| Daily OCD: 12/10/09 |
[Dec. 10th, 2009|11:59 pm] |
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http://www.fantagraphics.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=Daily-OCD-12-10-09.html&Itemid=113 Starting with today's Online Commentary & Diversions, some minor formatting changes to hopefully make it easier to scan all that text: • Review: "Published in the oversize Sunday page format ala the Fantagraphics’ Popeye collection (also, brilliant), Prince Valiant Vol. 1: 1937-1938 collects the earliest of Foster’s tales of the exiled Prince of Thule. ... The colors are warm and vibrant, and the line art pristine. The stories themselves are a delight. ... The art is consistently stunning... each page is spectacular to behold. ... The strips in Prince Valiant Vol. 1: 1937-1938 are merely the first installment of a massive, groundbreaking, and thoroughly exciting adventure saga that was better than nearly anything during its time, and remains better than nearly anything on the shelves today." – Michael C. Lorah, Newsarama • Plug: On Twitter, The Believer calls Dash Shaw's animated IFC.com web series The Unclothed Man in the 35th Century A.D. "eye-meltingly lovely" • Plug: "Fantagraphics is so cool. If I won the lottery I’d buy a copy of everything they stock and build a library to house it all." Thanks, Anika in London! • Things to see: Comic Book Resources presents a hilarious one-off Peter Bagge strip from Neat Stuff #1 as part of their "Year of Cool Comic Book Moments" • Things to see: Comicrazys presents a bunch of classic Don Flowers strips (via Mike Lynch) • Things to see: Sean T. Collins posts a bunch of updates to his awesome David Bowie sketchbook, starting with Jon Vermilyea • Things to see & buy: Wow, this etching by John Hankiewicz is really something (having done some etchings myself, I know a lot of work went into it), and also for sale • Things to see & buy: How'd you like a refillable glass water bottle with graphics designed by Ray Fenwick (or one of two other artists)? Faucet Face can make it happen (via Drawn) • Real estate: If you have $2.9 million, you could own a house that Charles M. Schulz lived in in the 1970s, reports the San Francisco Chronicle (via Comix 411, who breaks the asking price down to 58,000 Complete Peanuts box sets) |
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| LiveJournal Major Notes: Notification fix, Snowflake cookie avalanche, LJLimerick, holiday vgifts! |
[Dec. 10th, 2009|02:49 pm] |
Tweaks and enhancements- As a number of you reported, a service interruption impaired sending and receiving notifications for a couple of days. This was due to an avalanche of snowflake cookies. We've removed the free snowflake cookie and unclogged the pipeline. Timely notifications should resume shortly. Please note that there's a backlog in our queues, so you'll be getting earlier notifications first. For more details, check out this post at
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) lj_maintenance. - In anticipation of the new year, we've embarked on a self-improvement kick to boost our backend (pun semi-intended). This will allow us to offer you a holiday promotion in the next few weeks (yes, we're listening and working very hard to make it happen). We sincerely appreciate your continued patience and support.
Holiday vgifts are here!
We've added some fantastic new vgifts to help you spread holiday cheer. We also hope you'll honor AIDS Awareness Month by purchasing virtual red ribbons. Priced at $2.99, we'll donate 100 percent of gross proceeds to IAVI.org (the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative) to support the development and global distribution of an affordable HIV vaccine.
Introducing: LJLimericksWe cordially here do invite you
To craft a fine limerick. Might you?
Each week, a new theme,
Then a poll, that's our dream
Winner posted on news to delight you!
In honor of all the brilliant writers on LiveJournal, we've created a brand new community: ljlimericks! Each week, we'll enter a handful of limericks into a poll (which we'll tuck snugly under an LJ-Cut). The winning poem will be published in the following newsletter. In addition, the author will receive a virtual blue ribbon! If you have the time, come drop us a rhyme. Please keep the "Nantucket" stuff on the downlow, since this is a youth-friendly community. Our first prompt is: Insomnia in winter.
