Comics Workbook

An online magazine for comics makers

Posted in NewsTagged Busdriver, Chris Visions, Comics Salon, Inechi, INK BRICK, Pittsburgh, pittsburgh comics salon, Quang Comics

Harrison

Posted on June 23, 2016June 23, 2016

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11/28/2016

Juan FernándezNovember 28, 2016NewsJuan here with Ghengis Con Cleveland Check in; Gou Miyagi; Suzanne Ciani; Appplications for the Santoro Correspondence Course. ————————————————————————————————— I was just in Cleveland with the CW gang at Ghengis Con Cleveland. Sally Ingraham, Caleb Orecchio, Frank Santoro, Jenn Lisa and yours truly. I had a great time. Lots of fun. I love my team. John “draw hard” G. organized a cozy, profitable afternoon of comics sellers. He did an amazing job for this special show. This is my third year attending. I grew up in Cleveland, so there’s something very personal about coming back to where I grew up annually. It’s a good rustbelt comics reunion.The local seasons cycle is nice. Healthy. Ghengis Con in Cleveland November as winter sets in. PIX in Pittsburgh in April as spring cracks apart winters icy clutch. I’ll be sharing my experience there with you later this week in my Ghengis Con 2016 Report. The who’s who, the what’s what and favorite books from the show. Stay tuned Got some great photos.Lots of smiling faces, good conversations, hot coffee. No news for today. This is more important. Watch this: Listen to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73hRNJ0YkiM&t=395s Do your drills. ————————————————————————————————— Oh yeah, and don’t you forget that we’re still taking applications for the Winter term of the Santoro School Correspondence Course. Applications are coming in left and right, don’t get left behind! The Winter Semester of the Santoro Correspondence Course for Comic Book Makers – course starts Dec. 29th 2016! 8 week course – 500 bux – 10 spots available – apply by Dec. 13th 2016 and get $100 off course fee! More details can be found HERE – or email santoroschoolATgmail. Santoro School Application guidelines: -3 figure drawings done on blank 3 x 5 index cards -3 landscape drawings done on blank 3 x 5 index cards -3 still life drawings done on blank 3 x 5 cards -draw in a contour line style – Think Matisse – no under-drawing – draw directly in ink -just send small jpgs of images – dont post to your blog pls -specific url links to any comics work you have done. Send applications to: santoroschoolATgmail Share this page: [...]

06/26/2017

Caleb OrecchioJune 26, 2017NewsCaleb Orecchio here with thoughts on the art of Kull the Conqueror #3 by John Buscema and Klaus Janson. Plus, you guessed it, links! ————————————————————————————————— Here are some thoughts on one of my favorite look-but-don’t-read comics. Below are some highlights from the book I always refer to: Often when I am tired or depressed about comics, I will dig out Kull the Conqueror #3 (vol. 3). Penciled by John Buscema with inks and colors by Klaus Janson in 1983. I don’t “read” it because the writing sucks, but I love looking at the artwork. This is during a time when Buscema was no longer the next best thing to Kirby. He’s basically been dethroned by the likes of John Byrne and Frank Miller. He’s more or less the barbarian guy at this point. On the other hand, Janson is really hitting his stride. Post Miller-Daredevil and Pre-Dark Knight Returns, Janson is becoming one of the most sought-after inkers of the 80s. So it’s a bit of a transitional yin-yang comic and it harmonizes perfectly; the solid, “generic” drawing of Buscema laying the foundation down for Janson’s scratchy, energetic lines and rich colors—it just sings for me. The seasoned veteran fuses with the ambitious dynamo. The above spread is one of my favorite “passages” in the book. Notice the first panel on the left page. The clouds are green and yellow without any dividing lines in the inking to indicate any division of color. Usually an inker would have a line to “hold” the colors, basically guiding the colorist where the colors change. But since Janson is doing both, he can think in color. Color and lines combine to a point that feels much more cohesive than most mainstream comics of the time. And look at that torch. Instead of inking the outline of the fire, Janson cuts out the zipatone (dots) to make the fire seem more alive and bright. I also really like how he used brown to yellow to white to show the range of the torch. Again, no holding lines—and notice the sparse inking where he knew he wanted to use brown. I could go on and on about the little ways Janson makes this book interesting, but again, keep in mind that Buscema was a really solid penciler. He literally wrote the book on drawing Marvel comics. The concrete drawing of Buscema I think really let Janson stretch his legs; and I assume Buscema had a generally quick turnaround so I imagine working with Buscema lent itself to an inker or colorist taking their time to push themselves if they so desired. I will cap this off with an excerpt from Amazing Heroes No. 155 where Andy Mengels’ interview with Janson is the cover story for the issue. This is 1988—post-Dark Knight Returns, and Janson is gaining more penciling and writing credits. ————————————————————————————————— if you don’t know, now you know Matthew Thurber writes an excellent article for Artsy–“10 Cartoonists Every Art Lover Needs to Know” Françoise Mouly and Genevieve Bormes talk to Gary Panter at The New Yorker about his new book, Songy of Paradise. Sally covered this last week but I just really like this Mardou comic about her pregnancy and firing her doctor 38 weeks in. If you missed Friday’s post, give this comic a look. It’s so achingly personal, I cannot recommend it enough. I heard about this via Desert Island‘s Instagram—art from Dan Clowes’ tenure at Cracked over on Last of the Spinner Rack Junkies. Last but not least, there’s a new comics publisher in my hometown. This is indicative of Dayton, OH’s cultural taste: horror/fantasy—general genre. ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 6-26-2017 – by Sally Ingraham ————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 6-26-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

