Friday, September 25, 2020

Gene Luen Yang for the 2020 National Book Festival


In "Dragon Hoops" (First Second), bestselling graphic novelist Gene Luen Yang turns the spotlight on his life, his family, basketball and the high school where he teaches. In "Superman Smashes the Klan" (DC Comics), a Chinese-American teenager awakens to find his house surrounded by the Klan of the Fiery Kross. Naturally, Superman leaps to the family's help, but a mysterious green rock has left him weak. Can the teen and his best friend help Superman smash the Klan?

Please use this link to access the captioned version of this event on YouTube.   https://youtu.be/nwvQxt6Ae8g

Buy Books: https://www.politics-prose.com/national-book-festival-teens-stage

Robin Ha's book reviewed at School Library Journal

Graphic Novel Stars at the SLJ Summit

by SLJ Staff
Sep 22, 2020 | Filed in Reviews

https://www.slj.com/?detailStory=graphic-novel-stars-slj-summit

Editorial Cartoon by Steve Artley

"A Mitch in Time Saves Nine" (click on image for larger view)

Thursday, September 24, 2020

The Lily's latest comic on RGB

Ruth Bader Ginsburg changed the country we live in. Now is our chance to honor that work.

It's time to turn our grief into fuel for change

Ruth Bader Ginsburg changed the country we live in. Now is our chance to honor that work.

Oct 13: The Art of Political Cartooning

Kennedy Library Forum | The Art of Political Cartooning

The New Yorker contributor Barry Blitt; cartoonist Pia Guerra; and Washington Post editorial cartoonist Ann Telnaes explore the art of political cartooning with moderator Scott Simon, host of NPR's Weekend Edition Saturday.

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The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum is dedicated to the memory of our nation's thirty-fifth president and to all those who through the art of politics seek a new and better world.

Located on a ten-acre park, overlooking the sea that he loved and the city that launched him to greatness, the Library stands as a vibrant tribute to the life and times of John F. Kennedy.

Come tour our Museum which portrays the life, leadership, and legacy of President Kennedy, conveys his enthusiasm for politics and public service, and illustrates the nature of the office of the President.

Students and scholars can also arrange to conduct research using our collection of historical materials chronicling mid-20th century politics and the life and administration of John F. Kennedy.

NPR talks to Allie Brosh

How to Make an Artbook of Batman: The Animated Series

How to Make an Artbook (ft. Justin Erickson, Creative Director of Phantom City Creative Inc.)

Alexandra Bowman
Sep 24, 2020

Ever wondered how a pop culture art anthology is made? We sat down with Justin Erickson, the creative director behind the anticipated "Batman: The Animated Series: The Phantom City Creative Collection," to talk about how this stunning collection of artwork was produced. "Batman: The Animated Series: The Phantom City Creative Collection" will be released on October 6th.

Preorder your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Batman-Animate... Learn about Phantom City Creative here: https://phantomcitycreative.bigcartel... Follow @PhantomCityCreative here: https://www.instagram.com/phantomcity...

Recorded on September 16th, 2020 via Zoom. Edited by Owen Posnett Hosted by Alexandra Bowman Produced by Alexandra Bowman "The Hilltop Show" is Georgetown University's political comedy webseries and talk show. If you get your news from us, you have our condolences.

Tuesday, September 22, 2020

Cavna talks about editorial cartoons and Trump (among other comics)

The comedy that got inside Trump's head

It may be hard to spoof such an atypical president, but these 10 creative minds did it best.


Matt Wuerker is quoted.

OCTOBER 7: Quarantine Q&A with TJ Kirsch




OCTOBER 7, 2020 AT 6:30 PM – 8 PM

Online Event

Details

Wednesday, October 7, 2020 at 6:30 PM – 8 PM
Public · Hosted by Fantom Comics
Online Event

We're doing another comic creator event for your enjoyment. We'll be talking to cartoonist TJ Kirsch about his work; in particular about his newest project Willie Nelson: A Graphic History, in which he teams up with several other artists to tell the story of this country music icon from Hill County, Texas.

