By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 2/22/2016
Let’s get going with spring book announcements: SPACE, a collection of Robert Sergal’s series ESCHEW. Sergal is an Ignatz Award nominee for Outstanding Comic and a Best American Comics selection, and his comics are short, stark but funny snapshots of awkward interactions, body humor and moment we’d often rather forget. Rod Lott, of Bookgasm writes: […]
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 6/23/2015
Brooklyn based indie Secret Acres has just announced a couple of new projects and one of them is like an alt.comix supergroup: MK Reed (Cute Girl Manifesto, Americus) will write and Farel Dalrymple (The Wrenchies, Omega the Unknown) will draw Palefire, due out this September, a fiery story set in high school that sounds like the perfect comics YA novel:
In the small town world of Palefire, everyone knows everybody and everyone hates Dwayne, the firebug, the bad boy trouble follows everywhere. Good girl Alison finds a warmth to Dwayne, a spark everyone’s missing. Can Alison play with fire without getting burned?
Hope Larson, author of Chiggers and illustrator of A Wrinkle in Time: The Graphic Novel calls Palefire:
“Gorgeous and moving. Dalrymple’s cartooning sings, and Reed has the best ear for dialogue in comics.”
The duo will promote the book at the Small Press Expo. I’m sold.
Secret Acres is also releasing two from Theo Ellsworth: Understanding Monster – Book Three and a new edition of the long sold out Capacity.
The first book of the Understanding Monster trilogy was both a Best American Comics 2014 selection and a Lynd Ward Prize Honor Book. IN book Three the story winds up.
In the Understanding Monster – Book Three, our hero, Izadore, awakes to find his mind, body and soul reunited. The last Monks of the Imaginary Man lead him on a journey beyond Toy Mountain to discover the true nature of the relationship between creativity and reality.
Adding to the excitement, Theo Ellsworth’s classic, Capacity, will be re-released alongside the Understanding Monster Book Three. Returning for a third printing in a deluxe and unique stitched, softcover binding, a limited quantity of this new edition of Capacity will include a signed and numbered artist plate tipped into the book.
Counted among the best books of its original publication year by the Chicago Tribune, the Village Voice and theHuffington Post among many others, Capacity is part autobiography, part mythology and totally beautiful. Just try to remember: this all really happpened!
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 11/21/2014
Over at PW I reported on Consortium starting to distribute Alternative Comics and Secret Acres to bookstores. They currently distribute Uncivilized, Toon Books, Nobrow and Koyama Press, as well as publishers such as Fulcrum and Enchanted Lion who put out a lot of graphic novel material. (And a lot of other distinguished small press publishers as well.)
I understand that Consortium has been very important for publishers like Uncivilized and Koyama—and that Consortium is pretty aggressive about bringing new comics publishers into their fold. At CAB I also heard a bunch of griping about Diamond—mostly shipping dates catalog listing and so on. Small things, and Diamond is pretty much the rock of the industry, but if people are getting better service elsewhere they are likely to move.
One thing about the publishers picked up by Consortium—they may be small presses that publish a lot of indie cartoonists, but many of their books aren’t necessarily limited in audience to hardcore indie comics readers. For instance, Wendy, shown above, is a popular webcomic and a devastating take on socialite culture. Sam Henderson’s books are just funny gags, Nobrow puts out a ton of books that are just great to look at, Uncivilized books are smart and accessible, Edie Fake’s work has gotten acclaim many places, Toon Books are award winning crowd pleasers and so on. Getting better distribution seems to be a very important move for all these publishers and I expect we’ll hear more about this in 2015
Robyn Chapman has some thoughts about this and what it means to micro presses here.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 11/7/2014
Whoops a LOT to do tonight! Fire up your Über! These are ALL tonight.
A Faintly Lit Light- Group Show
at 4:00pm – 7:00pm
Right now! HOT DRINKS!