07/16/2018

Caleb OrecchioJuly 16, 2018News Caleb Orecchio here with thoughts on “copying,” and other news. ————————————————————————————————— WHAT IF comics adopted this attitude that resembled folk music where, particularly during the revival in the fifties and sixties, someone who wrote their own material was an anomaly as oppose to a standard expectation? The majority of folk musicians learned to play songs like “John Henry” and “Old Blue” before they wrote “Blowin’ in the Wind” or “Black is the Color” and so on. In fact, I’d argue that the reason folk music from that era remains so listenable to this day(to palated ears) because it was so rooted in tradition. These musicians understood this tradition and fused it with their modern sensibilities which created this new understanding of the past and present. Now, I’m not saying comics could or should mirror musical trends of the fleeting Greenwich Village folk revival, and yet, I am amused at the ideas of comic “covers.” Not that this is a new idea. Below is probably my favorite Paul Pope comic, and it is a “cover” (or I guess we can use the word “adaption” since cartoonists make books and not records) of OMAC #1 by Kirby. A reinterpretation, with a 21st Century shake-up. It’s a good comic, and I think worth looking at. The idea is more or less excepted (or expected) among the big two. One of my favorite recent comics is Ed Piskor’s X-Men comic, and part of my infatuation lies in the idea of Piskor making this elaborate yet condensed adaption of the X-Men saga. On top of that, I can’t count the times I’ve come across the rehashing of a Spider-Man or Batman origin story. These are practically folk tales in and of themselves. Or, for you readers who read exclusively indie comics, Kramers 8 features a story by Kevin Huizenga that he adapts from a comic in the Public Domain. I find that interesting. There are actually many other examples in indie comics, but they always tend to be put in the “apocryphal” category of the comics bible. Which I understand, but I wonder if we could change our attitude about these things? I don’t really have an “argument” to convince you, dear reader, that covering or adapting comics into a new comic is a good idea. I just think it’s something to consider. I think the idea would bear fruit. Of course, I hope cartoonists don’t stop making their own stories, but be honest, how many comics really contain good stories these days? Seriously. I think one should at least consider “covering” comics as an exercise when they start out down this winding road of cartooning. ————————————————————————————————— if you don’t know, now you know R.C. Harvey on Eddie Campbell’s The Goat Getters over on TCJ.com. See an issue of The Many Ghosts of Doctor Graves by Ditko over at Four-Color Shadows blog. Rob Clough on Ben Sear’s Ideal Copy. ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 7-16-18 – by Sally Ingraham Share this page: [...]

