedule and issued “An Apology” amid an escalating hullabaloo. The Comics Beat has more of the story. Berliac’s own statements were posted on his Facebook. Comic Book Resources reveals Matthew Thurber’s cover for the next Best American Comics. Happy to see Ben Katchor is the editor! Should be interesting. Jason Wood interviews Andrew MacLean over on 11 O’Clock Comics. MacLean and his Head Lopper series is a favorite among my pals here in Dayton. Finally, Heroes Con looks to be a good show this year with some great guests. ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 6-5-2017 – by Gabriella Tito ————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 6-5-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

11/02/2017

Sally IngrahamNovember 1, 2017NewsSally here with comics by Ben Passmore, Whit Taylor, Robb Armstrong, Stephen Bentley, Morrie Turner, and many more! ————————————————————————————————— The African American Literature Book Club (AALBC) has a page on their site devoted to nationally syndicated cartoonists of African decent. They list 12 cartoonists who have/had strips in newspapers or available via online syndicates, and include bios and information about each of them. I’m not sure when the page was last updated (some of the info listed under “Where to Submit Your Portfolio” is a bit outdated) but it’s a good reference nonetheless. Check out the list HERE. Above is a strip by Robb Armstrong, who started drawing JumpStart in the late 80’s. You can catch the strip daily on GoComics – HERE. Here’s a recent strip by Stephen Bentley. Herb and Jamaal also appears daily on GoComics – read it HERE. Bentley made comics while he was in the Navy, then worked in advertising for a long time before starting to draw Herb and Jamaal in 1998. The AALBC list also includes Barbara Brandon, creator of Where I’m Coming From, and daughter of Brumsic Brandon Jr. I wrote about Barbara a few weeks ago, and about her father and his Luther strip before that. Brumsic Brandon Jr. isn’t mentioned on the AALBC list, but Morrie Turner is. He created the first syndicated comic strip that featured integrated characters – Wee Pals. It wasn’t particularly well received when it came out in 1965, running in only one paper – but after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. the strip rose in readership and found its way into over 100 papers. (Brumsic Brandon Jr.’s Luther also rode that wave, coming out in 1968.) It was Charles Schulz, a friend and mentor of Morrie Turner’s, who encouraged him to draw a strip with integrated characters, after Turner pointed out the lack of one in the papers of the day. Schulz shared his contacts from the world of syndication, and the strip eventually took off. You can read more about Turner, and his barrier-breaking comics, in this New York Times tribute. ————————————————————————————————— Whit Taylor has a comic on The New Yorker – Things That Should Come With Trail Periods – one such thing is shown above. There are many more things HERE. ————————————————————————————————— More on the Comics Web Ben Passmore has a comic on The Nib about Whose Free Speech? Black Lives Matter, the ACLU, and Respectability Politics. Check out the work of Gado, a Tanzanian political cartoonist who lays claim to being the most syndicated cartoonist in East and Central Africa – his comics and bio can be found HERE. Here’s work by Zimbabwean cartoonist Tony Namate for you – he’s survived bomb attacks on the Daily Nation twice, and hasn’t given up on comics yet. A slideshow of his work can be viewed HERE. In fact, here is a whole list of the Top 10 Cartoonists in Africa. Here’s an article about how Aboriginal characters and ideas appear in numerous mainstream comic books, but are rarely created by Aboriginal artists or writers – lots of pictures and some interesting reading. One creator mentioned in the above article is Brenton E. McKenna, a Yawuru artist and writer who made the series Ubby’s Underdogs – check it out HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 11-2-2017 – by Gabriella Tito ————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 11-2-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio ————————————————————————————————— Cozytown – 11-2-2017 – by Juan Fernandez Share this page: [...]

