JK Snyder III's Fashion in Action Kickstarter

 

Local cartoonist John K. Snyder III has a Kickstarter campaign to reprint his 1980s comic book Fashion in Action. I've just backed it and encourage our readers to do so as well. John can regularly be met at Baltimore Comic-Con.

This project is a restoration and reprinting of the 1980s series FASHION IN ACTION created by John K Snyder III. This comic starred a high-priced, and stylishly dressed, all-female protection agency and was set in the far future. It was an intriguing breath of fresh air that was a prime example of the best in 1980s independent comic storytelling!

 It's the year 2086, and the 2080s haven't changed much from the 1980s - except of course for the jetpacks, Mars colonizations, and rocket-fueled cars. Frances Knight and her squad are "the world's highest priced and best dressed celebrity protection agency." They guard the world's rich and beautiful and make their base in the refurbished Statue of Liberty.

Fashion In Action square off against the diabolical team of the coldly manipulative Dr. Cruel, and his accomplices, Boss One - a henchman just happy to be involved - and the violently unpredictable Roxanne, Frances Knights' most psychotically devoted fan. Dr. Cruel plots to use the robot clone of a late night talk show host to turn the world's elite into gorillas during a snuff star's celebrity-filled wedding! Will they succeed? Will Frances defeat Roxanne? And will they look absolutely amazing doing so? Fund this project and find out!




Back in 1985, I set out to create an entertaining series that would reflect the times we were then living in by projecting it onto a futuristic society where the cult of celebrity and personality would become the status quo. It only seemed natural at the time to cast a group of strong-willed women as a symbol of reason and security in the middle of an ego-driven world full of social and political unrest. It was a creatively rewarding experience that was born out of the height of the creator-owned alternative market of the early/mid-80’s, but was a short-lived series that I have always hoped for the opportunity to re-introduce and return to and continue.

It is a pleasure to invite you to join Hope and I in bringing the Women and World of FASHION IN ACTION back to the twenty-first century, where they have always belonged.

Givhan on Wonder Woman's new fashion

Trading in briefs for pants, she's still a wonder [online title: From star-spangled briefs to skintight pants, Wonder Woman is still a wonder]
By Robin Givhan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 1, 2010; C02

The Post's fashion critic weighs in on DC's latest PR stunt.

Weldon on Wonder Woman's fashion do-over

Wonder Woman's Dated New Duds, or: Desperately Seeking Zeus-an

by Glen Weldon

 June 30, 2010

 

Glen Weldon on upcoming comics movies

For Glen's thoughts on Iron Man 2 (brief), Green Lantern (longer) and the attractiveness of superhero costumes (longest), see Steel and Spandex: Two Oscar Night Super-Developments, Considered, National Public Radio's Monkey See blog (March 10 2010).

OT: More fashion in comics

Years ago, Isaac Mizrahi did an expensive booklet series called Sandee the Supermodel. Last year, there was an exhibit on superhero fashion (or lack thereof) in New York. And now the press release that follows points out this new Italian book which seems interesting... AND has another cartoon picture of Obama!

Available in the best bookstores as from February 2009
aleXsandro Palombo
VANITAS, INSHALLAH
XI years of dreamlike color

The fashion world portrayed in the incisive and brilliant illustrations of aleXsandro Palombo in a poetic and colorful universe, surreal and provocative in a new book in the series "Chic et Simpliciter" from Hazard Editions. The first catwalk-book ever.

VANITAS, INSHALLAH is a veritable illustrated tale, extravagant and provocative right from the title, which leads into the imaginary and poetic universe of aleXsandro Palombo, revisiting eleven years of his creations: colors and memories, places and icons, slogans and insights.

A journey into the world of fashion in which real and surreal pursue each other along the lines traced by one of the most original and surprising talents in Italian and international fashion, a succession of illustrations with an unmistakable line that conveys with utter simplicity the thoughts and inner world of the artist, an endless moving archive, a gallery of relics and surreal hypotheses, precognitions and fantasies.

One hundred unpublished plates, composing a hymn to the poetic of color and epitomizing Palombo’s whole development, enable readers to experience a dream called fashion between imagination and provocation.

Accompanying readers on this adventure is Vanitas, the clown whose task is to act as a guide to memories and dreams, until the fateful moment of the fashion show in which the journey culminates. And it is at this point that Vanitas reveals Palombo’s new creations in the world’s first illustrated fashion show.

The reader becomes a privileged guest who can share the rituals of fashion - the show and favored guests, backstage and the catwalk, the creations and provocations, models and fashion writers…

As in a powerful snapshot, Palombo’s rapid, profound line illustrates the vices and virtues of the fashion world, building up with scathing irony to a surprising finale.

The power of the pages illustrated by Palombo needs no commentary and for this reason the volume contains no critical texts but only a series of intimate and private presentations written by those with a close knowledge of his personality, rich and intuitive, retiring and reserved.

This volume reveals the dreams of Palombo as illustrator and narrator of anecdotes, revealing an artistic temperament, unknown even to those who follow carefully his many-sided activities, which he has always maintained complete reserve.

He does so in the simple language of dreams, of fantasies that are joyous and sad, rich and allusive, original and profound, while always preserving that elusive and unrepeatable element which is a trait of his style.

The publisher Giovanni Miriantini declares: "I at once realized I was dealing with a great artist. His illustrations, graphically and chromatically perfect, create a sort of interplay between earthly and celestial, human and divine."

Founded in 1986, Hazard Editions is distinguished by the high quality of its publications in the field of comics d’auteur and artistic illustration. Its publications include works by authors such as Dino Battaglia, Enki Bilal, Silvio Cadelo, Philippe Druillet, Federico Fellini and Milo Manara, Hans Rüdi Giger, Dave McKean, Leiji Matsumoto, Lorenzo Mattotti, Sanpei Shirato, Josè Munoz, Posy Simmonds, Jacques Tardi and Osamu Tezuka.

The series "Chic et Simpliciter", devoted to great fashion illustrators, over the years has brought out volumes devoted to Maddalena Sisto, Ruben Toledo, Antonio Lopez and François Berthoud.

Robin Givhan on superhero-inspired fashions

The Post's fashion correspondent Robin Givhan blogs about superhero-inspired fashions today at "Super Heroes and Super Surprises." The International Herald Tribune has a lot more pictures though.