Photos of the weekWe're back with more incredible images from our global photography community. Congratulations to ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) sempre_marseeya, who has been awarded a virtual blue ribbon as the winner of our second lj_photophile poll.
We hate to squelch your creativity, but, as a courtesy to other users, please post only one photo at a time and keep the main photo no larger than 350x350 (so images display properly via mobile and on friends pages). You can link to a larger image and/or post photos under a cut. Just so you know, we select photos for the poll blindly, based on user comments and staff feedback. Please continue to vote, comment, and, of course, enjoy. You can check out the week in pictures and view more awesome user content after the jump!( Read more... )
Curtains
Thanks, again, for joining us. Stay warm and safe out there! |
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| The Fun Never Stops! |
[Dec. 10th, 2009|08:34 pm] |
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http://www.fantagraphics.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=The-Fun-Never-Stops.html&Itemid=113 
We hope that in all the excitement over the 3rd Anniversary Party this Saturday at Fantagraphics Bookstore — for which we have assembled the most amazing group of cartoonists ever — you don't overlook the equally auspicious Portable Grindhouse panel discussion on Sunday, December 13 from 4:00 to 6:00 PM. It promises to be both entertaining and enlightening. Participants include artist Lisa Petrucci of Something Weird, the world's premier purveyor of psychotronic film (and the subject of a new art book KICKASS KUTIES from Dark Horse); cartoonist Marc Palm of the exalted Scarecrow Video; Seattle Times pop culture correspondent Mark Rahner and Robert Horton, movie critic at KUOW-FM and film curator for the Frye Art Museum, who together write the acclaimed horror comic ROTTEN. The panel will be moderated by PORTABLE GRINDHOUSE editor Jacques Boyreau. The panel will be followed by a reception and book signing. Don't you dare miss either of these events or you'll regret it to the day you die and we'll be forced to taunt you with the infantile chant "Neener, neener, neener - we told you so." Sure, it's unbecoming, but sometimes we can't help ourselves. [Ed. note: Click on the mural image above to download a high-res version you can use as a desktop background or what-have-you!] |
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| 01/24/09 Homepage Spotlight |
[Dec. 10th, 2009|12:18 pm] |
doorwindowwall
A stunning collection of images sure to delight anyone with a penchant for architectural elements, this talented community, largely from New York, is hoping to attract new members from around the world. Featuring an eclectic variety of photos depicting doors, windows, and walls, there's an interesting balance of interior and exterior shots, many from urban streets, some from ramshackle rural farmhouses. Wonderful! |
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| More Me For You |
[Dec. 10th, 2009|03:07 pm] |
I'll once again be on SLG Radio later today (5 PM EST) along with Christopher Butcher, he of Comics 212/The Beguiling/TCAF, etc. Looks like Chris and Dan Vado will be discussing the recent mini-flap over children's comics and the adult children who have been whining about them. I will add to the discussion by adding nothing to the discussion. Listen live or hear the archive after the fact here.
Later tonight, I'll be doing something or other at Socko Jones' Tailgate party at Comic Book Jones here on Satan Island, NYC.
Next week, Comic Book Jones is having their 2-year anniversary celebration, and I'll be doing shaky sketches and signing flimsy funnybooks there along with Alex Robinson, Brian J.L. Glass and others. Should be fun. I'm hoping I might have an advance copy of Beasts of Burden #4 to show off. Probably not. We'll see.
While I'm here, I'll be a guest at the first-ever NESPA event which will be held in July of next year in Warwick, Rhode Island. NESPA stands for New England Small Press Assembly, btw. It's not a Cthulhu thing. I hope.