08/25/2016

Sally IngrahamAugust 25, 2016NewsSally here, bringing you a look at some of Pittsburgh’s born or borrowed cartoonists (Ed Piskor, Yona Harvey, Ben Sears) as well as another read through that Trevor Von Eeden interview. ————————————————————————————————— Yona Harvey is a Professor of English at the University of Pittsburgh – and Marvel’s first black female writer. She is working on a 10-page story for the upcoming Black Panther spin-off series, World of Wakanda. “Harvey says, as a poet, she’s always considered herself a visual thinker, and explained how poets, like comic writers, have to condense life into as few words as possible. “I think it’s more in the thinking, like when you’re a poet you do sort of shrink moments,” she said. “A lot can happen across the day, from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed. There’s something about when you’re a poet, you’re able to sort of zero in on very specific moments, maybe the most tense or terse moments of the day, and I like putting that way of thinking to use for a comic. Because you do have to be super precise.” Though the writing shares some craft elements, the audience crossover between poetry and comics isn’t one-to-one, according to Harvey. “I’ve had friends who have said, ‘Man, it’s been years since I’ve read a comic book,’ or ‘I’ve never read a comic book and this’ll be the first time that I’m reading a comic,’ and that’s really exciting to think about poets who are reading comics for the first time,” she said.“ Read the rest of the article HERE and keep an eye out for this series soon (the bulk of which has been written Ta-Nehisi Coates and Roxane Gay, with artwork by Alitha Martinez and Afua Richardson.) ————————————————————————————————— Ed Piskor‘s Hip Hop Family Tree Vol. 4 was featured on NPR recently – Etelka Lehoczky wrote about the “bubbles” in the work, “phenomena that inexorably head skyward, pop suddenly and create a roiling surface“, or the numerous artists who kept the stew at the boil throughout ’84 and ’85. She revels in Piskor’s use of color, always part of the wonder of these books. Check out the whole thing HERE. Another Piskor-related thing that’s been on my mind is this picture that showed up on his Instagram a few weeks ago. What gives?! Giant HHFT cover burner on the wall at the Smithsonian in DC. A photo posted by Ed Piskor (@ed_piskor) on Aug 1, 2016 at 12:08pm PDT I know where I’ll be headed in the summer of 2018…! Ed Piskor has always been an unstoppable force, quietly conquering the world, and now with the announcement last week that Hip Hop Family Tree will soon be an animated TV series (yes you heard me right! – check it out HERE) – it seems like the world has noticed and won’t soon be forgetting. ————————————————————————————————— Ben Sears is in Pittsburgh this week for a Comics Workbook Rowhouse Residency – which of course includes field trips to Copacetic Comics to look for treasures with Frank. Check out Ben’s book Night Air (Koyama Press, May 2016) and stay tuned for more of his Rowhouse adventures! ————————————————————————————————— Last week we mentioned the incredible interview with Trevor Von Eeden, and if you haven’t gotten a chance to read it yet, here’s your reminder. There was one detail from the interview that’s worth another look. There’s a yet unpublished – “…Black Lightning/Superman comic book called Sources commissioned by DC Comics, written by new Batman writer Tom King especially for Von Eeden to draw when he was both undergoing and recovering from cancer surgery.” – Rich Johnson via Bleeding Cool Find more of Von Eeden’s artwork (below) for this future project HERE. Also be sure to give Trevor Von Eeden’s Kickstarer campaign for the series The Hard Code (with Ramon Gil) a look! ————————————————————————————————— This is Sally signing off – Harrison will be back with your Thursday music choices next week! Share this page: [...]

06/15/2016

Juan FernándezJune 15, 2016NewsJuan Fernandez here with: los Cómics españoles en Bologna;lo nuevo de TIK TOK; las novedades del Club de Dibujo; Juan Diaz Canales’ COMO VIAJA EL AGUA; Santiago García y el arte del guion. ————————————————————————————————— Off the site: Report: Spanish Art Comics Day in Bologne Serena Di Virgilio over at Italian comics criticism hub, Just Indie Comics, has a great report on the Spanish Independent Publishing panels and exhibitions from this May in Bologne. Lots of inspiring photos and a great primer on some of the most exciting contemporary makers of Spanish speaking comics from around the world making comics in Spain. Thursday, May 26 BilBOlbul Spring / Summer 2016 , preview of Bologna balloon festival, a meeting dedicated to Olaf Ladousse, Klari Moreno, Roberto Massó and Martín López Lam, and an exhibition of the latest works of the latter. The four authors, mostly unknown in Italy, living in Spain and selfpublishing their creations. Apart from that, it is a rather heterogeneous group that presents a stimulating variety of imaginary and experiences. ————————————————————————————————— Novedades/New over on TIK TOK Cómics: ¡Click through to read/Dale click para continuar a los comics! ————————————————————————————————— Club de Dibujo – Weekly Drawings from Around Latin America Club de Dibujo es la publicación serial de un grupo de artistas latinoamericanos que envían cada semana un nuevo dibujo. La curadora es Adriana Lozano. Check them out and stay atop the refreshing and raw wave of Latin American illustration and comics! ————————————————————————————————— Rafael Villa con Martín Cáceres: El Sueño de la Máquina Here’s a neat interview of Martín Cáceres in the latest edition of Chilean arts periodical La Panera. The interview starts on page pg. 32 of the PDF, surrounded by lots of interesting contemporary arts and culture from Chile 😉 ————————————————————————————————— Juan Díaz Canales y Como Viaja el Agua Juan Díaz Canales, best known in the states for his work on the Blacksad series with Juanjo Guarnido, sits down and talks with Bilbao 24 horas about his ventures into his first solo graphic novel, Como Viaja el Agua. P.: “Como viaja el agua” es tu primer trabajo como autor completo. ¿Cómo afrontas el reto? R.: Como una experiencia más. Así es como me voy planteando el resto de cosas en la vida. Como apasionado de los tebeos es algo que quería hacer desde hace tiempo. También es cierto que, al no tener un pasado fanzinero tenía algo de miedo. Sin tener ese bagaje, me he enfrentado a un libro de 90 páginas. El riesgo era alto pero ha llegado un momento de madurez profesional y eso me ha dado algo de seguridad para afrontarlo. ————————————————————————————————— Diego Cuevas y Iván Galiano interview guionista Santiago García Over on Jot Down, EL PAIS’ contemporary culture magazine, there’s a solid interview with Spanish comics writing all star, Santiago García. If you’re not familiar with García, take note! He’s one of the most popular writers of comics in Spain. An auteur comics writer if you will. Smash that google translate button if you need to for all the juicy details of García’s creative formation, the nature of his collaborative process with artists and his hopes for the future. P: Estudiaste Periodismo e Historia del Arte. ¿Las hiciste pensando en trabajar en algo relacionado con los cómics? R: No. No sabía lo que iba a hacer. Empecé Filología Inglesa y en mitad de ella me fui a la mili. Cuando volví en vez de retomarla me fui a Periodismo en la Complutense. Fue la carrera que hice con veinte años. Años después, con treinta y cinco, hice Historia del Arte. A mí me gustaban mucho los tebeos. En realidad lo que me ha gustado siempre es el papel impreso, la prensa, los periódicos, las revistas y los libros. Yo lo que quería hacer era papel impreso. Probablemente en orden de preferencia los cómics eran lo primero, pero yo me veía de periodista. Aparte, Peter Parker era periodista, Clark Kent era periodista, era la profesión que lo aunaba todo . ————————————————————————————————— hasta la proxima! (Share the love you have. Nunca sabes que pasara…) JF Share this page: [...]

