Anticipation & Convergences

I have finished eleven reviews over the last three months.  I write these reviews because I like the books and I want to let everyone know how to find and support them.  The thing is once I publish a review I continue to get updates from and about artists.  As I move on to the next artist I am getting all these awesome little tidbits that I haven't been sharing.  I asked Geoff Vasile for permission to use images from his books.  He said sure.  He also said that he was moving most of his web-presence to The Geoff Vasile Show! on tumblr.   I bit the bullet and set up a tumblr account.  I found out that about half of the artists who had stopped updating their web pages are now posting on tumblr.  On a side note, Vasile posted this new slick silk screened cover for issue four of Trackrabbit.

Robinson's take on Fin & Jake

Now on tumblr, I have started to see Andy Hirsch promoting this Adventure Time book that Liz Prince had been mentioning.   Not having Kids or cable I really had no idea what Adventure Time is.  Everyone else seems to already have been keyed into Adventure Time.  The young woman running the register at Austin Books all but rolled her eyes at me when I asked if all the issues of Adventure Time had back-up stories by indie artist.  Turns out I had been seeing a lot of Adventure Time fan art floating around the intertubes.  I just had failed to draw the connection.  Unsurprisingly Alex Robinson's attempt at The Wonderful World of Alx Robinson is both awesome and a little freaky.

Hirsch did the art for the B alternate cover for the third issue of Adventure Time:Marceline and the Scream Queens.  He will also be doing a cover of another issue in November.  Hopefully this is a good link, if not he posted both covers at It's Andy Hirsch.   The six issue Marceline series were done by Meredith Gran.  Gran has been rocking out her own web-comic called Octopus Pie.  Octopus Pie: There Are No Stars In Brooklyn, is a hoot and brought back the few fond memories I have of Brooklyn.  Hirsch 's cover highlights Liz Prince's seven page back-up story.  I ran out and got it but starting at issue three of six left me a little at sea.  Gran's work seams like some solid story telling.  Prince's back-up story Fruit Salad Days is hilarious and stands on its own.  With the Hirsch cover it is totally worth the cover price all on its own.

Prince with Hirsch's Cover

So that's where things I had been anticipating converged.  Some of the other things I am looking forward to have been in print for years.  Following Alex Robinson on social media is a reminder that I have three more reviews of already published work, that I hope to explore here. He also keeps on putting out teaser pages for the book he is currently working on.  He just posted page eighty-eight; it is ridiculous good but frustratingly gives almost nothing away.  Also, when I wrote my Guy Davis review Guy Davis Artworks was off line for renovation.  Now it is back up with many awesome preview pages including may works I missed.  From adverts in B.P.R.D. I knew I had missed Nevermen but I had no idea about The Zombies That Ate The World and some other work he did for Les Humanoides Associes.  As I track down those works there is also some work free of charge on My Space Dark Horse Presents. 

I came across two things slated for 2013 that have me chomping at the bit.  Monica Gallagher had mentioned that she had done some work for Oni but she has now announced that  Glitter Kiss will be coming out in January.  She is also stepping up Bonnie N. Collide to a twice weekly comic strip!  There are also all her mini-comics Boobage, When I Was A Mall Model and Go For The Eyes that I hope to review.  The 2013 news that has me jumping up and down is issue number four of Varmints!  I am not normally an exuberant guy.  As far as content goes, on the surface of it, Varmints is one of the lighter books that I follow.  While deeper things are developing, each issue stands on its own as a little comic adventure.  Hirsch recently posted a page that reminded me why I just can't wait to see where his work is going.  I have been accused of being dourer and I do hate musicals.  So why am I so giddy?   It is the audacity of having a singing dancing extravaganza conveyed only in static silent juxtaposed illustrations.   I would call bullshit on many others artists, but he makes it look easy.  You should go to It's Andy Hirsch and look at the larger  image.  I could (and may) write a entire review just on this page.

That's it for now.  I still have a stack of mini-comics to get through before I see what people bring to Artists' Alley at Austin Comic Con. 

Epic

So there are few things I want to get back to with this blog.  I should mention that Indie Spinner Rack is back on air.  If you're not familiar with their work check out the back catalog   They have had some terrific interviews over the years.  I also got around to checking out Mr. Phil's tumbler account and it is pretty cool.  In September and October I want to get back to reviewing mini comics.  Artist who are self publishing are the most likely place to find the bleeding edge of comics as an art form.  I have a stack of zine sized comics from two years of comic conventions, Austin Books and Domy Books.  I also have large stack of exceptionally long works that I want to get deeper into.