San Francisco, CA Scene Report

Frank SantoroDecember 10, 2011Riff Raff / Scene ReportsThis article originally appeared on The Comics Journal 12/10/2011 This week’s scene report is brought to you by my old friend Gabby Gamboa. I remember meeting Gabby in 1992 when I walked into Comic Relief on Haight Street in San Francisco to sell my zines. She was the mini-comics buyer. I lied and said that I didn’t make them. I was too shy. She became a good friend and I’m happy that she agreed to do a scene report for that cow town known as SF. Please enjoy. Also, I will be posting a full Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival report soon. Thanks to Dan, Gabe, Bill and everyone who helped put on the show. It was the best con ever on the fun meter for me. XO. INTERMISSION FUNNIES with MICHAEL DEFORGE San Francisco CA Scene Report by Gabby Gamboa It seems like a million things have happened recently, there is so much to report. Fall started with SF Zine Fest, which was once again held at the County Fair Building in Golden Gate Park. It was an inspiring, energetic show that reminded me a lot of APE when APE first started. APE itself was a bit too large and unfocused for my taste this year. There seemed to be a larger emphasis on selling crafts and prints, much less on books and comics. Most people I spoke to said that sales were way down (curse this economy!) and everyone seemed to have a different opinion on what was wrong with the show and how to fix it. It will be interesting to see what direction the show will take in the future, especially now that Wondercon has moved to Anaheim. As a former Comic Relief employee, I was saddened when the Berkeley store shut down recently amid chaos, but from the ashes grew two new very good comic shops that are worth a visit: Fantastic Comics on Shattuck Avenue, and The Escapist on Claremont Ave. Here in San Francisco, the institution that is Al Kizziah just closed his Al’s Comics store after 22 years, and will be selling comics online and at trade shows. After a long absence, Marc Arsenault has restarted Wow Cool, his comics, zines, and music mail order empire, proving that it is indeed the 90’s all over again. You should buy some great comics at wowcool.com. Isotope (The Comic Book Lounge) continues to be a friend to creators and the indie-comics crowd. They recently presented their Isotope Award for excellence in minicomics to Katie Longua for her comic “Rok.” Seeing her around APE in a viking helmet made me nostalgic for some of the cool comics dames who have since moved away. Isotope also hosted a Halloween-themed book party with local cartoonists Lark Pien, Thien Pham, and First Second Books’ Mark Siegel. Isotope is currently hosting a series of comics creation classes taught by Ed Luce, creator of the seriously awesome Wuvable Oaf. Matt Wobensmith and Ed Luce run Gotblud Vintage Zine Store, which sells and buys vintage zines and minicomics, stocks all of your Wuvable Oaf needs, and hosts events with visiting artists like Tom Neely and Dave King (designer of the Crass logo). Needles and Pens continues to be another good place to get hard-to-find minicomics, much like the Rock Paper Scissors Collective in Oakland. Mission Comics and Art on 20th Street just celebrated its 2nd anniversary. It is a brilliant store with the best of everything. Like Isotope, Mission Comics takes comics seriously, so if you want action figures or trading cards, look elsewhere. Owner Leef Smith is very knowledgeable and he is a great supporter of the local comics community. He turns his store into an all-night studio for 24 Hour-Comics Day, he hosts a graphic novel book club and a lending library. In October the Mission Comics Gallery exhibited the Francois Vigneault-curated show Tales, which featured quirky fantasy art by cartoonists such as Dylan Horrocks, Jesse Reklaw, Ben Catmull, Andrice Arp, Kane Lynch, and many others. The December show will be original art from Mari Naomi’s Kiss and Tell graphic novel. Another great thing about Mission Comics is that they host a monthly creator meet-up. There are several other on-going creator meet-ups happening in the Bay Area, including a Berkeley Jupiter Comix Jam that has been happening for at least a decade. And I suppose that OWS is a meet-up of sorts. Cartoon journalist Susie Cagle was arrested along with a lot of other journalists and legal observers for standing off to the side during the riot that followed the shut down of the Port of Oakland. I have been enjoying her sketches from the scene. The Cartoon Art Museum had a great retrospective of local legend Lloyd Dangle’s now defunct Troubletown strip. One of the worst side effects of the demise of the newspaper is the end of great strips like this. They have an exhibit up now that I’ve been meaning to check out celebrating 100 years of The Wizard of OZ comics and newspaper strips. Opening December 17 is “Black and White and Read All Over: Comics of the New Millennium” featuring post-2000 comic strips, including Richard Thompson, Stephan Pastis, Keith Knight, Mark Tatulli and others. And ordering goodies from the online museum store is a great way to support them. Rina Ayuyang and Thien Pham are putting out the monthly Comix Claptrap podcast. Imagine The View, but about comics. Or Fresh Air, but about comics. Thien’s Elizabeth Hasselbeck is a great counter-point to Rina’s Terry Gross. Okay, it’s not like either of those things, but you should give it a listen if you haven’t already. Lit Quake is a weeklong San Francisco literary festival during which a dizzying variety of authors read from their works at venues all over the heavily mustachioed Mission District. I attended When Pictures Speak Louder Than Words at ZSpace. The highlights were a reading /mock-bickering session from Game Over by Gene Yang and Thien Pham (man that guy is everywhere!), Jon Macy reading his classy, yet sexy Teleny and Camille, Christine Shields reading from her beautiful limited-edition children’s book, and MariNaomi reading a creepy comic about bedbugs that can be found on the delightful therumpus.net. I was sad to have missed the LitCrawl event the next night at Mission Comics where Kane Lynch, Justin Hall, Rick Worley, and MariNaomi, but I heard it was smashing. In mainstream news, local publisher Image comics is still making up for torturing us in the 1990’s by putting out great stuff like the Walking Dead and the upcoming Danger Club. Besides stealing some of the best former Comics Relief employees (shout out to Todd Martinez and Biggles @Biggletron), they are also planning to celebrate themselves at the recently announced Image Expo at the Oakland Convention Center on February 24-26. They are welcoming exhibitors and artists, so a Wondercon replacement this may become. We suffered a tragic loss this Fall of cartoonist and Sparkplug publisher Dylan Williams. Though he had lived in Portland since the late 1990’s, he grew up in Berkeley and had a great impact on the Bay Area comics scene. He had been an employee of both Stand Up Comics and Comic Relief. He was an artist and founding member of the Puppy Toss collective, of which I was also a member. He was the main drive behind the unwieldy Puppy Toss minicomics publishing and distribution catalog, which he would finally get right all on his own with Sparkplug. He left behind many friends here, and we memorialized him with a gathering generously held at cartoonist Scott Hsu-Storaker’s house, and then again at a very teary-eyed panel at APE. He will be profoundly missed. As I write this I am getting ready for the East Bay Alternative Press Book Fair at Berkeley City College on December 10. Cartoonists such as Jaime Crespo (winner of Season 2’s America’s Favorite Vato! ), Kane Lynch, Sophie Yanow, MariNaomi, and many others will be there. I will be sharing a table with Primahood creator Tyler Cohen, and I will be selling my new Miss Lonelyhearts minicomic, and original art. By the time you read this, this event will already have occurred. I hope to have seen you there. If you had a time machine, you could go back and visit me on this night as I write to share in my eager anticipation of my future/your past event. Then we could both travel to the future and enjoy the release of my upcoming work concerning a group of young people who abuse their time machine to visit insignificant historical events. But then I would have to travel back again to this night to stop myself from writing this passage so no one can steal my awesome idea for my time travel comic before I get a chance to write it myself. Share this page: [...]