The Perfect Nothing Catalog
260 Johnson Ave, Brooklyn, New York 11206
Blaise Larmee / Quintessa Matranga / Lms Sadler / Aidan Koch / Marie Jacotey / Anthony Cudahy / Wiley Guillot
Pre-CAB party! Join us 4-7, Friday November 7th at The Perfect Nothing Catalog shack for art, a bonfire, and hot drinks ^_^
Al Jaffee ART SHOW opening reception FRIDAY NIGHT Nov 7th 6-9 PM
Scott Eder Gallery
18 Bridge St Apt 2I,
Brooklyn, New York 11201
Come celebrate the opening of our new show ‘The Mad Fold-In Art Of Al Jaffee’. Enjoy the majesty of these paintings in all their glory. Al will be in attendance.
Anya Davidson: CHARACTER FLAWS
6:00pm – 10:00pm
Tomato House
301 Saratoga Avenue,
Brooklyn, New York 11233
Tomato House is thrilled to present a solo show of drawings by the acclaimed cartoonist, printmaker, and musician Anya Davidson.
Davidson has produced an avalanche, a torrent, a dizzying froth of comic work over the course of the last decade, often self-published in labor-intensive, fully silkscreened editions. Her storylines frequently collapse elements of the fantastic, the grotesque, and the mythological onto scenes of everyday life, exposing the ancient forces at work under our veneer of modern civilization. Her story “Barbarian Bitch” appeared in Kramers Ergot 8 and the graphic novel “School Spirits” was published in 2013 by PictureBox. “Band For Life”, her Ignatz-nominated online comic about the trials and tribulations of a group of young musicians, continues to appear weekly on vice.com.
“Character flaws is an attempt to capture some of the inhabitants of my brain, my neighborhood, my planet and my galaxy. They are usually in motion but they stood still for these portraits. As a cartoonist I have a deep and abiding obsession with the human figure and the myriad ways it can be altered, twisted and re-interpreted. I also have a compulsion to make up stories. Sometimes my character designs generate stories and sometimes it’s vice versa. Each one of these creatures is the potential protagonist of a story I haven’t thought up yet.” -A.D.
CHARACTER FLAWS opens November 7, with a reception from 6 to 10 PM and continues through December 6.
NY Launch Party of Matt Huynh’s comic book ‘Magpie, Magpie’
at 6:00pm – 8:30pm
B_SPACE NYC,
219 Mulberry St
New York, NY 10012
Come join us for drinks and great music to celebrate the launch of Australian artist Matt Huynh’s gothic sumi-e comic book ‘Magpie, Magpie’ including exhibition of original art.
Today at 6:00pm – 1:00am littlefield 622 Degraw St,
Brooklyn’s own legendary Cannonball Press has again assembled an extraordinary menagerie of graphic artists under one roof who will be present displaying and selling their prints for $50 or less for one night only on Nov. 8th at LITTLEFIELD NYC.
ONE NIGHT ONLY. Friday, Nov. 7th, 6pm – 1am
LITTLEFIELD
622 Degraw St., Gowanus, Brooklyn, NY 11217
btwn. 3rd and 4th Aves.
www.littlefieldnyc.com
Take the 2, 3, 4, 5, B, D, N, or Q to Atlantic Terminal or the R train to Union St.
directions: www.littlefieldnyc.com/directions
21 and over only.
As part of New York Fine Art Print Week, organized by the International Fine Print Dealers Association in conjunction with the Annual IFPDA Pint Fair, long-time champion of the affordable art cause Cannonball Press has brought together these great artists so that New York can have a chance to see first-hand the incredible resurgence in affordable fine art printing that is happening across the country.
Featuring:
Justseeds
Bikini Press International
Sean Star Wars
Drive By Press
Cinders Gallery
Non Grata
Florence Gidez
Deerjerk and Haypeep
Raking Light Projects
Church of Type
The Amazing Hancock Brothers
Cannonball Press
Come join us for live printing, beer, music, and a GIANT dogpile of awesome cheap prints!!!
Graphic Canon of Children’s Literature Book Launch Party
6:30pm – 8:30pm
Society Of Illustrators 128 E 63rd St,
New York, New York 10065
Come out and celebrate the official book launch of The Graphic Canon of Children’s Literature by master anthologist Russ Kick. The launch party will be held in conjunction with the second annual “Push and Kick Awards” at the Society of Illustrators. Seven Stories Press would like to recognize the enthusiasm and support of three important figures in the comics art community, R. Sikoryak, Hillary Chute, and Lynda Barry. The reception is being co-sponsored by The Society of Illustrators and Publishers Weekly. The awards ceremony also coincides with the opening of an accompanying exhibition at the Society of Illustrators, of original artwork by contributors to The Graphic Canon of Children’s Literature.The exhibition will run November 4–December 20.
