By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 8/10/2015
Update: the correct dates for the show are April 2-3, not 3-4 as I originally wrote. MoCCA Festival, New York’s largest indie comics focused event, has announced a new venue for 2016: Metropolitan West, an event space located at West 46th Street between 10th and 11th Avenue. Programming will be held nearby at Ink48, a […]
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/20/2015
Swedish randos (aka Dongery) from SPX 2005
§ There’s been some chatter over the last week or so over this public FB thread by Stephen Bissette about what he sees as exclusion of certain creators at indie comics shows. It sprang out of an older thread, and the conversation eventually includes Bill Kartalopoulos, who works with SPX and MoCCA, as well as Zack Soto of the just concluded Lineworks NW, Tom Spurgeon of the upcoming CXC show, and a lot of exhibitors past and present. The main complaint, it seems, is that there isn’t enough room at shows like SPX (the one which hurt the most feelings) and TCAF and Lineworks NW and so on and this leads to exclusion. Or as one Carl Antonowicz puts it:
If one’s work doesn’t meet the unstated aesthetic of the committee, one is out of luck.
Which is…yeah. If you’re gonna spend the money to put on an indie comics show—an undertaking so bereft of big profits that many of them are crowdfunded—you do get to choose what kind of comics you want to showcase there, and it turns out that people dedicated enough to actuallly put on a show generally have a pretty clear idea of what kind of comics they want to promote.
There are some sad stories in the comments—veteran cartoonist turned educator Don Simpson can’t get into the local indy show in his native Pittsburgh, and 90s mainstay David Chelsea was denied a table at Linework but gets a free table at the local Wizard show. And other people can’t get in and so on and so forth.
I have my own comment there, but if you read this site at all you can probably guess what I say: there are a zillion small shows out there and more coming. If you can’t find a local place to get set up and show your wares, you must live in a very remote spot. And yes, tables are expensive at some of these shows (but see next couple of items), but guess what: NO ONE PROMISED YOU’D BE ABLE TO MAKE MONEY AT THIS THING. There are more good cartoonists than ever and old-timers do have to compete against the new kids, who often have strong support networks via social media and colleagues from art school. And even if you build it, they may very well not come because you could be set up between Todd McFarlane and Kate Beaton.
Is this a competition? Sort of. While comics people are generally inclusive to a fault, the moment you put your first line on paper/screen you started competing for attention and acclaim (which come in unlimited amounts) and for money and space (which come in more limited amounts.)
One aspect of CAFs/indie shows that gets thrown around a bit in the thread is how they have become an alternative distribution system. It’s true a lot of publishers rely on CAFs to make a lot of their profits. This is far from healthy, but we’re still talking work that is of a niche appeal, and we have an indie comics reading audience that really likes buying their comics at shows where they can get a signed edition, have a personal transaction and maybe even buy some other stuff they didn’t know about that is normally warehoused in a shoebox under the creator’s sofa.
So while I understand the frustration of people who can’t get in to certain very popular events, there are lots of other ways to get out there. And all of this is going to change more. A column by the late great Dylan Williams from 2011 where he’s rethinking his convention strategy shows now much the landscape has changed in a more four years..and in four years it will have changed some more.
I think another underlying aspect of this is the youth movement in comics, and older creators feeling very much left out of the picture. But that deserves a post all its own.
§ Meanwhile, Bissette himself was a guest of the Big Wow Con in San Jose and reunited with the old Swamp Thing crew of Rick Veitch, Tom Yeates and John Totleben.
Posted by Stephen Bissette on Sunday, April 19, 2015
§ AAANNNNNNNDDDDD speaking of CAF/con economies, Barry and Leon, the Secret Acres boys, have posted their MoCCA Fest 2015 report and confront the money things head on. You’ll notice that MoCCA isn’t on the “dream list” for comics folks because tables are very expensive:
We’ve talked a bit about the con economy on this blog before. But let’s go there again. MoCCA has the highest table cost of any show we attend at $460 per table. That’s a whole $110 above SPX and a whopping $64.50 above TCAF. TCAF costs attendees nothing. MoCCA is five bucks. SPX is three times that, asking a whole fifteen dollar bill of everyone coming through the door. They look alike from here. Or do they? Tony Breed, a Chicago guy and our RIPE neighbor of a couple weeks ago, came by and said the most interesting thing: his sales at CAKE were slow, but he makes more money at that show than at any other. This year, we brought home something less than half of our take from MoCCA 2014. We made money. We can’t not make money. We live here.