And speaking of 2010, and of TCAF, Sarah and I are working on the very distinct possibility of our attending TCAF next May. Fingers crossed. I really loved the show and we both dug Toronto (Emily liked it, too) and hope we can make it happen. |
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| Daily OCD: 12/9/09 |
[Dec. 10th, 2009|12:21 am] |
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http://www.fantagraphics.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=Daily-OCD-12-9-09.html&Itemid=113 Chock full o' Online Commentary & Diversions: • List: The Village Voice 's R.C. Baker names 2009's Best Comics and Graphic Novels. Among the choices: "A lucid nightmare, Al Columbia's dazzlingly well-drawn Pim & Francie features vignettes of its young protagonists menaced by creepy relatives or starring in exceedingly grim fairy tales. These inky visions seem unearthed from the deepest vaults of Uncle Walt's id. ... Anything but Victorian, Nell Brinkley (1886–1944) celebrated the Roaring '20s with sinuous lines and colors as lurid as William Randolph Hearst's presses could muster. Author Trina Robbins notes, in the lavishly oversize The Brinkley Girls, that the illustrator 'closely resembled the girls she drew.' But Brinkley, with her thrilling fantasias of pirate abductions and aviatrix romances, remains an inspiration beyond flapper flamboyance to any young lady seeking to break into the boys' club of high-end illustration." • List: Greek site Comicdom is halfway through counting down the top 100 comics of the '00s. On the list so far: Tales Designed to Thrizzle Vol. 1 by Michael Kupperman at #99 ("Following at a discreet distance from the legacy of Monty Python, Michael Kupperman should be considered a genius by any man who has laughed with the group of Britons"), Billy Hazelnuts by Tony Millionaire at #67 ("In the surrealist vein of Krazy Kat and the otherworldly, oneiric atmosphere of Little Nemo... misanthropy and almond sweetness"), Safe Area Gorazde by Joe Sacco at #60 ("The shock was, however, not an end in itself, since what actually manages to come across is the sense of pain and loss that each of the interviewees had experienced"), and Fred the Clown by Roger Langridge at #53 ("Ingenious comics by an equally intelligent designer who not only knows the history of the instrument and understand what makes it work"). [Quotes cobbled from autotranslation.] • Review: "There have been a lot of great comic book releases this year, but none has the beauty and melancholy resonance of Fantagraphics' Prince Valiant: Volume 1-1937-1938. ... As for Hal Foster, Fantagraphics has given this artist his due and helped place him in his proper context as a great American artist and master of the comics form." – Mark Rhodes, Omnicomic • Review: "Employing a storytelling dynamic not unlike that of Serling’s science fiction classic, Thomas Ott’s The Number 73304-23-4153-6-96-8 is itself a visit... to a dimension not of sound, but of sight and mind that at once both rewards and confuses. ... Ott’s hyper-meticulous attention to how detail relates to used space and negative space is at once both unsettling and captivating, utilizing a form of technical, pen-like cross-hatching for essentially every line that can only be described as Robert Crumb on Adderall. ... The Number is a universally literate work of fiction that is a quick first read with potential for longer lasting examination." – C.R. Stemple, Pads & Panels • Review: "The Unclothed Man in the 35th Century A.D. is a fascinating first animated work [third, actually — ed.] from one of today's most original and unusual artists. Shaw adapts well from the comics page to the cinematic form. ... Almost as well as his comics, this film expresses Shaw's ongoing desire to look at the world from a slightly askew perspective, to express his fascination with the complexity of people's inner universes. ...