08/23/2016

Aaron CockleAugust 22, 2016NewsAaron here today with Gabriella Tito comics; Julie Doucet interviewed; Marra/Bayer; Laura Knetzger; Bauhaus on the internet; Clough reviews Delporte and Oliveros; some propaganda comics; CW Benefit Auction continues ————————————————————————————————— Homesick by Gabriella Tito This week’s Featured Comic is Gabriella Tito’s re-working of her Homesick comic from earlier this year. Initially made in black and white for Zona #1, Tito incorporated color into the updated piece during her recent Comics Workbook Rowhouse Residency. ————————————————————————————————— Julie Doucet Interviewed at/by 2d cloud i did start my own “label” because the book projects i’m working on are getting less and less lucrative, in the sense that you won’t sell as many poetry books as a comic book. you work 6 months on a book that will have a 250 copies printrun you get 10% of the sales…that means you’re paid at best $300. for 6 months work. it is just not worth it. also i had a few such small projects that publishers agreed to publish…someday…i got tired to wait. and since i can print and all, it really doesn’t cost me much to produce the book. ————————————————————————————————— Benjamin Marra in conversation with Josh Bayer, Tuesday, August 30, 2016 at 7pm The 157th meeting of the NY Comics & Picture-story Symposium will be held on Tuesday, August 30, 2016 at 7pm at Parsons School of Design, The New School, 2 West 13th Street, in the Bark Room (off the lobby). Free and open to the public. A conversation with Benjamin Marra and Josh Bayer. Join Ben and Josh for a lively discussion about process, influences and what it means to be cartoonists who are much indebted to comics history as they are committed to making their permanent mark on comics’ future. Via Ben Katchor, who has been organizing these events since 2012. The Fall 2016 Schedule has been posted as well, so please do try and attend if you’re in the NYC area. ————————————————————————————————— Laura Knetzger was recently podcasted over at We Should Be Friends ————————————————————————————————— Staatliches Bauhaus Via Open Culture, the Harvard Art Museums have made an astonishing amount of Bauhaus-era work available online. Harvard’s web site represents its physical collection, but it does not duplicate it. Many of the small images in its online archive do not expand to larger versions and cannot be downloaded. However, if you follow the guided tour by clicking “Continue Reading” under the site’s introduction, you’ll be able to click on the several dozen examples in each section and see them up close. You’ll also get a thorough survey of the Bauhaus school’s brief history and mission. The best way to access the collection is to click here, then scroll down to the box where it says “Search the Bauhaus special collection by keyword, title, artist, or object number, and by using the filters below.” ————————————————————————————————— Delporte and Oliveros Reviewed Over at the High Low Comics blog, critic Rob Clough takes a look at Julie Delporte’s Everywhere Antennas and The Envelope Manufacturer by Chris Oliveros. On Delporte: While the end has no real solutions in sight for her affliction, she at least is in control of her own fate and own decisions. Delporte’s use of colors is disorienting in a way that’s meant to reflect her own increasing sense of alienation in her own environment. That alienation is something she has to cope with, understanding that the very forces she tried to cling to early in the book were literally killing her and driving her insane. On Oliveros: The book works as a metaphor for any kind of personal endeavor that’s endangered by the whims of the market, and it’s not too much of a leap to transfer the sheer absurdity of a three-person envelope manufacturing concern to an equally small art-comics publishing company. Yet one can see Oliveros in D&Q’s darkest days, betting on the next book to keep the company going. That said, what marks the characters in this book are their unrelentingly obsessive personalities, an obsession that borders on narcissism and self-delusion. ————————————————————————————————— Religion & Comics, Comics & Religion From the Pink News site: The American Family Association, which is strongly opposed to LGBT rights, has partnered with Revival Fires International to give away 65,000 copies of the ‘Truth for Youth’ Bible across the US, encouraging evangelical teens to “commit to give the Bibles to their unsaved friends in school”. The excerpted comics posted in the article are pretty offensive, from a subject-matter standpoint as well as an aesthetic one. The published work is supposedly based on the teachings of the Bible, which, depending on your belief system, may either be a science fiction anthology of dubious authorship or the divine text of the Christian religion. The article is here. Anyway, 65,000 is a lot of funny books. ————————————————————————————————— Los Bros Hernandez Benefit Auction Items From Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez (but nothing from Mario???). Proceeds go towards funding the Rowhouse Residency. Share this page: [...]

06/23/2016

Posted on June 23, 2016June 23, 2016 by Harrison

Harrison’s Daily News for June 23, 2016 starts off in the Salon, drops off midway with Inkbrick 5, and lands with some Busdriver.

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Salon Etiquette

Your favorite correspondent’s favorite correspondent Juan Fernandez reflects on the latest meeting of the Pittsburgh Comics Salon. Ingest your daily vitamins of theory, modular grids, holding the center, and more below.

http://comicsworkbook.com/notes-from-the-salon-june-18th-2016/

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Visions

Chris Visions was at Heroes Con last weekend, where Izzy Renzi took this photo. As soon as he got back…

“’…all of a sudden, for no pahticulah reason… I decided to go for a little run…’ And draw.”

Always moving. Check out The Chris Visions Summer Collection, 2016

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Ink Squad

Alexander Rothman: We’re proud to announce that INK BRICK no. 5 is now available for preorder from our online store!

Yet again our submission pool brought us more excellent work than we could hope to print, and as a result this will be our largest to date. Part of the book is a special section excerpting Jenny Zervakis’s upcoming book Strange Growths, which will be published jointly by John Porcellino of Spit And A Half and Tom Hart of the Sequential Artists Workshop.

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GATOSAURIO

Gatosaurio Grab Bags! Each includes one surprise tee, sticker pack, tote bag and enamel pin plus more surprises like zines, 90s tattoo chokers, a pocket notebook or a coin purse!

inechi.com

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Color is Light

I heart kokooma_, you should too.

instagram.com/kokooma_

Quang Comics

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Thumbs

“Po-pos don’t wan’t to follow me, when they see me in sneakers and cotton tees.”

Busdriver Thumbs out now.

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Comics Workbook

An online magazine for comics makers

Posted in NewsTagged Busdriver, Chris Visions, Comics Salon, Inechi, INK BRICK, Pittsburgh, pittsburgh comics salon, Quang Comics