Our most expensive show, by far, is TCAF. Believe us, if we could afford to skip customs and ship our books to Canada, we sure as shit would. Depending on the exchange rate, food and shelter and gas, we need to clean up every year or we go broke. We’re pretty sure Annie Koyama is making more money at TCAF than she could at any other show and, at any other show, break-even has got to be way up there for Koyama Press. We’ve enjoyed a couple of years of making more money at TCAF than we have at MoCCA, but we took home less money every time. And we’re a publishing company, micro or no. If you’re an artist making mini-comics, you’re not making table at MoCCA without a gang to split costs – and profits – and if you can’t make it there, you’re not making it anywhere else, either. How much are you saving traveling to Toronto or booking a room at the SPX Marriott? If not for the money, why bother with shows at all? Do we really need to answer that question?
§ Speaking of Secret Acres, they’ve joined the gang of small presses (Koyama, Uncivilized, Alternative, Nobrow, Enchanted Lion Arsenal Pulp, etc) that are being distributed by Consortium. Consortium seems to do good things for small comics publishers so good for them.
§ And speaking of Linework NW, it sounds like it went well:
And it’s a good one at that. In its first year, last year, Linework packed 3,000 people into the Norse Hall in northeast Portland. This year they expanded the festival to two days in an effort to thin the crowds, but if Saturday was any indication the event is only getting bigger. “I love it,” Portland artist John Black said at his booth. “It’s more of an illustrator’s (event), you know what I mean? It’s for people who make stuff.”
HASHTAG BLESSED pic.twitter.com/SwMlXZvX17
— Melanie Gillman (@melgillman) April 19, 2015
§ BUT over in Binghamton, NY, everything was coming up Milhouse for the local comic con:
More than one thousand people attended the River Road Comic Expo Sunday at Tioga Downs. The event was free and open to the public, and featured industry artists as well as local independent artists. “It’s great to have a place to come and be able to get a little face-to-face time and shake hands with the guys who make your day,” said illustrator Mike Capprotti. There were also vendors selling both new and old books and related products. “One of the great things about the pop culture community is that everyone’s really enthusiastic,” said expo organizer Jared Aiosa.
§ George Lucas has felt a tingling in the force and thinks Marvel might reboot Howard the Duck for the screen!!!
During the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival, Lucas commented on negative movie reviews, noting how even the worst reviewed films can “float up to the surface of the lake, and then they become cult classics. … It means you made an interesting movie or a weird movie, and a small group of people love it.” He continued by saying, “Even Howard the Duck is a cult classic. I have a feeling that Marvel’s gonna redo it because of the technology they have today.”
§ In less frightening news, John Ridley, showrunner of American Drime and OSar winner for 12 Years a Slave, may be working on a show for Marvel/ABC reinventing an existing Marvel superhero character or property.” Vague as hell so it could be anything, even Howard the Duck.
§ Reminder, Bart Beaty and co. are analyzing the hell ouf of comics over at What Were Comics? including Fun Home and more.
§ I forgot to link to this cool of page of interviews from the pages of Frontier Hellen Jo, Sascha Hommer, Ping Zhu and Sam Alden.
§ Here’s an old link I had to an investigation of a crappy scraper site.
§ And an interview with Keith Knight who has seen it all and then made a funny comic strip about it. .
§ Juliet Kahn offers a list of The Best Anime And Manga For Beginners and i think it’s pretty solid, but she left out …..(enter a list of 1000 names)
§ Finally, Zainab Akhtar reviews Jillian Tamaki’s SexCoven, the small press book of the year thus far.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/9/2015
I’m not the kind of critic that likes to wax poetic about the production of a piece of art. I believe that, although an artist’s life always influences their creations, a work should be judged on its own merits. However, occasionally, as is the case with Seth Kushner’s comic anthology Secret Sauce, exceptions must be made.