[T]he film... [is] a probing, emotional examination of what it means to make art and to forge meaningful human interactions..." – Ed Howard, Only the Cinema • Plugs: More Segar birthday/Popeye Google fallout: Mark Evanier, • Plug: In an interview with IFC found by our own Janice Headley, musician Chuck Prophet names Ghost World as a favorite movie: "A coming-of-age teen flick movie that pivots around Skip James’ 'Devil Got My Woman' can do no wrong with me. And shouldn’t with anyone else." • Interview: At Comics Comics, Dan Nadel presents audio of the panel with Gary Panter & Peter Saul at the Brooklyn Comics & Graphics Festival last weekend • Interview: New in the TCJ.com audio archives: Gary Groth's 1997 interview with Charles M. Schulz • Things to see in the future: The Daily Cartoonist reports that the "Schulz’s Beethoven, Schroeder’s Muse" exhibit which ran at the Charles M. Schulz Museum & Research Center last year is moving to an online home a week from today — we'll try to bring you a link when it launches • Things to see: A potpourri of Amazing Facts... and Beyond! with Leon Beyond by Kevin Huizenga (BTW we tend only to link to Kevin's AFAB...WLB strips since he's on our roster, but that's not to give short shrift to Dan Zettwoch, who routinely knocks these out of the park too) • Things to see: An interesting oldie from Bob Fingerman • Things to see: Progress on Tim Lane's Temptations cut-outs diorama • Things to see: Richard Sala's "Psycho Santa Movies," in color! (from 2003) |
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| First Look: Fantagraphics Releases for March 2010 |
[Dec. 9th, 2009|05:28 pm] |
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http://www.fantagraphics.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=First-Look-Fantagraphics-Releases-for-March-2010.html&Itemid=113 
Just as we received our office copies of the new issue of Previews, we've already submitted our March 2010 releases for the next issue, and as always we just can't wait to give our website readers an exclusive first look at our offerings! It's another big month — heck, I guess they all are — with 9 books & comics headed your way. We've got us another Jacques Tardi masterpiece (pictured above), the next volume of The Complete Peanuts, a brand new Hate Annual from Peter Bagge, another great collection of Walt Kelly's Our Gang, our new collection of the earliest Krazy Kat Sundays, and a great, never-before-reprinted Basil Wolverton rarity, plus an R. Crumb classic in hardcover for the first time, and softcover reprints from Tim Lane and Jack Cole! Here's the scoop. |
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| What Did You Like In 2009? |
[Dec. 8th, 2009|09:06 pm] |
I needed some sort of LJ entry to call the Absorbing Man commentary closed. It was fun, and we'll do more of that sort of thing when time allows, but I had to finally leave the bar and go home, if you know what I mean.
That being said --one interesting thing I noticed in the previous discussion (besides how many of you know a lot about Carl "Crusher" Creel, The Absorbing Man (tm)) -- in all the comments made, not one person, as far as I can recall, made any mention of the drawing I posted. I point this out not to goad anyone into giving praise or an opinion on the drawing (especially if it's along the lines of, "it stinks") but because it's a good illustration of an aspect of my career that used to bother me a lot, and doesn't so much now. Basically, my writing often merits a response of some sort, my drawing does not, or rarely does. Let me stress that I'm gratified anything I put out there gets some sort of response out of folks out there. Secondly, I'm not a creator who issues art books or sketchbooks or puts out prints, I know what I am and I know what my drawings look like, I know what my art sells for (or doesn't sell for), and I know where I stand in the scheme of things, cartooning-wise. I've also learned to deal with the fact that humor cartoonists often are perceived as either funny or not funny, and that's pretty much the extent of the feedback unless you are a super-sharp, important satirist like Feiffer (he's funny), or a super-skilled draftsman, like, well, I'd offer up Richard Thompson as a modern example (and he's funny). it's just something that really struck me on this occasion and I felt like discussing it. So, this honestly isn't a cry for attention, or for a pep talk, I'm in a good mood (except for a headache and anxiety over finances, but otherwise, yeah, I really am) and I like the drawing just fine and am glad the last post entertained a bunch of people, myself included. I wish I had time to finish my Mole Man drawing, or the damned Mad Thinker and his Awesome Android piece that I never quite nailed down some months back. Among the several others I started and had to toss in a pile. I will, though, and we'll talk.