I may be less regular reviewing mini comics because I don't want to publish it without clearing it with  the author.  Most of these books were available for purchase through personal web sites but some times they sell out never to be printed again.  So I want to make sure that I am not going to send you down a rabbit hole by talking up some once in a life-time you had to be there publication.

I have thought about really digging into some long running creator owned comics.  David Sim's Cerebus  ran to issue 200 from 1977-2004 and although I own the first 5 collections I have yet to get through Church and Sate.  I know there is some controversy over some things he said and wrote.  Never the less Cerebus is one of the the first, most regular and longest running creator owned comics.   Conversely I have read all the Love and Rockets collections the Hernandez brothers' published from 1982 to today.  Jaime Hernandez went on to continue his Locas just as Gilbert continued stories featuring the Palomar cast of characters. 

There are a few more of these epic series that really need mentioning.  Before Scott McCloud wrote Understanding Comics he worked on a series called Zot! and continued in an amazing web comic.  I came late to Jeff Smith's Bone and Terry Moore's Strangers in Paradise, but they are awesome.  Both series are complete and well worth checking out but both Smith and Moore are continuing with new projects that you can check out at  Boneville and strangersinparadise.com respective.  Douglas Wolk's  Reading Comics introduced me to Carla Speed McNeil's Finder comics.  They were hard to find but now that Dark Horse is distributing them I have a lot of catching up to do.

I don't feel like I have the time to read and re-read Strangers in Paradise in its entirety just for a one page review, nor do I feel like suspending this blog and writing a treatises on it that no one will read.  So, here is my idea. I would love to start an on-line book club.  If anyone who reads this blog is interested in reading and discussing any of the titles, please e-mail me.  I will make a list if I can get enough people interested. We can see if we can plan a little forum in the comment sections.

About the blog

If there is one thing that I want to get across it is that comics are an important art form. 

In 2007, SUNY Stony Brook awarded me a Master's Degree in Philosophy for a thesis largely focusing on Kantian Metaphysics and Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics. My plan was to create a new critical vocabulary for the study of comics as high art.

Now that I'm out of the academy my exposure is limited to what I pick up here in Austin and from podcasts like Indie Spinner Rack, so I want to reach out to communities of like minded readers and to up the profile of comics. I feel that part of doing that is maintaining a few commitments to those of you who are kind enough to read this and the artists that share their brilliance with the world. So here is the mission:

1) Every Monday I will publish a post of either reviews or bits of house keeping like this one. Hopefully one day I will have interviews...

2) Because I want this to be a resource for ongoing discussion and not a soap-box, each post will be tagged to allow you to search out my thoughts on a particular artist or on comics in general.

3) I am interested in sequential art as art and not a given genera, so my reviews will focus on artist styles of narrative storytelling favoring form over content.

4) I will try to keep the reviews updated with info on where you can purchase the books and contact the artists.

5) Out of the deep admiration I have for anyone who puts their art out there, I will not publish any reviews on anything self-published and self-marketed without getting it approved by the artist.

6) I won't review anything that I wouldn’t generally recommend and I will try to give warnings if I feel a particular work might be too offensive or difficult for a given audience. (I have a 10 year old nephew who breathes comic books. I get the need for rating.)

That is what you can expect here. Hopefully, there will be audience participation. There are three ways that I would especially love to get feedback from you the reader.

Please, please leave comments. They are always welcome. Don't hesitate to share any positive or negative feedback about this blog. Positive discussion about the books reviewed is the point. The only caveat is if you pick up something I suggest and you don't like it, I ask that you focus your criticism on my failure to properly represent the work and live up to point 6 of the above. You don't have to agree with me, but I ask that you remain polite to the artist and those of us who do like their work.

I want to encourage you to get involved in the comic book community. It is still small enough that most artists are reasonably approachable. Most have websites or blogs which make fan mail easy. They tend to do lots of book signing and conventions which I should be highlighting according to point 4. If you do get a chance to meet them, ask if you can take a picture of yourself with them and post to the review.

If any of the artists read and especially like my review, I hope you want to help build the content I offer. Please contact me to do an interview by e-mail or locally around one of our Austin conventions. Contact me if you would be willing to share an image or images of a page from the book in the progress of composition. It would be extremely cool whether it is just a quick photo of the page with the pencil lines intact or images from the stages of completion.

And let me know if there is something you want me to review