As he elucidates at the start of the work, Kushner spent much of 2014 in and out of the hospital being treated for Leukemia. He was told that he only had weeks to live. Then weeks went by. A few more. Yet again, a few more. Time passed, and Kushner still lived. By the end of the year, Kushner had done what doctors had said would be impossible— he defeated his leukemia. And then he made Secret Sauce.
Secret Sauce is structured as a set of five short stories, two of which are illustrated and three of which are produced as photocomics. All feature Kushner’s writing, but each story has its own set of artistic collaborators who lend a different flavor to Kushner’s words. Going in, I was worried that Secret Sauce would be a set of ruminations on mortality— the frailty of life and the relentless passage of time. Happily, I was proven wrong. Secret Sauce is not an exploration of death, but is instead a celebration of life.
In Secret Sauce‘s first short story, “The Brooklynite in ‘A Man of His Word,'” Kushner immediately establishes an upbeat and energetic tone that persists through the stories that follow it. Shamus Beyale provides great art for this short. The backgrounds are rendered with care, and his characters are expressive and drawn with clearly defined lines. Colorist Frank Reynoso uses a palette of upbeat pastels with some bright primary colors for accents, which further book’s energetic feel.
Kusher’s script never takes itself too seriously, and there are some great laughs as comic-artist-by-day-superhero-by-night Jeffries aka The Brooklynite takes on a disgruntled hipster-meets-MMA-fighter named Billy Burg. It’s a testament to the team’s collective effort that they manage to successfully create a comic that feels full and fun in only four pages. It’s fast and leaves the reader breathless and waiting for more.
Sci-Fi short “”Youtopia” does something similar, with a heavy dose of well-directed action composed by artist Charles Stewart and a beautiful color scheme and world design inspired by Tron. These two works have nothing in common in terms of plot, and instead find connection through the energy that Kushner imbues into his script and that his collaborators put into their art.
However, where Secret Sauce really shines is in its photocomics, particularly “Heyday.” In it, Kushner tells the story of a young girl whose grandfather used to be a superhero known as The Insomniac. Kushner and co-director Dean Haspiel do some great work in this short, bringing a fun and heartwarming story to life with an artistic technique that is not commonly explored in comics, and is occasionally even maligned. I myself often think about what would make a photocomic resonate with readers, and there’s a lot that can be learned from “Heyday.” Its greatest success comes from the use of color in each photographic panel. 
Characters are highlighted by wearing outfits with bright shades of blue, and the scenery of the living room that the story takes place in is pushed into the background through a unified use of oranges and browns. It’s a simple, but incredibly effective technique, and really helps the story feel less like a vaguely connected series of images and more like a well-composed comic. That’s not to say that “Heyday” is completely successful— the digitally produced sound effects and speech bubbles clash with the photographs, and Kushner and Haspiel’s use of stroke in one panel feels too synthetic when placed up against a photograph of a person rather than an illustration of one. Ultimately, however, the risks the two creators take in this photocomic are worth the slight missteps, as they demonstrate that comics still have plenty of room to grow and that Kushner has unique ideas on how to direct that growth (the ending to the story is also pretty ingenious and got a well earned laugh out of me).
It feels disingenuous to rate or score Secret Sauce on a scale. Kushner doesn’t try to shove a message down anyone’s throat. He’s not in it to prove something. He’s in it because he loves comics, and it shows. Secret Sauce is a revelry that is playfully self-indulgent with its references to Brooklyn culture and superhero tropes. It’s a deeply personal work that is simultaneously universal in its themes. It’s a book that plays with form and theme in ways that are not commonly explored. In short, Secret Sauce is not a treatise— it’s a party.
Secret Sauce debuts at NYC’s MoCCA Fest 2015, which takes place this weekend, April 11th-12th.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/8/2015
This exhibit of works from Craig Yoe’s original art collection has already garnered stellar accolades – tonight you can see why. And that’s not all …
I had the good fortune of seeing an early preview of Is That Art? at the Society of Illustrators a few weeks ago, and it’s a must-see for anyone who wants to connect with the magic and the power of creative design. The exhibit covers much of the first century of comics & cartoon art, and the work is displayed in ways that highlight deep connections and spark new ideas. A original Spark Plug parallel to a Peanuts strip where Snoopy is dismissed as a dog; a landmark portrait of Superman for Siegel-and-Shuster’s syndicate chief near a reflection on a woman’s dual identity by Fay King; the first Pogo newspaper strip; the original Fin-Fang-Foom-awakes page, signed by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Dick Ayers ….