Harrison

Posted on June 23, 2016June 23, 2016

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08/24/2018

Sally IngrahamAugust 23, 2018NewsSally here with a look at Anne Simon’s “Song of Aglaia” ————————————————————————————————— I found Anne Simon‘s Song of Aglaia difficult, but in a way, the things I didn’t like about it are what makes it interesting. When I am presented with a female protagonist I want to get behind them 100%. When a female protagonist turns out to be complicated and prone to making decisions that hurt the people around her, I have to adjust my expectations. Such is life, of course. Simon demands many adjusted expectations with Song of Aglaia. She begins by upsetting a number of traditional tropes that are usually found in myths and fairy tales. A water nymph, Aglaia, is presented at the beginning of the comic as a fairly typical victim of male violence and oppression. She wants to be happy and loved, and in the pursuit of that finds herself abandoned and with child, rejected by her father, and then forced into a marriage of convienence in order to avoid a punishment of death handed down by a tyrannical ruler. Switching things up from there, Simon draws Aglaia with more backbone than is usually the case in fairy tales. Aglaia fights back, rescuing her children, killing the tyrant, escaping her loveless marriage – but at what cost? Once she has gained power, Aglaia wields it poorly, decreeing her own opressions and abondoning people who care for her. The moral clarity that many fairy tales lay claim to is definitely blurry in this comic. It’s easy to root for Aglaia to a point, but when her choices continue to lead to heartbreak, reality sets in and I am forced to consider that Song of Aglaia is NOT a fairy tale. It is a story that asks “what happens next?” After the male oppressors are overthrown and equality is achieved, when women in fact gain the upper hand and are free to build the world they wish for…then what? The example that Aglaia provides is an all too possible result. There is no triumph when cruelty leads to more cruelty, when the abused turn into abusers. With interesting artwork and good storytelling Simon offers a thoughtful comic, but one that doesn’t answer the questions she brings up. It’s a fairly heavy reminder that in the fairy tale and in real life there are no easy answers. Everyone is complicated and nursing their own wounds, and we are caught in a cycle that often seems inescapable. At best, we can hope to muddle onward, perhaps with a little more grace than Aglaia manages. Although it may sound as though I didn’t like this comic, I do recommend taking a look at it! Somewhere, hidden between asking these types of questions and imagining the possible answers, there lies the potential for discovering a solution – and examining the “difficult” things always brings us closer to that. ————————————————————————————————— Share this page: [...]

09/14/2017

Sally IngrahamSeptember 13, 2017NewsSam Ombiri on Patrick Kyle’s Everywhere Disappeared, plus other comics and news! ————————————————————————————————— Sam Ombiri here: I had a chance to read an advanced PDF copy of Patrick Kyle’s new comic Everywhere Disappeared. (The book has now come out from Koyama Press.) At first I had trouble with this book, but I took the time to read through it twice and I made many discoveries. There is part of the book that feels rather navel-gazy and a bit vain as a result, (for him to be showing work like this). This was an initial misinterpretation on my part, because it looks at first like this new book is just a reflection of how Patrick is a private person. From what I’ve heard him say about this, he is pretty private, and he’ll keep many elements of his work that could be interpreted as personal, hidden. The work then feels somewhat rigid when he’s documenting what we might see as his artistic struggles, and personal struggles. Being who he is, he is doing this in a really roundabout way, and while I enjoyed the book, it’s a little bothersome to sit through. (Although the bothersome aspect became the interesting aspect later.) When I first read the second strip I thought to myself “Does Patrick think his work is in so much demand that we’re willing to sit through this nonsense?!” It’s not as focused as his last book (Don’t Come In Here, 2016), which might answer why any emotional triumph in the beginning of the book feels unearned, and this made me a little nervous, because that was a problem I had with certain parts of Don’t Come In Here. Now I had to read a whole book that was filled to the brim with that problem? I discovered that I should not have worried. I felt at first that there wasn’t any long term investment to be had with Everywhere Disappeared, but as I read more and more of the book, I was proven wrong. Patrick has a big artistic triumph. Everywhere Disappeared is a collection of stories in the form of comic strips. Taken together the book seemed to me to be about taking risks, and people reacting to your insincerity, be it through art or just normal interaction. The first strip functions really well in telling the reader what mindset Patrick is in. The strip that follows just baffled me in how much he’s testing the reader’s patience, as I mentioned above. Then I had to eat my words with the following strips, which were just amazing – hilariously portraying his solutions to his dilemmas in his current role (with the sentiments expressed in the first and second strip, and the answer being the third strip.) Point being, though I felt at first that the second strip was a lousy strip, it really served the book well. It was a step up from just being a self-conscious comic, a major step up – instead of stagnating with his self-consciousness, he advanced. Not only that, but it tells you as the reader that Patrick isn’t suddenly making these big conceptual leaps as a maker. He’s still this guy who you come to to read some fun stuff, and he’s still very much thriving in this territory. At a certain point as a reader of Everywhere Disappeared, even looking back at the Dracula story (the second strip), I realize it’s been really fun and it’s going to continue to be fun. The illustrations are getting tastier and the punchlines are getting funnier. The ridiculous concepts are more acceptable to the reader. There a style that was introduced in the Dracula strip, then a couple strips later we get the pay off with it. Amazing pay off too, when a character does a print with Bart Simpson with Nike for eyes (and that gag only manages to get better). It reminds me of a gag I’d see from Ben Jones, but it’s all Patrick Kyle. By the time I read the strip titled “Glory of the Pile” I knew that I was completely wrong in thinking that Patrick was running out of his bag of tricks. That strip hit me hard. There’s a real impressive element to how Patrick is recycling shapes he normally draws and just uses them here and there, to elicit some kind of emotion or feeling or sentiment he’s trying to get across to the reader. The book speaks its own language now and is super comfortable in it, and this seemingly comes out of nowhere (or everywhere?). – Sam Ombiri Get a copy of Everywhere Disappeared HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Sally here – The Art of Vanesa R. Del Rey was reviewed as an Orbital Comics staff pick recently (Orbital Comics is currently hosting a show of Vanesa’s work!). “Thomas says: I wasn’t aware of Del Rey’s art until her work came in for the show that is currently running in our gallery (until the end of the month) and was absolutely blown away by what I saw. Her work is gorgeous, her line work free and energetic with an exuberant life of it’s own. Even static figures seem to be in motion, breathing with a life of their own. This sketchbook serves two functions; it is a beautiful selection of Del Rey’s work but is as much a glimpse into her life, past, present and future as it is anything else. Interviewed by Frank Santoro, Del Rey is open and forth coming about her work explaining as best as she can her thoughts regarding the human figure, to the influence art has had on her life and is also quite open about her life and her childhood. With a new book out this past month written by the wonderful Jordie Bellaire, Del Rey’s star is in the ascendant and you would be foolish to ignore this talented young artist. Excitingly, Vanesa will be signing here on Saturday 16th September 2017, from 17:00 till 19:00 so come along and pick up a copy of her sketch book or Redlands and say ‘Hi’. Click here for more details.“ Get a copy of The Art of Vanesa R. Del Rey HERE. ————————————————————————————————— There’s a piece in the Washington Post‘s Comic Riffs about Shawn Martinbrough, and how he came to draw Hellboy in a recent one-shot issue of Hellboy and the B. P. R. D. Heavily influenced by the artwork of Mike Mignola as a kid, this was a dream project for Martinbrough, who has been storming the mainstream comics scene for a few decades (more on his story HERE). “Martinbrough…is known for going out of his way to add diversity to the comics he works on. If a story’s script doesn’t specify the race of a supporting or background character, he’ll frequently draw that character as a person of color. That wouldn’t be necessary with this Hellboy story (written by Mignola and Chris Roberson), in which Woodrow, Hellboy’s partner, is a brilliant African American from Chicago. In the story, Woodrow is offended but not shocked when he brushes up against some racism even noticing that the white man he and Hellboy have questions for is more comfortable around a giant demon from hell than a black man. “Hellboy is an average Joe in the form of a large, fantastical red demon with a large stone hand and tail,” Martinbrough said. “The idea of a white guy accepting Hellboy without skipping a beat, but questioning the legitimacy of a black scientist is tragic but, unfortunately, very realistic. The social commentary was a very pleasant and welcome surprise.”“ Read more about it HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 9-14-2017 – by Sally Ingraham Share this page: [...]