TJ Kirsch is also the creator of Pride of a Decent Man, a story with an episodic plot about a man from an abusive household who tries to lead a straight and narrow path, and his friend who always pulls him in the opposite direction and into significant trouble.

If you would like either of these books, please contact us at FantomHQ@fantomcomics.com or call during business hours at (202)-241-6498.

Cavna on Justice Ginsburg cartoons

How Ruth Bader Ginsburg is being memorialized in cartoons

Sunday, September 20, 2020

I was there! A boast about the Palais du Louvre comics exhibit in 1967

 by Katherine Collins*

September 18, 2020
(reprinted with permission)

Since the famous Louvre exhibit of Comics is cited so often, and was mentioned again in a lengthy press release from Heritage Auctions, I think the time has come for me to puff out my chest and reminisce about having been there, in Paris in 1967. (Yes, it was 1967, not 1968, as was mistakenly stated in HA's post.)

I am a Canadian, not any species of European. I happened to be in Paris in spring of 1967, just wrapping up a one-year "tour by bicycle" of Europe with my good friend Alan Hughes. We had split up for the day, to pursue separate interests. I was strolling along the Rue de Rivoli, in central Paris, not knowing that I was beside one of the walls of the rather enormous Palais du Louvre, and with no knowledge that there was an exhibit therein of (ta-da!) COMICS! Suddenly, I came upon a door into the Palais, with a lot of huge signs all around it, and up the high wall, proclaiming Bande Dessinée et Figuration Narrative — meaning Comic Strips and Graphic Narrative. (Luckily I could speak French a little bit.) The outside display also sported really enormous blow-ups of portions of panels from Hogarth's Tarzan, and Prince Valiant and Terry & The Pirates and lots more. I was utterly dumbstruck. It was like finding a gold mine! It was a gift from the gods! There was nothing in the world that I could have more happily come upon!

I had been digging for comics all over Europe for the previous year, and was fully aware of the European love of classic American comics — and of the many excellent reprints of the same, during the long period of drought of appreciation for those comics in North America. I was 19 years old, and had been very consciously and assiduously collecting everything to do with newspaper comics that I could find ever since I was nine years old, in the mid-50s. As anyone who was trying to do the same at that time can attest, there were very slim pickings. I had been buying every single available book of comics history and scholarship ever published, and I had maybe about five books. Plus my own scrapbooks, and my mother's scrapbooks of Caniff's Terry from the thirties and forties.

I was well aware of the energetic scorn consistently heaped upon comics by anybody who fancied themselves an arbiter of culture. I had been drawing my own comics since I was about 7, and publishing a strip in my University newspaper for the last two years. (And I went on to publish lots of comics for the next 21 years, and more again, more recently.) But I was never given any credit or praise for my work, alongside the others in my university "creative writing" community. If I had been writing puerile poetry and shallow short stories, I might have received some respect. But that did not happen. Nonetheless, I had no other ambition but in comics.

So, finding a comics exhibit, loudly trumpeted in The Louvre of all places, boosted my self-esteem and my belief in the worthiness of my interests. I have remained bolstered and proud ever since. Of course it was another twenty-five years, more or less, before genuine scholarship and quality reprinting of comics began to noticeably wriggle their way out of the Halls of Shame. I had to continue buying European reprints of American comics, in assorted languages, on buying trips to "The Continent." I would ship boxes of books home to myself.

I have never forgotten the joy and encouragement of that Louvre event. I have here beside me the "programme book," which is a 256-page, 8x11 very detailed history of, and love letter to, our favourite art form. Its bright-red covers have always shone proudly from my bookshelves ever since I brought it home in 1967. Maybe it is valuable, but I have never sought to find out. It is my treasure! It was translated into English in the early 70s or so, and of course I have that right beside me as well.