I could go on, but I’ll leave you to discover all the wonders for yourself. The exhibit’s official opening is tonight from 5pm – 10pm at the Society of Illustrators, 128 E. 63rd St. in New York City. If you can’t make it this evening (or at all, alas), you can find some consolation in the extensive Yoe! Books library, which includes lavish and faithful restorations of material ranging from kitsch to classics. One place to start: the latest Yoe! Books/IDW publication, Milt Gross’ New York, which has been receiving impressive reviews.
If you can make it to the Society of Illustrators, don’t miss its other must-see exhibits. The original art from Little Nemo: Dream Another Dream is up through tomorrow (April 9), and seeing it at full size reminded me of seeing the original art for Robert Crumb’s Book of Genesis at the Hammer Museum – a revelation. As for the exhibit on Alt-Weekly Comics curated by Warren Bernard and Bill Kartalopoulos, well, that too deserves a book of its own – this exhibit is important not just for chronicling an influential, if under-appreciated genre within North American comics, but for helping us understand the world today.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/11/2014
Straight from the offices of Publishers Weekly, it’s More to Come! Your podcast source of comics news and discussion starring The Beat’s own Heidi MacDonald.
In this week’s podcast the More to Come Crew – Heidi “The Beat” MacDonald, Calvin Reid and Kate Fitzsimons – discuss this year’s MoCCA Arts Fest and Emerald City Comic Con – with interviews from the MoCCA floor, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, new comics to screen deals including Federal Bureau of Physics and Sinister Six and more on PW Comics World’s More To Come.
Now tune in Fridays for our regularly scheduled podcast!
Listen to this episode in streaming here, download it direct here and catch up with our previous podcasts on the PublishersWeekly website, or subscribe to More To Come on iTunes
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 7/10/2012
As reported yesterday, the Soho gallery and office space of the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art closed suddenly this month. A statement went out later on Monday:
The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art (MoCCA), New York City’s only cultural institution dedicated specifically to celebrating the comics medium, will be closing its physical location effective immediately.
The SoHo museum, currently at 594 Broadway, recently celebrated its tenth anniversary. While the physical space is closing, plans are afoot to continueMoCCA in a new and exciting incarnation. An announcement of MoCCA’s future arrangements will be forthcoming by the end of July.
Current memberships will be honored at the new venue, as will table renewals forMoCCA Fest 2013.
@GoogleNYC @Comixace – The new venue in NYC will be announced by the end of the month.
— MoCCA (@MoCCAnyc) July 10, 2012
While the closing was definitely sudden—as we noted, many upcoming presenters at the museum only found out a few days ago that they would have to move their events— the situation isn’t hopeless. MoCCA president Ellen Abramowitz has a background in real estate and brokered the museum’s past deal, so she’s the right person for the job of finding a new spot for the museum.
Of course there are many questions–where is the museum’s collection being stored in the meantime, for instance. Museum staff hasn’t been answering any inquiries–but until any further information is released, museum supporters are remaining positive.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/27/2012
Just a brief guide to some publishers and creators and stuff to look out for!
ABRAMS:
:
11:15: PANEL: Kids Comics — with Jorge Aguirre, Giants Beware!
1:15: WORKSHOP: Checklist for a New Comic — with Matt Madden and Jessica Abel, Mastering Comics
2pm: SIGNING: Jorge Aguirre, Giants Beware!
4pm: SIGNING: Joe Infurnari, Mush!
