Web comics on 'Drawn Out'

Okay, an experiment: I'm going to try blogging about what I'm GOING to talk about on the radio, rather than what I HAD talked about, which I kept not doing anyway.

So.  On tomorrow's 'Drawn Out' segment, 9.15 - 9.30am, as part of Richard Watts' weekly love letter to the arts in Melbourne, 'Smartarts' (9am - 12pm every Thursday morning on 3RRR, 102.7 on your FM dial), he and I are going to talk about web comics, about which I know nothing.

Should be interesting.

(I would like at this point to credit my web comics fingerposts, Liam Routt, Adrian Regan and John Retallick, for at least pushing me towards a computer and assuring me that yes, there are comics in that thing.  No, you don't have to turn the pages.  And very importantly, no, you don't buy them.  You just type and click and read...)

First up: Top Shelf 2.0 is the online arm of the well-built body that is Top Shelf Comics in the US, paper comic book (real? physical? what to call that good ol' content delivery system?) publishers of works by great favourites of mine, Alan Moore ( 'From Hell', 'Lost Girls' and Eddie Campbell (the upcoming omnibus of his autobiographical stories, 'The Years have Pants', 'From Hell'), among many many others.  Whoo! 2.0!  It's digital! It's amazing!  You get a great long list of comic book makers, among them some great Australian comic bookers (the Bens Constantine and Hutchings, Jessica McLeod, Edward J Grug III), in the company of some well-regarded alternative North American talents such as Dean Haspiel, David Chelsea, Alex Robinson, Dash (rising star) Shaw and clearly a raft of folks who I've never heard of but can cartoon like deamons.  Including, incidentally, the great, no, really, the GREAT Glenn Dakin, 'the demon catoonist'. Recommended.

Of course, the other great thing about web comics is the leaping from lilypad to lilypad... you know, the whole intremenet thing. The whole 'Gen XYZ' concentration-span-of-a-gnat thing.  So you should check out James Kochalka's American Elf because it's beautiful and it's short, a daily strip of at most 4 panels, little observational autobiographical moments.

Then, following other recommendations, you stop for a little bit at various recommended sites before realising that they're not for you but then you see something out of the corner of the page, something called Papercuts and suddenly you're in the beautifully realised worlds by Michael Cho, who's having a bit of time off while his wife has their baby but in the meantime you can look at his great singlepage 'Smoking' and his ongoing 'Waiting'.  If the name David Mazzucelli means anything to you, then I'll say it.  David Mazzuchelli.  Interested now, aren't you?

Finally, although of course NOT finally because this web comic universe is immense, but you really should go to Trudy Cooper and Danny Murphy's Platinum Grit, a sexy girl/genius nerd story which was brilliant as a paper comic in the 90s and is even brillianter as a web thing in the 00s.  And a really elegant solution to the 'comics on the web' presentation problem too...

 Go.  Laugh.

Finally, this Saturday May 23 you can go to the State Library of Victoria and meet a comic book in person! Shane McCarthy is a comic book writer from Perth who has written for Batman, Daredevil, Star Wars and currently Transformers.   Well, he's in Melbourne for the Emerging Writers' Festival and if you go to the website you can organise to meet him (he's going to be a "living book" at the library) and chat about how one writes these sort of comics.  Or, about what Optimus Prime has for breakfast.

Target 144: join the conspiracy

 

Target 144 is part of International Literature Conspiracy Week.

You've heard of it, right?

No?

Good.

What you must do:

Monday 9 February, 2009, 12 midday: start making a comic.

Tuesday 10 - Friday 13 (ooooh!): keep making the comic.

Saturday 14 February 2009, 12 midday: finish making the comic.

Simple, eh? There's more, but the above is pretty much it: if you've been looking for an excuse to dive in to comic making for 6 days, whether you're a first-timer, a battle-scarred veteran or somewheres in between, this is the 144 hours (6 x 24 = 144) you've been looking for.

What's 'more':

1.  Your comic needs to be about what is happening during those six days, either what's going on in your head or in the world outside or the space in between (where, after all, so much happens).

2. You need to tear out and include the date from some  'official' print source (newspaper, tram ticket etc) to effectively 'carbon-date' your work.

3.  You are most welcome to kick off the 144 hours by spending the first 6 with me, other comickers and some zinesters down the rabbit hole at Sticky (in the Degraves Street Subway under Flinders Street).  We'll be there from 12 midday to 6pm on Monday 9 February and I'll be buying top notch coffee, tea and donuts for any comicker there until my 'organiser funds' have run out.

4.  You are most welcome to celebrate the end of 'Target 144' by coming down to the aforesaid Sticky on Saturday 14 February (yes, by all means, bring your Valentine) with copies of the comic you have made (which you have photocopied at the photocopier of your choice) and you can --- well, sell 'em, swap 'em, give 'em away for a kiss if you're that way inclined.  The zinesters will be there too, and all of us 'Target 144' folk will be holding hands and singing old 'zine and comic' folk ballads from the 16th century. Or something like that.

5.  Finally, get good copies of your pages to me the following week (Feb 16 - Feb 20).  I have been entrusted with the sacred task of compiling the 'Target 144' publication, collecting all the pieces, zine and comic, produced that week and packing them up into a natty little photocopied A5 book.  Already I think this will be a beaut publication, so make that comic.  Set those evenings aside.  Take one of the days off from work/school/sleep and really hit the target.

