MoCCAFest 2016 announces programming with Gloeckner, Sugar, Blechman and more

The 2016 MoCCA Festival is just around the corner at its new (and we hope permanent home) at Metropolitan West, with the dates of April 2-3. The programming has just been announced, as as with last year, it will take place a block or so away at Ink48 at 653 11th Avenue at 48th Street. This year’s Fest features Guests of Honor Stephen Universe’s Rebecca Sugar, Diary of a Teenage Girl author Phoebe Gloeckner, El Deafo author Cece Bell, legendary illustrator, animator and graphic novelist R. O. Blechman, and artist Sonny Liew, suthor of this year’s masterpiece. As in years past, the programming curated and organized by MoCCA Arts Festival Programming Director Bill Kartalopoulos and it covers all facets of the comics ublishing business.

Access to programming on a daily basis is included with the price of admission to the MoCCA Arts Festival. Admission to MoCCA costs $5 per day. To be admitted to programming, attendees must display proof of ticket purchase for that day to the Fest. Tickets are available at the door at Metropolitan West the weekend of the Fest, and on-site at Ink48 during programming.

And here’s the line-up; I’ll be moderating a panel on autobiographical comics on Saturday, any success will be due to th epanelists who are outstanding. But so is the rest of the programming:

SATURDAY April 2

12:30 pm / Garamond Room
Phoebe Gloeckner in Conversation with Ariel Schrag
Phoebe Gloeckner is the author of two essential contemporary works about adolescent girlhood: A Child’s Life and Other Stories, a collection of short comics, and The Diary of a Teenage Girl, an account in prose and pictures which was recently adapted into a critically-acclaimed and award-winning film of the same name. In this special conversation, Gloeckner will talk about her work with cartoonist and writer Ariel Schrag (Likewise, Potential, Adam, The L Word), who has also taken her adolescent life as subject matter for her work in comics.

12:30 pm / Helvetica Room 
Sonny Liew Spotlight 
Born in Malaysia and based in Singapore, Sonny Liew produces work that bridges diverse areas of comics. His body of work includes the Xeric Award-winning Malinky Robot,DC/Vertigo’s My Faith in Frankie, contributions to the Flight anthology, and work for Marvel Comics. He is currently the artist for DC Comics’ Doctor Fate series, and his graphic novel The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye has just been published in a North American edition by Pantheon Books. The Singaporean edition of this book suffered the loss of a substantial grant due to content that was considered politically subversive. Liew will discuss his work in conversation with his Doctor Fate collaborator, writer and former DC Comics President Paul Levitz.

BREAK

2:00 pm / Garamond Room 
Cece Bell on El Deafo 
Cece Bell is an illustrator, author, and cartoonist whose children’s books include Itty Bitty, Bee-Wigged, Rabbit & Robot: The Sleepover, and the Sock Monkey series. In 2014 she debuted as a cartoonist with the middle grade graphic memoir El Deafo (Abrams), a humorous and inspiring personal account of her hearing loss at a young age. El Deafo was named a 2015 Newbery Honor book by the ALA. Her next book will be the picture book I Yam a Donkey. In this spotlight session, Bell will talk about El Deafo and her overall career in conversation with Susan Van Metre, Vice President and Publisher for Abrams Books for Young Readers and Amulet Books.

2:00 pm / Helvetica Room
Bill Plympton Cartoon Showcase
Bill Plympton is an icon of independent animation. He has produced dozens of animated shorts, including such classics as “Your Face” and “How to Kiss.” His animated feature films include I Married a Strange Person, Hair High, and, most recently, Cheatin’. He has animated music videos for Kanye West and “Weird Al” Yankovic, and has produced animation for MTV, The Simpsons, and NBC. In this special showcase, Plympton himself will discuss and screen specially selected examples of animated cartoons from throughout his career. Please note:the animated cartoons that will be screened in this panel are suitable only for mature audiences.

BREAK

3:30 pm / Garamond Room 
Venn Diagram: Art/Comics 
Painter and cartoonist Keith Mayerson once called his 1996 graphic novel Horror Hospital Unplugged “too arty for comics” and “too comics for art.” The boundary between those two fields, however structural and arbitrary, may be weakening, but is it happening quickly enough to accommodate the rapidly growing number of artists who are now so productively working in this seam? Moderator Bill Kartalopoulos will investigate these questions and more with three leading lights of contemporary artcomics: Austin English (Gulag Casual), Aidan Koch (After Nothing Comes), and Blaise Larmee (3 Books).