I lost track of the hours I spent inside the exhibit on that day. What sticks in my memory the strongest is the huge — really huge! — enlargements of individual panels of all the great strips from throughout comics history. You name them, there they were. Their size recalibrated my standards of appreciation for comics. Before then, I had seen only, at the biggest, panels of maybe 6x8 inches. These were up to 6 ft. by 8 ft.! Maybe bigger. Ever since then, I have always preferred my comics really big!!

And the lengthy texts posted on the walls gave an intelligent voice to the analysis and appreciation of the comics; this was something I had been lacking for my whole life. Although I have, in the subsequent 53 years, forgotten a lot of the details of the show, I can still easily call back to my mind and emotions the astonished excitement of being there, surrounded by huge comics and the obvious respect they were given. My heart once again beats faster, my mind reels with mounting pleasure, and I am once again distracted from any other reality in the world. I can feel it again any time I want.

In late afternoon, I stumbled back out onto the street, clutching my programme book of inestimable value, thinking of nothing but comics; I was unconscious even of the charms of my favourite city, Paris. And you can tell by this paean to the exhibit and its comics, that I have never lost the thrill and the re-education of the Louvre's history-making creation.

And I was there! I was at an epochal event in the elevation of comics' place in culture. For the rest of my life, it will reverberate in my grateful brain.

*I was the cartoonist of "Neil the Horse," which was part of the black-and-white boom in the 1980s, under my former name, Arn Saba. A big fat anthology (360 pp.) was published in 2017, by Conundrum Press; it was titled "The Collected Neil the Horse." My name change was due to a "sex change", as they formerly were called. It was "announced" in 1993, and resulted in my immediate expulsion from the comics community. I could not get published again until 2017, with the anthology. I am now working on a new graphic novel for Conundrum. It is not a funny animal book this time, but a "real people in the real world" story. Not to be melodramatic, but I may not live to finish it. My health is very dire and uneven. I have long periods of complete disability. Many doctors have failed to diagnose it, over the last five years. But I am plugging along as much as possible. I am happy to say that I am thrilled to be Back In Business as a cartoonist. I owe fulsome thanks for this pleasure to Andy Brown, the Honcho of Conundrum Press, and one of the finest gentlemen I have ever known.

(UPDATED Sept 21 2020):

I try never to miss an opportunity to plug myself. So I should also mention that I have been inducted into both of Canada's "Comics Halls of Fame". (I don't know why Canada has two.) I was named to The Joe Shuster Awards in 2013; and in 2017 was entered into The Giants of the North Canadian Cartooning Hall of Fame. 

One last toot of the horn: the graphic novel I'm working on has the Working Title of "Beautiful". Nice and simple, but could be changed in time. It takes place in Vancouver in 1918, during the so-called Spanish Flu epidemic. I have been planning this book for decades, and its timing, at the outbreak of the Covid-19, is a coincidence. I am not sure whether I think this is a good thing or not. The story is deeply-researched, but is not really "about" the flu epidemic. It is "about" the main characters living through the drama of so much death. Large pages, beautiful scenery, good looks at early Vancouver. It is another "big fat" book, and I hope it will be in colour. It is also a sapphic love story, and what's more involves some Native characters, who have fled up the coast. I have had to constantly pull the reins on myself so that I don't keep writing in all sorts of slapstick and nonsense. (That being my natural tendency.) It is a serious story, but not grim or horrible. There's also some political content, about the left-wing resistance to Canada's WWI conscription, and the simultaneous fierce anti-union stance of the government. One of main characters is an activist.

Troy-Jeffrey Allen talks to Ryan North about 'Slaughterhouse-Five'

Interview: Chopping It Up About 'Slaughterhouse-Five' in the Year 2020

Interview by Troy-Jeffrey Allen and Matt Barham

Sep 18, 2020

https://www.previewsworld.com/Article/245888-Interview-Chopping-It-Up-About-Slaughterhouse-Five-in-the-Year-2020

Saturday, September 19, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Steve Artley

 "A Mitch in Time Saves Nine" (click on image for larger view)

©2020 Steven G Artley • artleytoons • ALL RIGHTS RSERVED


Friday, September 18, 2020

PR: Tomorrow is BATMAN DAY 2020 at all Third Eye Locations!