In the meantime -- this shit year's almost over, and this shit decade's almost over. Yay. Feel free to toss out the names of some comics you enjoyed this past year. I'm so backed up my list would be somewhat dated (I'm a year or three behind on a lot of stuff: I just read Paris, by Andi Watson and Simon Gane and really liked it, ditto The War at Ellesmere by Faith Erin Hicks, both from my home publisher, SLG. I just picked up the Doug Wright book in April while doing a signing at Bergen Street Comics. I finally read The Rabbi's Cat this year, borrowed from the library --it's great, btw -- just finally catching up with Richard Thompson's great Cul De Sac strip). I loved The Toon Treasury of Children's Comics. Popeye vol 4 just dropped, essential. Hellboy Library vol 3, beautiful stuff. I liked The Simpsons #50 by Sergio Aragones. I mainly read books I get from publishers I'm working for. I admit it. Haven't read Asterios Polyp, it's on a shelf. Haven't yet read The Hunter by Darwyn Cooke. Want to read the new Sacco book. Haven't read Love and Rockets vol 2, series 3, chapter 7, or whatever they call it now. I'm behind on various and sundry Gilbert Hernandez books. Haven't picked up the Rex Morgan book. Haven't read this year's Dick Tracy or Little Orphan Annie volumes, they're on a shelf. Fell behind on the Peanuts books. Haven't read A Drifting Life, yet, it's by my bed, along with Blackjack vol 7-8 or 20 or whatever. I'm ignorant of practically every comic on the web, I admit it, I have no bias against the format or delivery mechanism, I just have no time to stay in touch with any web strips, and I also don't love reading comics off my monitor. or any monitor. I get a headache. Especially if the comic has elves.
Oh, I am enjoying the Steve Ditko pre-code collection from FBI, crazy, pulpy, great junky stuff. I read some of the wonked-out Jack Kirby Losers comics in the book DC put out this year. Can't remember anything else off the top of my head, I know I've read and enjoyed more than that. Oh, well, no big deal. This isn't my job, and I'm not a goddamned professional critic. What I remember is what I remember, so screw it. The list stops there.
Anyway, what did you read and like (and remember) in 2009? What did you not like? What did you hate? What did you avoid like the plague, what drove you crazy, what disappointed, what surprised, what are you looking forward to next year in funnybook-land?
I didn't see any 2009 movies or tv shows (other than what we worked on), or read any recent books, or watch any wrestling, or play any new video games or pinball machines (if Stern produced any). I did listen to some music from the last year, but it was all on WFMU.org or on MP3's, and I'd have to hunt around to make a list that was longer than songs by The Electric Six, The Thermals, The Ettes, The Black Hollies (was the Night Marchers CD released last year or this year? The last Ladytron CD --2008? The Knife --that's old, right --?) and that's where my memory quits as far as tunes go.
Okay, your turn: |
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| Daily OCD: 12/8/09 |
[Dec. 9th, 2009|01:23 am] |
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http://www.fantagraphics.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=Daily-OCD-12-8-09.html&Itemid=113 Online Commentary & Diversions: • List: The American Book Center in Amsterdam names Rock Candy: The Artwork of Femke Hiemstra one of its Books of 2009 • Review: "...[T]here’s one reason why Pim & Francie pulls off the unlikely feat of being more than the sum of its fragmented, disconnected, half-inked parts: it’s terrifying. ... The book... hangs in your head long after you close your eyes." – Martyn Pedler, Bookslut • Plug/Name Drop: Whitney Matheson of USA TODAY's Pop Candy blog calls Dash Shaw's IFC.com web series The Unclothed Man in the 35th Century A.D. "colorful and captivating" (and mentions that writer/director Paul Feig liked Dash's graphic novel Bottomless Belly Button, so that's cool) • Plug: Thanks to Hef for plugging Gahan Wilson: Fifty Years of Playboy Cartoons on Twitter today! • Plugs: Lots of Popeye plugs and Segar tributes today, in addition to Google: Technologizer, Mike Lynch, The Beat, Robot 6, Super I.T.C.H., and The Daily Cartoonist • Plug: "If you ever skipped school to zone out to stacks of rented VHS tapes, or exhausted the wealth of movies at your local video store by 1995, then this is the perfect item for you, or someone like you. Packaged lovingly to resemble an VHS tape from days gone by, the book Portable Grindhouse: The Lost Art of the VHS Box contains some of the greatest crap-rack video covers of all time." – The Incubator • Interview: Publishers Weekly's Calvin Reid talks to Joe Sacco about returning to Palestine • Reviewer: For The Wall Street Journal, Alexander Theroux reviews a new biography of Patricia Highsmith • Things to see: Original Al Columbia artwork for sale from Floating World |
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