05/02/2018

Juan FernándezMay 2, 2018los Cómics / News Marcela Trujillo, Power Paola, Elisa McCausland, Autoras de Cómic + Digital Comics Museum’s Access Month —————————————— Los cómics y las noticias que me han llamado la atención esta semana: ~ en Español y “sometimes in English” ~ —————————————— Digital Comics Museum – Access Month For this month of May 2018 every user who donates to the Digital Comics Museum, the best site for downloading FREE public domain Golden Age comic books, will be given FTP access as an alternate method to download files from the 21000+ Digital Comic Museum collection. For each dollar donated donors will receive 5 gigs of file downloads over the next 31 days from the day the donation was made. Click on the Donate link here (or at the top of the page) to contribute to the cause and receive your FTP login info in an email. For the last two years our FTP Access Month has been remarkably popular. Donations to the site are vital for keeping our server bill covered. These FTP Access Months help DCM build a reserve fund for those months we come up short in our monthly goal of $288 or if there is an emergency such as a hard drive that needs replacing in our servers. —————————————— De Frente Me Escondo – Cali, Colombia Este sábado 5 de mayo, desde las 3:00 p.m. en el Museo la Tertulia inaugurará la exposición y conversatorio “De frente, me escondo”, que intentará poner en escena el mundo de la artista colombo-ecuatoriana Power Paola con sus dibujos. —————————————— Marcela Trujillo y los Abusadores de Poder – Chile Hoy en el DesconCierto, dibujante Marcela Trujillo revela vergonzoso episodio de abuso de poder y acoso laboral de Rodrigo Salinas, Carlos Reyes y otros editores de Feroces Editores. Me acusaron que me había robado la plata. Llamé y les devolvieron la plata al día siguiente. Y a la semana hicieron programa en Internet donde invitaron a dibujantes y dijeron: ‘Invitamos a una dibujante chilena muy conocida, Marcela Trujillo, que venga Maliki’… y llegó una vedette argentina, casi en pelotas, con plumas, bailando. Estaban todos súper curados en el video. Le tocaban el poto, le ponían la cabeza entre las tetas y en la tele ponían ‘Marcela Trujillo, Maliki‘, ¡todos mis nombres! La hicieron dibujar y ella dibujó un corazón y empiezan ‘ah que dibuja bonito la Maliki’. Yo no lo podía creer, eran mis editores, mis amigos, eso no se puede hacer. Cómo tan machista, tan indigno. Después me llamó la hermana de Rodrigo para retarme porque hablaba mal de su hermano en Internet. Eso fue lo único que recibí de ellos, porque nunca nadie me pidió disculpas. Léanlo todo AQUI. —————————————— Fanzine Magazine – 26/04/2018 Ya disponible el #FanzineMagazine donde Mireia Pérez y Víctor Coyote hablan largo y tendido con Elisa McCausland sobre la trayectoria del colectivo de Autoras de Cómic y de otras cosas ocultas… Además Cynthia Alfonso les recomienda a viva voz sus canciones para dibujar. —————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 5-2-2018 – by Sally Ingraham Share this page: [...]

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