Tag: Indie Comics

Whew the comics arts festival circuit news is flowing thick and fast; we're in the middle of application season and hearts and minds are turning to tabling. And the CAFs are answering back with news.

Whitney Taylor continues to be my favorite investigative comics journalist—well, maybe investigative is too strong a word, but if "talking to a lot of people and painting a picture" is the criterion, Whit is it, as her report on Comic Arts Brooklyn shows. This was a strong show but one that experienced an unexpected glitch: a lot of people thought it was a two day show and didn't come to the exhibits on Saturday. This resulted in a smaller crowd and, for some, lower sales. On the day there was a lot of anxiety—it's like basing your business plan on Christmas sales and then there's a big blizzard the day of the big sale—but everyone seems to have survived intact. And yet, is a financial model this precarious one that is "sustainable"? I predict sustainable will be THE word of 2015, as a the last few days of posts here have been exploring. Taylor talks about the model with many publishers and creators and key behind the scenes people like publishing rep Tony Shenton, and while everyone is optimistic, there is no real consensus on whether things are working, improving or just providing a false illusion of hope:

Well, sort of. It's well known that some used book prices on Amazon are just kind of...loony. Take for instance, Monsters by Ken Dahl, an excellent book about a guy who thinks he has herpes by Ken Dahl, published by Secret Acres but now out of print. (A new edition is planned for next year.) In the meantime, you can get a used copy for a mere $394.94... or brand new for $11,964.08.

Over at PW I reported on Consortium starting to distribute Alternative Comics and Secret Acres to bookstores. They currently distribute Uncivilized, Toon Books, Nobrow and Koyama Press, as well as publishers such as Fulcrum...

Koyama Press is making many of its current and past graphic novels available in digital editions via the Sequential app. The titles available are yet to be announced, but according to the PR...

By Matt O'Keefe There’s no one doing as pure a form of worldbuilding as indy fantasy comic Cartozia Tales. Not only does it have a map that it intends to explore every part of (unlike the...

I'm pretty sure we've posted some of Eric Haven's creepy cool Mancat comics before. But not it's all being collected by AdHouse, in UR. The publisher describes these comics as "Dark, absurdist, and deadpan, these stories reflect the apocalyptic undercurrent of the modern era. Also included is Haven's long-running comic strip "Race Murdock" which appeared in The Believer magazine." Haven is among those cartoonist's whose work is just inherently spooky. In the past his work has appeared in various anthologies, but when he isn't cartooning he's producing the TV Show Mythbusters. A real hyphenate for the season.

While nerdlebrity comics lines are common now—from Shia LaBeouf to DMC—a pioneer in this regard and still one of the best in terms of quality is Burlyman Comics, which is owned by the Wachowskis, the directing siblings behind The Matrix, the much beloved Speed Racer and the upcoming Jupiter Ascending. The company has been around for about a decade and launched about a decade ago with Doc Frankenstein by the Wachowskis and Matrix storyboard artist Steve Scroce, and Shaolin Cowboy by the all around genius Geof Darrow. Burlyman put out 7 issues of Shaolin Cowboy before fading away—the seriesfollow the  adventures of a nameless Shaolin and his mule in an apocalyptic American West—a concept that seems maybe too simple until you know that Darrow is drawing it with all his hallucinogenic detail. The tagline "A buddy picture with a body count" explains it all.

SF's sole remaining comics show, the Alternative Press Expo, aka APE, kicks off tomorrow at Fort Mason. Guests include Bob Fingerman, Spike, Robert Williams and Paul Pope.Programming is here.  APE is a fun show, or was when...

The indie comics world and The Beat are recovering from the yearly love in also known as the Small Press Expo. You can see lots of photos on the SPX tumblr including the above...

The Best of Comix Book: When Marvel Went Underground is in B&W/  and Full color, HardCover  an exclusive Kitchen Sink Press imprint under Dark Horse  ISBN:978-1-61655-258-9 Intro by Stan Lee Forward by Denis Kitchen Designed and Edited by John Lind by Pam Auditore Tall,...

As the indie show/CAF circuit gets more popular, one market seems to be without its own show and that's Los Angeles. It's always Los Angeles. They have book fairs and Comickaze but indie shows tend to founder there. Well, a new kid just hit the block and it's called Comic Arts Los Angeles. Like the best CAFs it has an acryonmic name that makes shandy shortcut: CALA.