So, how have you been? Quiet week since our last Small Press & Indie Comics update? I know talking about comics in the middle of a global pandemic sounds ridiculous, but let’s have some levity and semblance of normalcy amidst everything.

PLUGS

§ There are two things that should be obvious to all of our readers: 1) comics are phenomenal teaching tools and 2) graphic medicine is an active and expanding field. In that optic, there is a series of comics that have been created to talk to children about the COVID-19 outbreak that was created by the National University of Singapore and illustrated by Sonny Liew.

MONEY

§ The result of the ongoing and upcoming cancellation of conventions, festivals and general public gathering is that cartoonists will be losing revenue this year. I’ll try to highlight every opportunity for funds that I see here, but if you see something, please post it in the comment or reach me via email or on Twitter. I’ll also try to retweet everything I see concerning artists selling art or in need of funds. Hit me up on Twitter @Leblanc_Phil.

NEWS

§ French-Canadian cartoonist Iris Boudreau and Cathon‘s book series La liste des choses qui existent has been adapted into a cartoon series over at the National Film Board. It’s available in both French AND English as The Great List of Everything

§ Happy Third anniversary to Aminder Dhaliwal‘s Women’s World

§ Shortbox will be moving to a Kickstarter campaign for it’s next box. Creator and editor Zainab Akhtar explains over at the Shortbox blog.

§ Cartoonist Ben Katchor is the latest guest on Gil Roth‘s podcast Virtual Memories.

§ Michael Deforge on Butter Tarts and Anarchism

§ Anna Sellheim talks with Ariel Bordeaux

§ Process for the cover of one of my favourite Les Cités Obscures book, La fièvre d’Urbicante

AWARDS

§ Riad Sattouf‘s much-celebrated The Arab of the Future series just won an award for it’s Japanese language translation.

§ Here’s the list of the Bédeis Causa nominees for this year.

EVENTS

§ As far as I can tell, it’s #CancelEverything time. At this point, it would be silly to keep track of what’s still happening. I don’t know what indie comics events are or aren’t taking place, and things are changing on a daily basis. Visit the website of the events you are planning to attend for the latest updates, and stay safe everyone.

COMICS

§ Beth Barnett‘s ongoing diary on Social Distancing and COVID-19

§ A look at where the money from Mike Bloomberg‘s failed presidential bid might have gone

§ I Have no Mouth, yet I must Kiss

REVIEWS AND OTHER NOTABLE THINGS

§ Anya Davidson on For Real #1

§ Yeah, I’m enjoying the X-Men again. It’s been a while since I read X-Men comics that I liked. The X-Men seems to be able to have some kind of revival every decade or so and some are more interesting than others.. I’ve tried countless reboots before, but it always felt kind of hollow, re-threading the same stories with mild variations, nothing to keep me interested for a long time. This new “Dawn of X” revival has a lot going for it, at least for now. Anyway, WWAC has a double take on the excellent, mostly wordless Giant-Size X-Men: Jean Grey & Emma Frost.

§ Again with the X-Men, this time at Shelfdust, Claire Napier makes a great pitch for how great X-Men #1 is. It’s hard to disagree with her, I do enjoy this comic, but I also find it incredibly weighed down by the sheer number of dialogue in it. It looks gorgeous, I just wish there wasn’t that many speech bubbles on top of every page.

§ And finally, Daniel Elkin on Xia Gordon‘s Sorry


§ If you see something I should know about, tell me about it. You can email me, tell me in the comments or tweet at me @Leblanc_Phil. I’ll be back in two weeks with more small press & indie comics updates.