7:00pm – 10:00pm
Park Slope Ale House
356 6th Ave,
Brooklyn, New York 11215
Join Hic & Hoc Publications, Space Face, Secret Acres, Breakdown Press, Decadence Comics & Happiness Comix for our first annual pre-CAB Comic Book Party, Friday, November 7 from 7-10PM at the Park Slope Ale House.
Come out, have a beer and tell us universal truths that we’ll try to dispute. It’ll be a good opportunity to get ready for CAB, where we’ll all try to out-cool each other and fail miserably.
We’ll be in the back room but a group of sad-faced comic nerds shouldn’t be too hard to spot.
Poster art by Joe Kessler!
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 11/10/2010
In the run up to King Con, the Brooklyn-based comics show held at the Lyceum in Park Slope this weekend, it was asked many times, “Do we NEED another New York comics show?” Starting with the Big Apple Con back on October 1, running through New York Comic-Con the next week and on to the Brooklyn Comics and Graphic Fest on December 4, King Con made a total of four cons in three months, not really a heavy workload for a comics town as huge as NYC, but definitely a strain on the wallets of attendees, especially after the NYCC epic. (New York’s fifth show is MoCCA Fest in April.) So from the outset you have a show with big questions hanging over it.
Friends had asked me to come out for various events and I was slotted for the Kids Comics panel on Sunday morning so I ended up going out on three out of four days. What I saw was a scene with enough energy to overcome logistical mistakes and misconceptions to still create a fun and informative afternoon activity. But it didn’t answer the fundamental question of what King Con’s mission should be.
King Con started out with a pair of panels on Thursday night that, perhaps due to rain or lack of promotion, were so poorly attended that the second one was cancelled. Not a good start.
Friday night was a big comics reading/rock fest party. I arrived habitually fashionably late only to discover that I had missed a lot of cool comics readings — none of the press materials had bothered to include a schedule. I was defnitely “non plussed” by that. Luckily a few beers next door led to a lively discussion on a frigid roofdeck with Paul Pope, Charles Orr, Sean Pryor and others. One big plus for King Con — an excellent bar/restaurant next door with a lot of outdoor space and a weird deck covered with mysterious junk in the back.
I returned later the next day to catch some panels, arriving at what seems to have been the apex of attendance. King Con is held in the Brooklyn Lyceum, a former bathhouse that now houses stage productions and craft fairs. Last year, the people who run the facility thought it might be fun to put on a comics show, thus the genesis. The Lyceum has no heating or cooling facilities; a cafe in the front serves food made by heating them in a tiny toaster oven. The venue itself is large (not cavernous) and crumbling, but in a funky bohemian way that sets off the indie comics vibe.
Artist Jen Ferguson and cartoonist Dean Haspiel
The exhibitors room was small and traversed in a few minutes; schmoozing time took much
Arsenal Pulp is another little known client with a decent GN list.
Manic D publishes a wide variety of geeky titles.
Searching the Consortium site, I found 173 titles under the Graphic Novel category.
Toon Books is owned by Candlewick Press (Walker Books), which is distributed by Random House Publisher Services, which, it could be argued, is the “500-pound gorilla on the cover of Strange Adventures” of graphic novel distribution.
Diamond Book Distributors did save the industry after CDS collapsed, and still has major clients:
http://www.diamondbookdistributors.com/default.asp?t=2&m=1&c=53&s=528
I think you’ll see more of this… distributors dealing with comics publishers just like they deal with any other publishers; small presses experimenting with the occasional graphic novel, and possibly, slowly, creating a backlist of titles in the subject.
Publishers Group West (PGW) is also picking up more graphic novel/comics publishers. I think this is due to a combination of things: more great books getting published, more comics publishers are becoming better educated about the overall market place, and distributors becoming better educated about the comics medium and graphic novel format. Maybe the right word to use is Convergence? It’s pretty cool to see that there are more options available to everyone. Competition is a very, very good thing.