§ Hi everyone, Philippe here with some micro press, small press and indie comics links and news.
§ Nice art: The above image is from Xia Gordon, a phenomenal cartoonist from Orlando (now based in NYC). Her work is one of the highlight of my TCAF experience. She participated in the 2dCloud Altcomics 10 comics reading/art show/animation/dance event. Her reading of her comic A Cure for Madness was simply fantastic and something I’ve thought about regularly since coming back to real life. It was near perfect, even with the technical difficulties during her presentation. Her work is beautiful and I can’t wait to see her other comics and upcoming 2dCloud comics.
PLUGS
§ If you misses the Retrofit Comics 2017 Kickstarter campaign, you can now pre-order this years’ worth of comics on their website (Right HERE). There’s a lot of excellent looking material in this list, including new work by Yuichi Yokoyama, Laura Ķeniņš, Warren Craghead III, Zach Hazard Vaupen, Tara Booth and Will Cardini. It`s worth a look, Retrofit has been publishing fantastic comics over the last couple of years and this publishing slate looks great.
§ There’s a couple of crowdfunding campaign of notes at the moment, the first one being for the first volume of Melanie Gillman’s As the Crow Flies. It’s published by Iron Circus, they’ve run a few successful campaigns in the past and have released quality material. It looks well on it’s way to being funded and I’m sure the comic will look fabulous. There’s also a new campaign for the Spring lineup of Kilgore Comics. They have fabulous contributors this time around including Glynnis Fawkes and Noah Van Sciver.
§ Michel Fiffe, he of the excellent Copra, has launched a Patreon page last week. The goal is to help fund a new comics series called Negativeland and the rewards are interesting. You can get access to some behind the scenes stuff on Copra, get a copy of the book, or you can get a sketch. He’s already fulfilled his two of his goals and just added a third goals. It’s a fun initiative.
§ Meags Fitzgerald is working on her latest graphic novel Arm’s Reach and has a Patreon page as well. She posts a lot of process videos, but mostly, her series of ambidextrous drawings which I’ve been finding fascinating to watch. It’s an interesting thing to witness and you should take a look.
§ Finally, Céline Loup’s new horror comic The man who came down the attic stairs is available in all it’s creepy glory. It’s about motherhood and post-partum depression.
NEWS
§ Laura Ķeniņš has a new comic book coming out via Retrofit, but she also has a gig at the CBC. She’s been writing about comic book for them for quite some times. It’s nice that the CBC is able to showcase some smaller presses. She talked about Jane Mai and An Nguyen’s So Pretty/Very Rotten and spoke with Élise Gravel about some tips to draw.
§ Speaking of the CBC, Nick Bradshaw has a nice video where he’s drawing a Batman Beyond. It’s a nice quick look at the process he uses to draw cover art.
§ Andrea Tsurumi has a new picture book coming out in October called Accident! that will be published by HBH. She’s revealed her cover and it looks very charming. Her style is very fitting for a picture book and I look forward to see it.
§ I missed the launch of the latest volume of RAV by Mickey Zacchilli published by Youth in Decline during TCAF. I’ve started seeing some photos of the book online and it looks amazing. Speaking of Youth in Decline, they should be relaunching their 2017 subscription soon for their anthology series Frontier. Keep your eyes peeled
§ Rich Tommaso has a new comic called Spy Seal for Image Comics coming out in August. It looks like a fun espionage-romp that’s kid-friendly
§ Gemma Correll has done a series of illustration for Mental Health Awareness Month.
§ Speaking of Michel Fiffe, Fantagraphics will be publishing a collection of his early work Zegas in the Fall
COMICS
§ Comics Workbook has a new comic from Kyung Me called Copy Kitty. Kyung Me did this amazing comic called Bad Kover at Space Face Book in 2015, I’m eager to see more of Kyung’s work.
§ Annie Mok has some free comic on Gumroad that should be interesting.
§ Céline Loup’s contribution to Laura Lannes anthology Bad Boyfriends is available online. It’s a deeply personal and heartbreaking comic that’s worth a read.
§ Katriona Chapman has new comics available on her website. Her latest Highlands and Islands is about a trip to Scotland’s Isle of Skye, one of the most beautiful place in the world.
§ Two great comics from the Nib, one by Vreni on abortion and a response to Alex Tizon’s much maligned essay My Family’s Slave by Sukjong Hong
§ K.L. Ricks short comic contribution to the Critical Chips essay and comics magazine is available online
COMMENTARY, REVIEWS, ETC.
§ Ottawa’s own Kin Jee, the former manager of the Ottawa Silver Snail, has remained active since the Snail closed almost two years ago. He has been keeping up with his regular weekly posting of micro reviews of a large swath of which comics are coming out each week even after the closing of his shop over with his Off The Rack feature. He managed to keep a positivity and enthusiasm for comics as an art form throughout this whole time and it’s pretty impressive.
§ Alex Hoffman reviewed Diana’s Electric Tongue by Carolyn Nowak over at Sequential State. I’ve reviewed this comic as part of Shortbox earlier this year, but it is finally out for individual purchase. It’s a wonderful comic that deserves a wider audience. .
§ New reviews from Zainab over at Comics and Cola. I’m eternally glad for the work that Zainab has done over the years and her reviews are always insightful. I’m glad she’s back at it. Here she talks about House of Penance and Dissolving Classroom
§ Katie Skelly reviewed the excellent Anya Davidson comic Lovers in the Garden over at The Comics Journal
§ Tip of the hat for Abhay Khosla, who recently experimented with a twitch style live reviews of Marvel’s terrible-looking Civil War II over at Savage Critics. It’s a neat experiment and an interesting way to look at comics, it’s very raw.
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See any news I should know about, tell me in the comments or tweet at me @Leblanc_Phil
Great collection, Philippe! Thanks for sharing. Will this be a recurring feature on the Beat?
Great capsule reviews of small press comics!
These days I find myself much more receptive to small press, and online publications. I am downsizing my paper comic collection, and going to pdf/cbr.
So thanks for highlighting which comics are available for digital purchase or (yay) free reading online!
Andrew. I’ll try to make it a monthly thing!
Al, lots of good online comics. Check out Hazlitt comics section, there’s a ton of good stuff by phenomenal cartoonist on there.
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