5pm: SIGNING: Derek Kirk Kim, Same DifferenceSunday:
(exhibits 11am – 6pm)11am: SIGNING: Dave Roman, Astronaut Academy
11:15: PANEL: Young Adult Graphic Novels — with Derek Kirk Kim, Same Difference, and sister-company guest-star Kevin Pyle, Take What You Can Carry
1pm: SIGNING: George O’Connor, Hades: Lord of the Dead
3pm: SIGNING: MK Reed, Americus
Saturday, April 28th
12:00 pm-1:00 pm Josh Simmons / Kim Deitch / Olivier Schrauwen
1:00 pm-2:30 pm Drew Friedman
1:30 pm-3:00 pm Nicolas Mahler
3:00 pm-4:00 pm Michael Kupperman
3:00 pm-4:30 pm Jason
4:30 pm-5:30 pm Fredrik Strömberg / Hans Rickheit
By: Betsy Bird,
on 4/25/2012
Ain’t he just the sweetest thing? Author/illustrator Aaron Zenz recently wrote just the loveliest ode to his four top favorite children’s literary blogs, and then went and created original art for each. In my case he created this little Fuse guy (or possibly Fuse gal) based on the bright yellow Fuse you see at the beginnings of each of my posts (I put it there in lieu of my face because I can only look at myself so often before going stark raving mad). This, I should point out, is not the first time a little Fuse person has been created for this blog. Katherine Tillotson, an artist of outstanding ability (I’m biased but it also happens to be true) created not one but TWO little Fusemen in the past, both for separate birthdays.
I’m a fan. So thank you Aaron and, once again, thank you Katherine. Fusemen of the world unite!
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/7/2011
Coming to this year’s MoCCA-fest and wondering where to grab a quick lunch to eat in between selling your mini comics? Look no further!
Although considered drab by New York standards, the Rose Hill/Gramercy/Flatiron area surrounding the the Sixty-Ninth Regiment Armory, setting for MoCCA Fest, still offers a colorful array of authentic, delicious and affordable cuisine from around the world within a radius of only a couple of blocks. (It IS New York City, after all.) Bearing in mind the small budgets of most MoCCA attendees/indie cartoonists, we’re going to highlight places where, for $10 or under, you can still get a decent meal — some of them even prepared by Iron Chef level celebrities. At a few places if $10 isn’t enough for a meal it is still enough for some rare treat that will make your trip one to remember.
For dinner you will want to grab some friends and a subway or cab and head to one of the great restaurants of the city, but your lunchtime is definitely covered right here.
View MoCCA Dining Guide in a larger map
• BAOGUETTE: The hit of the two previous MoCCAs at this location and ground zero for the still going craze for Vietnamese bahn mi sandwiches. Prices have gone up — $6 for chicken and pork, $7 for beef, catfish and veggie. We hadn’t eaten here for a while and stopped in for a BBQ chicken just yesterday — even better than we remembered! For $9.25 you can get a spicy sandwich on am amazing crusty roll with chicken, pate, cilantro, daikon and siracha sauce and a strong, sweet iced Vietnamese coffee that will keep you rolling for an hour. WARNING: these sandwiches are stinky and do leave you with the kind of burp halo that you would expect from a sandwich that includes radish. Baoguette also sells pretty good pre-packaged green papaya salads and summer rolls which are refreshing and full of veggies, but they’ll sell out pretty quick. We saw owners celebrity chefs Michael Huynh and Thao Nguyen eating lunch here the other day, and Nguyen greeted us with a “Long time no see!” when we went in after six months, so they get some neighbor points for that. ALSO: CLOSED SUNDAY so make sure to get your bahn mi on on Saturday.
• MIDORI TEA HOUSE 61 Lexington. Taking over the spot once occupied by the much-missed Latin Thing, this is a full service Taiwanese tea house, complete with the tapioca bubbles, and hot and cold elixirs in flavors from lychee to almond. They have ice slushies with tapioca as well. A large, cool beverage will set you back most of a tenner, so consider this a luxury item. I haven’t sampled a wide variety of their wares, but they are thirst quenching and tasty. CLOSED SUNDAY.
• ROOMALI (On 27th be
By: Julie Fortenberry,
on 6/7/2008
The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art is proud to announce MoCCA Art Festival 2008, June 7th-8th, at the historic Puck Building in lower Manhattan.
The new space looks nice–it might be smaller but I’m hoping Mocca being on just two floors helps the flow. The one this year felt cramped and separated to me.
I love how the PDF of the floor plan includes examples of the various tables and chairs for planning!
“Maximum Occupancy 700 Persons”