Target 144.

6 days of sheer comic (or zine if that's your scene) making pleasure.

Carpe carpem, as Thomas Pynchon says.

Seize the carp.

Contact me bernard@cardigancomics.com if 1) you have any questions, and 2) if you're going to be part of it (and good on you if you are!) so I can book you a place in the 'Target 144' book.

International Literature Conspiracy Week and Target 144 has been whispered about in shuttered rooms by: Sticky, Polyester Books, The City of Melbourne and Cardigan Comics.

Wireless Comics - 2009 begins!

Hello all, welcome to 2009 - year of the ox and year of oz comix! 

(actually I don't really like either of those misspellings but they both seem to go with with 'ox')

There'll be another post tonight letting you know about 'Target 144',  a 6 day frenzy of comics making which will take place in the second week of February, and which you really should get involved in, but right now it's important to let you know that the comic book media circus has pulled into town and they're setting up the Big Top right now.

Tomorrow, Thursday 29 January, will see Melbourne's community radio stations (and this year TV too!)  rev their engines in the transmitting of comic book news via the airwaves:

9.30am: I will be on 3RRR's (102.7 on your FM dial) weekly arts show 'Smartarts', hosted by Remarkable Richard Watts, talking about the international and local comic book scenes and recent publications for 10 - 15 minutes. This segment is called 'Drawn Out' it will be featured on the third Thursday of each month.

5 - 6pm:  Jo Waite,  John Retallick and I take over 3CR's (855 on your AM dial) weekly 'DIY Arts' program to talk exclusively about Australian comic books.  We will be doing this on the last Thursday of every month at this time, so mark it in your diaries.  Jocular John also helpfully podcasts this broadcast.

Yours truly will also be appearing on TV this year, doing spot reviews of local and international comics on Channel 31's arts program, 'Yartz', 10pm Thursdays.  Maybe those will startbeing broadcast tomorrow night too.

(Thursday clearly is talk-about-comics day...)

You know, all of this is the sort of thing that will be great for the 'Sexy Men of Australian Comics* Financial Year Calendar 2009-10' when it gets drawn and launched at 'Comic Book Funny' as part of this year's Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

You betcha.

And now, in the words of Scott McCloud, and taking our cue from the spirit of this Oxen year, it's time to:

 'Work like hell'. 

So: go! Write! Draw! Publish!

See you in the year.

* as drawn by the women of Australian comics

The White Suit

There's me and Dur-e Dara, her regaling the crowd at the Tango8 launch with great words about the vital importance of love, and of food, and of comics in Australia, preparatory to an improvised beer-glass-and-spoon percussion piece which would officially launch the book into the world.

And there it is, the face that launched 1000 comics.  And the suit that he did it in.

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Thanks to Arts Victoria for the funding.  Thanks to Anita Bacic for the cover.  Thanks to Jen Jewel Brown for the publicity.  And thanks to Justin Caleo for the book design.

And most of all, thanks to the 70 contributors for entrusting their work to Cardigan Comics.

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It really IS a great book.  But don't take my word for it.  Buy a copy and read it for yourself.

'Tango8: Love and Food' - Launched!

Well well well: last night, Wednesday 17 December 2008, in a packed bar upon Lygon Street in East Brunswick ('Mr Wilkinson', 295 Brunswick Street to be precise), we launched the most recent issue of the Giant Australian Romance Comics Anthology.

Tango8: Love and Food

A goodly bunch of the 70 contributors were there, and as usual at a launch I met quite a few of them face to face for the first time (Simon Barnard, Brendan Halyday, Richard Butler, fine comic book makers all).  Much champagne was drunk, a bit of speechifying was done (thank you to Dur-e Dara, who officially launched the book) and a sense of joy and celebration filled the bar, as did we.

So now the book is out, and well and truly launched: you can grab a copy from our Melbourne stockists, listed on our website, or indeed direct from the site.

Thank you particularly to the following people, who I didn't credit in my speech as I should've: Adrienne Leith and John Retallick, super vendors of 144 copies of Tango8; Mary Anne and Salvatore Caleo for my new white suit (pictures to follow), and most of all, with great love, to Susan Bamford Caleo for making the making of the book possible in so many little and large ways.

And there we go!

There's the wonderful Jo Waite, curator of the exhibition 'Ugly, Drunk and Stupid' that she, and I, and Matt, and Susan, and Rose, and Joseph, and Georgia, and Zebedee, took down yesterday at the Town Hall Gallery at the Hawthorn Town Hall.  And next to her is Mr Smiley, who Jo drew and was our exhibition mascot.

Mardi Nowak, who's the curator of the space and a great booster for local zine and comics culture, took a whole bunch of photos of the exhibition, and of the 'Ugly Draw-Off' comics jam that we held on Saturday arvo after I gave a talk about the Ugly Tradition in comics art, focussing on Basil Wolverton, Ralph Steadman and Peter Bagge: a great discussion, much drawing, and, yes, sherry drinking ensued.

Thanks Mardi!  See you at next year's Fringe comics exhibition, eh?