04/27/2017

Sally IngrahamApril 26, 2017NewsSally here with the Kugali database, work from Adam Griffiths and Lawrence “Raw Dog” Hubbard, and your daily dose of comic strips by Comics Workbook creators! ————————————————————————————————— I recently discovered Kugali, a curated database of African comics, games, and animation. The three Nigerian founders – Ziki Nelson, Tolu Olowofoyeku, and Maculay Alvarez – spoke to Konbini recently about why they started the site and their continuing plans for it. Ziki speaking here: “My relationship with comics was love at first sight. I started with Spiderman and for over two decades it’s been non-stop. However, at some point I realized that the vast majority of comics consistently overlooked or simply ignored the African experience. At first this was disappointing. I felt like this thing that I loved so much didn’t care about me or my culture. I reached out to my co-founders, both of whom had gone through similar experiences, and our goal was simple: find out if there are any African comics and see if they were any good. Not not only did we discover dozens of amazing comics, we also found awesome video games, cartoons and many other cool projects. The only problem I had with this revelation was the whole discovery process. So, we decided to aggregate all of this awesome content so people could discover the best African content.“ The Kugali blog is an excellent place to start exploring – check it out HERE. The official database can be found HERE. The guys also have a YouTube channel and a Podcast, so take some time to really dig into the comics of Africa and the African diaspora with them! ————————————————————————————————— Adam Griffiths has launched a new webcomic called American Cryo – you can read the rest of the first strip (pictured in part above) HERE. He also released the mini-comic he finished drawing in January during his Comics Workbook Rowhouse Residency – The Permanent Night – which you can purchase HERE. ————————————————————————————————— In his weekly roundup of comics-related stuff on VICE, Nick Gazin spoke to Lawrence “Raw Dog” Hubbard, co-creator of the Real Deal comics (with H. P. McElwee, who passed away in 1998). Lawrence has been working on the comic since 1990, and Fantagraphics recently collected the 7 issues. “VICE: What’s it like to have this hardcover collection of your comics after all these decades? Lawrence “Raw Dog” Hubbard: “What’s it like?” It’s a feeling of euphoria, of validation. Thinking of all of the hard work, hours of drawing and creating Real Dealand wondering, Does anybody give a shit about this? All of the times me and H.P. McElwee took Real Deal directly to the people, the fans, they loved it! But at the same time when we went before the gatekeepers of the industry—publishers, distributors, shop owners—they said, “No! Why don’t you come up with a new superhero?” The best way to look at this is to never give up! If you love something and have a passion for it, stick with it! And whatever happens will happen! And thanks to Fantagraphics, the word about Real Deal will get out to gobs of comic fans who never heard of it before.“ Read more HERE. Get a copy of Real Deal from Copacetic Comics! ————————————————————————————————— Extra Innings Keith Knight was featured on Episode 29 of Study Group‘s Process Party. The Comics Journal shares one last review of Krazy: George Herriman, A Life in Black and White by Michael Tisserand – reviewed by Mathias Wivel HERE. David Betancourt, who has joined the Washington Post‘s Comic Riffs blog team, wrote about Tee Franklin‘s Bingo Love earlier this month. James Kaplan reviews Space Riders: Galaxy of Brutality #1 by Alexis Ziritt and Fabian Rangel Jr. on Panel Patter – HERE. ————————————————————————————————— Blinkers – 4-27-2017 – by Jack Brougham ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 4-27-2017 – by Sally Ingraham ————————————————————————————————— Joanie and Jordie – 4-27-2017 – by Caleb Orecchio Share this page: [...]