Hey there, Third Eye Faithful!

One of our favorite days of the year is BATMAN DAY, and we're pretty darn stoked to be celebrating BATMAN DAY tomorrow, with a ton of fun stuff going on!

We'll be offering up big BAT-SAVINGS, including:

  • 15% OFF ALL BATMAN and BATMAN-related GRAPHIC NOVELS!
  • 15% OFF ALL BATMAN and BATMAN-related toys & statues
  • 15% OFF ALL BATMAN and BATMAN-related TABLETOP Games!

And, with every purchase, we'll give you a FREE DC Comic (while supplies last!)

This is valid at all locations, and the hours for each are:

ANNAPOLIS SHOPS - 11AM-9PM
LEXINGTON PARK - 11AM-7PM
RICHMOND VA (MECHANICSVILLE) - 11AM-8PM


STAY CONNECTED  

Flugennock's Latest'n'Greatest: "DNC Headquarters, Nov. 4 2020"

From Mike Fluggenock, DC's anarchist cartoonist -

"DNC Headquarters, Nov 4, 2020"
http://sinkers.org/stage/?p=3068

After observing the behavior and positions of Joe Biden, the Democrats, and their supporters, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict that Senator Nothing Will Fundamentally Change is going to lose, and bigly. Beaten like a drum. Roasted like a nut. Smoked like a roach.

...and I'm going to be so goddamn there for it.

(special thanks to Gallifreyan Jedi for the inspiration.)

13 x 12 inch medium-res color .jpg image, 1.1mb

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"US Elections Rank Last Among All Western Democracies", Electoral Integrity Project 01.07.2017 
https://www.electoralintegrityproject.com/eip-blogs/2017/1/7/its-even-worse-than-the-news-about-north-carolina-american-elections-rank-last-among-all-western-democracies

"Democrats are gonna lose this election and think 'we should have yelled at poor people more'." Gallifreyan Jedi on Twitter, 09.15.2020
https://twitter.com/JediofGallifrey/status/1306073801214623747

Dead Reckoning's Atlas at War reviewed in the NY Times

Revisiting the 'Violent Ballets' of Jack Kirby

Thursday, September 17, 2020

Winsor McCay's son returns home from World War I

 The Library of Congress has introduced a new search feature for their newspaper collection's images - News Navigator.


Times Artist and His Soldier-Son
Washington Times March 11 1919

Winsor McCay, the famous cartoonist, whose drawings often appear on the editorial page of The Times, welcoming his son, Sergt. Robert Winsor McCay, jr., who returned from France recently with the Twenty-seventh New York Division. Sergeant McCay was awarded the British Military Medal for gallantry in action during the attack by the Twenty-seventh on the Hindenburg line last September. 


That one's fairly blurry, so here's a later, better print.
 
 
LITTLE NEMO HOME WITH WAR HONORS
4/26/1919 Yerington times.

Sergt. Robert Winsor McKay. Jr., son of Winsor McKay (sic), the cartoonist and creator of "Little Nemo,” lias returned from France with the British military medal won (luring the smash of the Twenty-seventh division on the Hindenburg line last September. Sergeant McKay, who was the inspiration for his father’s cartoon character some years ago, was a member of the headquarters troops of the Twenty seventh. He returned the other on the...

and finally, here's a War Bonds ad he drew from El Paso Herald, Oct 20, 1917.

 



Troy-Jeffrey Allen talks to Darick Robertson and Jim Rugg

Got It Covered: Darick Robertson on 'The Boys: Dear Becky'

by Troy-Jeffrey Allen

OCTOBRIANA: A Comic Talk with JIM RUGG

by Troy-Jeffrey Allen
 Sep 8, 2020

NPR on Yanow's Contradictions

'The Contradictions' Chronicles A Classic College Experience