3:30 pm / Helvetica Room
Autobiography: Revealing the Self in Comics
Autobiography, diary, and memoir have been a vital area of comics since Justin Green’s 1972Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary, and have only increased in visibility since the graphic novel format was popularized. How do artists choose what to reveal about themselves, and what kind of light to paint themselves in? And in the age of online oversharing, what specific possibilities and opportunities does the comics form offer for self-revelation? Moderator Heidi MacDonald (The Beat) will discuss this and more with Gabrielle Bell (Truth is Fragmentary),Nicole Georges (Calling Dr. Laura), Jennifer Hayden (The Story of My Tits), and Gina Wynbrandt (Someone Please Have Sex With Me).

SUNDAY April 3

12:30 pm / Garamond Room
Making Comics for Younger Readers
Comics for middle grade and young adult readers are a booming area of publishing. Witness the success of Raina Telgemeier, whose books including Smile have been on the New York Times Softcover Graphic Books best seller list every week for four years now. Desk Set co-founder and Browning School Head Librarian Sarah Murphy will speak with Laurent Linn(Draw the Line), Kevin McCloskey (We Dig Worms!), Noelle Stevenson (Nimona, Lumberjanes) and James Sturm (Adventures in Cartooning) about the process and responsibilities of creating comics that meet the needs and appetites of younger readers.
12:30 pm / Helvetica Room

R.O. Blechman Spotlight
Multiple award-winning artist R. O. Blechman has enjoyed a robust and singular career, working as an illustrator, animator, art director, studio head, and as the author of books that we can only call “graphic novels,” though they were drawn decades before that category even existed. His classic animation work — including his 1966 CBS Christmas animation, commercials for products including Alka Seltzer, work for programs including Sesame Street, and his feature film A Soldier’s Tale — have been screened at the Museum of Modern Art. His 1953 graphic novel The Juggler of Our Lady was recently re-published in a new edition by Dover Books; his new graphic novel Amadeo & Maladeo has just been published by Fantagraphics. Blechman will discuss his diverse body of work with Fantagraphics publisherGary Groth, and will show rare examples of his animation.

BREAK

2:00 pm / Garamond Room
Rebecca Sugar Q & A
Rebecca Sugar made comics and studied animation as a student at the School of Visual Arts. After she finished school she found work as a writer and storyboard artist for Adventure Timebefore creating the critically-acclaimed and much beloved animated series Steven Universe. Sugar is the first woman to create a series for the Cartoon Network, and the series continues to break boundaries with its imaginative world building and message of radical tolerance. She has been nominated for Emmy Awards for her work on both Adventure Time and Steven Universe. In this spotlight session, she will answer questions posed by Youth in Decline publisher Ryan Sands.

2:00 pm / Helvetica Room
You Can Get Killed Doing This: Sketches from the Satire Biz
Can satire survive in a world of trigger warnings and Kalashnikov triggers? Could The National Lampoon be published in a post-Charlie Hebdo world? Is self-censorship the greatest sin of all? National Lampoon cartoonist and author Rick Meyerowitz (currently the subject of anexhibit at The Society of Illustrators) will lead a frank discussion covering these subjects and more with political cartoonist Steve Brodner, former Lampoon co-editor Sean Kelly, and cartoonist Peter Kuper (Ruins, Mad Magazine, World War 3 Illustrated).

BREAK

3:30 pm / Garamond Room
Wimmen’s Comix 
In 1970 Trina Robbins edited It Ain’t Me, Babe, the first underground comic book produced entirely by women. Two years later, a collective including Robbins founded Wimmen’s Comix, a feminist comix anthology that was published for twenty years and featured dozens of women drawing diverse narratives. To mark the publication of The Complete Wimmen’s Comix from Fantagraphics, this panel will feature contributors Jennifer Camper, Phoebe Gloeckner, Diane Noomin and Leslie Sternbergh discussing the impact and importance of Wimmen’s Comix and feminist comics in general with moderator Margaret Galvan (The Graduate Center, City University of New York).

3:30 pm / Helvetica Room
The Center for Cartoon Studies: Ten Years of Fellowship
In 2005 James Sturm and Michelle Ollie founded the Center for Cartoon Studies, a graduate degree-granting institution focusing on the art of making comics, in the tiny hamlet of White River Junction, Vermont. In the years since, the school has produced dozens of working cartoonists. For the past ten years, CCS has also hosted Fellows: working artists who participate in the life of the school while working on their projects. This panel, moderated byAlec Longstreth and held in conjunction with an exhibit at the Society of Illustrators, brings together several CCS Fellows from the past ten years including: T. Edward Bak, Max de Radigues, Julie Delporte, Connor Willumsen, Chris Wright and Sophie Yanow.