10/11/2016

Aaron CockleOctober 10, 2016NewsAaron here today with CW festival events for this upcoming weekend; Chinese Comics; Agnes Martin; Dog City 3; Screening Dash Shaw; Reviewing Safe Distance; Some Notable Comics of Note ————————————————————————————————— Comics Workbook will be participating in 2 festivals this weekend in the U.S. and U.K. Cartoon Crossroads Columbus, October 13-16. We will be hosting workshops and tabling. Join Comics Workbook, along with cartoonists Alyssa Berg and Kurt Ankeny, for an immersive weekend of comics creation. We will examine art and the grid, bringing the strong artistic practices of Berg and Ankeny together with the discipline and rhythm of the grid, as laid out by Comics Workbook founder Frank Santoro. Four hours across two days will be filled with the exploration of a variety of techniques and methods which will inspire the beginner, and challenge the established cartoonist. Comics as jazz; comics as architecture; how a simple index card can transform your sequencing and storytelling process – come join us for an hour or four and take your comics making to a new level. The full festival schedule is here. The Lakes International Comic Art Festival, October 14-16. Join Frank Santoro, Aidan Koch, and Connor Willumsen for some cool workshops and visit table 67 in the Comics Clocktower to meet Oliver East and Jack Brougham, among others. We will be hosting 3 special workshops, “Visual Poetry” with Aidan Koch, “The Hammer Party” with Connor Willumsen and “Composition Competition” with Frank Santoro. Visit our event page for more information. ————————————————————————————————— Chinese Indie Comix Writer, critic, and translator R. Orion Martin has an overview of the Special Comix anthologies published in China during the past 10 years or so: Like other iterations of Special Comix, the artists are working in a range of qualities and directing their work towards diverse, sometimes mutually exclusive audiences. Some artists use the poster format to great effect, creating dense visual landscapes that challenge the reader to interpret them. Yayi’s intricately constructed illustration guides the viewer from one symbol-laden visual to another, refusing to settle into any obvious reading. Similarly, New York-based illustrators Lisk Feng and Jun Cen contribute surreal works that seem to a capture a single moment from a much longer tale. Lisk Feng’s work depicts a troop of Boy Scouts and the creatures that haunt them, while Jun Cen presents a naked woman who has just encountered a giant praying mantis encased in a Mignola-esque crystal prison. Though both these artists come from a background in illustration, they use the poster format to build the foundation for a narrative that could develop in multiple directions. Image above by Chihoi, I’m waiting for you to come back (from Special Comix 6: Transform). Additionally, Martin has been conducting interviews with Chinese cartoonists and artists (Yan Cong, Li Kong, Fanqiao Wang), as well as translating work into English (Bu Er Miao). ————————————————————————————————— Agnes Martin on view at the Guggenheim through January 11 One of the few female artists who gained recognition in the male-dominated art world of the 1950s and ’60s, Martin is a pivotal figure between two of that era’s dominant movements: Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism. Her content—an expression of essential emotions—relates her to the earlier group, the Abstract Expressionists, but her methods—repetition, geometric compositions, and basic means—were adopted by the Minimalists, who came to prominence during the ’60s. Martin’s work, however, is more than a bridge between the two. It stands apart by never losing sight of the subjective while aspiring toward perfection. “I would like to represent beauty, innocence and happiness,” she said. “I would like them all to represent that. Exaltation.” ————————————————————————————————— Dog City #3 CW’s intrepid Juan Fernandez recently unearthed some copies of Dog City 3, from 2014. From his Instagram: I found some of the LAST copies of Dog City 3 and took some to @copaceticcomics – the rest of ’em are safe and sound at my place 😉 Want to bring one of these puppies home?$27 bux postpaid. US shipping only. “The comics expo in a box.” Mad props to Closed Caption Comics for setting the bar way back when. For those of you not yet in the know: Dog City is a small press comics magazine dedicated to publishing quality minicomics. Each issue of Dog City consists of a curated selection of minicomics packaged in an artfully designed cardboard box. Dog City 3 features comics by: Jennifer Lisa, Sophie Goldstein, Caitlin Rose Boyle, Luke Healy, Simon Reinhardt, Amelia Onorato, dw n me, Allison Banister and Tom O’Brien with a collaborative mini, Iris Yan, D. Rinylo – prints and posters by Laurel Lynne Leake and Steven Krall + reprints a selection of strips from the now-forgotten newspaper series Who’s Zoo, which has been restored and compiled by Reilly Hadden! ————————————————————————————————— Making My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea Wednesday, October 12, 7pm, as part of the New York Film Festival, at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, 144 West 65the Street, NYC With My Entire High School Sinking into the Sea, playing in this year’s Main Slate, celebrated graphic novelist Dash Shaw and his team have created a beautifully layered, colorful, and entertaining new animated film. Shaw’s first feature is a comic adventure about friends overcoming their differences and having each other’s backs in times of crisis, and its marvelously complex characters are voiced by Jason Schwartzman, Lena Dunham, Reggie Watts, Maya Rudolph, and Susan Sarandon. This discussion—featuring writer-director Dash Shaw, lead animator Jane Samborski, and producer Kyle Martin—will go behind the scenes to explore the making of this distinctive new movie. ————————————————————————————————— James K. Hindle’s mini-comic, Safe Distance, is reviewed over at Sequential State Hindle sets the stage of the comic with a bizarre chemical spill that only affects his apartment. The strange spill causes an overgrowth of plants and trees inside his apartment, eventually causing the destruction of his home and his disconnection from the rest of the world. The metaphor of destructive change, acceptance, and growth links closely with the way death affects families and people. No matter where you are when you start, you aren’t the same at the end. The grieving, the anger, those final questions – they all change you irrevocably. ————————————————————————————————— B.A.C. 2016 The Notable Comics list from The Best American Comics 2016 has been posted, see if you (or someone you may care dearly for and/or feel massively ambivalent about) are on the list! Thanks to series editor Bill Kartalopoulos for compiling and painstakingly linking to each of the cartoonists and their individual works on the list. And here’s a quick note from Bill K about the B.A.C. series: As Series Editor of The Best American Comics, it is my job to attempt to see as many of each year’s most interesting comics as I can. The majority of these arrive as submissions through our public postal address (below). Others I find by attending comics festivals, consulting with colleagues, reaching out individually to artists and publishers, visiting comic books stores, endlessly scanning the internet, and generally keeping my antenna up at all times. After nearly a year of looking and reading, I forward to each year’s Guest Editor a selection of more than one hundred outstanding works. From this pool of material, the Guest Editor selects the pieces that will appear in each year’s Best American Comics (while retaining, as well, the latitude to bring in some work they may have discovered independently). On the subject of our process, I cannot urge any artist or publisher strongly enough to submit work to Best American Comics. We have a completely open submission process, and all work that is submitted will be considered. Please send work, labeled with contact information and date of publication, to: Bill Kartalopoulos Series Editor The Best American Comics Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company 3 Park Avenue, 19th floor New York, NY 10016 ————————————————————————————————— Have you seen the recent collaboration between Frank Santoro and master jeweler Airi Maeno? Want to help us get Connor Willumsen to The Lakes International Comic Art Festival? Share this page: [...]

05/23/2017

Aaron CockleMay 22, 2017NewsAaron Cockle here today with Roz Chast (and Françoise Mouly); Pan Terzis; Graphic Medicine; Florine Stettheimer; Maggie Umber; Dieter Lumpen ————————————————————————————————— ‘I like taking on complicated, detailed projects, especially if I’m not a hundred-per-cent sure how they’re going to turn out.’ Françoise Mouly looks at the wonderful embroidered piece Roz Chast made for the May 15, 2017 issue of the New Yorker, including an animation of the process that went into making the cover. ————————————————————————————————— ‘Each issue has a secret formula that I have to discover. ‘ Frank Santoro continues his survey of recent developments in Art Comics Risography – this week he talks with Pan Terzis: People want to show up. They want to look at your thing in person, hold it in their hands. They want to talk to others in person about it and look at it at their own pace, without the publisher or distributor knowing how long they spent lingering on a page or whether they got to the end of the book in the same time as 76.3% of other consumers. All of this activity is still happening in the context of capitalist systems of production, supply and demand and distribution, but I think that people who work with this kind of cultural ephemera must know on some level that the real art is what happens in between the object and the viewer, and the consumer of that piece of art and the person they describe it to. It’s inherently a social act, and this can manifest through all stages of the process. People-power is what drives this activity, and just like a blade of grass can slowly destroy a piece of concrete given enough time to push to the surface, I think DIY culture might be the key to breaking out of the mechanistic, algorithm driven nightmare that our tech overlords are driving us towards. ————————————————————————————————— SAVE THE DATE: 2017 Comics & Medicine Conference: Access Points June 15-17, 2017, Seattle Public Library Central Branch ————————————————————————————————— Florine Stettheimer: Painting Poetry The artist Florine Stettheimer (1871–1944) is an icon of Jazz Age New York. Born to a wealthy Jewish family in Rochester, she studied at the Art Students League in New York City and then in Europe, where she encountered two profound influences: the Symbolist painters and poets and, on the eve of the Great War, the Ballets Russes. Returning to Manhattan, she hosted an elite salon together with her sisters Carrie and Ettie and their mother, Rosetta, attracting many of the leading lights of the artistic vanguard. Her circle included Alfred Stieglitz, Carl Van Vechten, Georgia O’Keeffe, Elie Nadelman, Gaston Lachaise, and many others. Among her intimate friends was Marcel Duchamp. Through over 50 paintings and drawings, a selection of costume and theater designs, photographs and ephemera, as well as critically acclaimed poems, the Jewish Museum will offer a timely reconsideration of this important American artist, revealing Stettheimer’s singular and often satiric vision and significant role in American modern art. The exhibition highlights the artist’s distinctly personal style of painting, Stettheimer’s position amidst New York’s artistic elite and avant-gardes, and her continued influence on artistic practice today. May 5-September 24 at the Jewish Museum, 1109 5th Ave at 92nd St, NYC. ————————————————————————————————— 2dcloud in Toronto Maggie Umber has a nice photo-recap of the TCAF show: Some of my favorite 2dcloud convention moments – talking with Carta’s wife Emily about our shared adoration of Junji Ito and Emily Carroll. @cartamonir letting me read Ghost Call on her phone since my Tumblr app never let me read the end last Halloween. Meeting @tommipg and watching them embroider a beautiful panel, meeting @goodcomicsbykim and being astonished by her energy and exhaustion, her humor and her seriousness. Blaise rearranging the 2dcloud table into a better format that sold more books. Juliacks casual yet persistent (and very successful) sales style and her gorgeous book trailer. I was also very excited to meet @artbl0g Xia Gordon when we did a panel together. 2dcloud is publishing a mini-comic with her soon!!!!!! ————————————————————————————————— ‘To be sure, these are the adventures of a white European wandering through the wreckage of a post-war world.’ Lastly, RM Rhodes looks at The Adventures of Dieter Lumpen, by Jorge Zentner and Ruben Pellejero: Pellejero uses color and a confident line to build on top of a very solid foundation. The real appeal of the series are the settings. The premise is that shortly after the war, a German named Dieter Lumpen gets a job as a chauffeur and the first page of the first story finds him being chased through an Istanbul market by a man with a gun. From there, he travels to the Agean, Haifa, India, Sri Lanka, Paris, Manaus, Tunisia and the Caribbean. The appeal of these destinations is Pellejero’s ability to render them almost like a documentary film maker, matter of fact about amazing sights, which adds verisimilitude. The amount of detail on each page means that every time you return to a page, you notice something new. And the stories are very rereadable. ————————————————————————————————— Announcing the Summer Semester of the Santoro Correspondence Course for Comic Book Makers! 8 weeks! 500 bux! Payment plans are available! Summer Course starts June 1st 2017! Applications are due by May 25th. Visit THIS page for more details and email santoroschool@gmail.com with applications and questions! ————————————————————————————————— A Cosmic Journey – 5-23-2017 – by Cameron Arthur ————————————————————————————————— Suzy and Cecil – 5-23-2017 – by Sally Ingraham Share this page: [...]

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