tantramar

Robot Rising

A new Tom Gauld book will be popping up on our shelves shortly, and yes it's pretty nice.

Quimby The (Moving) Mouse

Happy is the day when I find a new Chris Ware animation. This time Quimby the Mouse gets an outing. I saw this had been done a few weeks back but dammit, Vimeo is blocked in China so I've only just bee able to view it.

It's really nice, as you might expect and the music is by Andrew Bird, so it's a double win.

Chris Ware Interview

The image above was drawn by comic book artist extraordinaire Mr Chris Ware. The delightful man granted me a little interview recently.

Here's my Chris Ware interview.

Where's Ware

If you've read this blog for a while you'll know there's not much I like more than Chris Ware. After all I wrote about him here, here, here and here. Yes, I think he's great.

I'm obviously off my game as I just recently found out that he had a show last year at the Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery in Nebraska. I wouldn't have gone perhaps obviously, living about a hundred million miles from there although it might be nice to listen to Nebraska (Bruce Springsteen) in situ. Anyway... Chris Ware, he made a beautiful exhibition catalog for the show as you imagine he might.

It has all the great strips you'd expect to see...

In fact it's pretty much like an Acme Novelty edition but you get some nice extra bits too. Some bits about his working method...

...and background, which is quite surprising as he's quite a private chap.

You can't buy it now but this guy has 3 copies for sale, jump in.
And go and listen to Nebraska if you don't it, it's stunning.

Showing Love For Stan

A Los Angeles gallery (1988) has a nice group show on featuring a plethora of artists creating versions of Marvel characters that Stan Lee invented.

Via The Ephemerist

Clowes In The N.Y. Times

I've been reading this spread for a while and realised I hadn't told  anyone which was kinda selfish so I'm telling you now. Daniel Clowes has a weekly strip in the New York Times which those nice clever people have put online in easily downloadable PDFs. It's called Mister Wonderful and features the life of a certain unfortunate chap named Marshall.

I used to read comics as a lad and now having this weekly installment is somewhat refreshing. I don't consume anything in that way any more, life seems to be too messy to be able to subscribe to weekly time-slots and now days I consume most media on mass and there's something refreshing about having to wait. You forget about it and as if by magic it pops up again.

More Chris Ware

Just before Christmas, Chris Ware released the latest Acme Novelty Library installment, number 18. It's excellent but then anyone that knows Chris Ware, will know that already. The second volume of his Datebook series also recently got a release. That's lucky, I was getting withdrawal.

The New Literature

I bought a book the other day, it's something I do far too frequently. I should really buy one when I need a new one to read but alas I'm greedy and not practically minded, I'm stupidly impulsive.

So, anyway I bought this book, it looked good. I like short stories I find it's nice to read a book of shorts between novels. I've just finished a great collection of shorts, No One Belongs Here More Than you, by the great Miranda July. Now I'm reading the Slash autobiography, hoping it's as good as The Dirt. So I bought this new book to read after that.

Wow, long intro, this is what interested me:
It's a book of short stories edited by Zadie Smith by notable folk such as Miranda July and Nick Hornby and wait for it Chris Ware and Daniel Clowes. Yes, there are drawn comics in with the typed text.

Brilliant.

For years now people have been yapping on about how comics are as relevant as novels (in a literal context) which they can be. Chris Ware (a few years back) won the guardian book prize, note the book prize not comic book prize.

This is the first time I've seen a publisher actually place them all together. That's progress that is. I don't know if the book is good yet as I've not read it but I know some of it will be good because Chris Ware and Daniel Clowes are unable to do bad.

Jeffrey Brown, You're Wonderful

I've been a Jeffrey Brown fan ever since I stumbled across him a while back. I've read several of his books and I recently finished his debut - Clumsy on a long train journey.

His books are wonderful, he writes in a frighteningly honest manner, incorporating all the little social quirks that we humans have but seldom acknowledge, let alone lay bare for the world to see.

Reading about his experiences warms my heart. That sounds lame but I find he makes me feel better about me. Everyone has hang ups and weird fears about stupidly unimportant things. Jeffrey shows you his, thereby making you feel better about yours.

Aside from the great little stories, his lo-fi drawings are beautifully charming, presenting you with what seems like not enough information but telling you everything you need to know.

Simply fantastic.

Get Fit - The Marvel Way

This turned up in the post the other day.
How to be fit...like a superhero. So do superheros need to be fit? I mean, aren't they gifted with superhuman abilities and strength. Could the Hulk pull a muscle lifting a tank or Spidey tear a rotator cuff swinging off a lamp post? Hmmm. I think not.

As my flatmate astutely pointed out, things like this book are exactly what caused comics to loose some of their credibility. It's a really dumb idea. But then I really like dumb ideas. It's almost a passion.

Every had a patriotic pull? Hopefully not!

Did you ever think you'd see Ghostrider on his back...doing that?

I bought this as I saw it online somewhere and thought it looked brilliant. It is brilliant of course. I then went to eBay and after a swift 'buy it now' for one fine English pound it was on its way to me in the post.
Sometimes, when the light it just right and I have no psychosomatic RSI, the internet is amazing.

Krazy Kat Saves Lives

Krazy Kat is making my life better. Which you know, has to be a good thing.

I've been reading 10 minutes of Krazy Kat every day - like a prescription or daily fix and it's great. George Herriman is a genius. Some of the Krazy Kat strips are out and out funny, some of them are weird and some of them I've yet to decipher. Herriman started Krazy Kat in 1913 and some say it stopped making sense in the late 1920s. Some of it is indeed pretty weird. He managed to create his own language  and sometimes you have to read the speech bubbles several times to understand what Krazy Kat, Officer Pupp or Ignatz Mouse are trying to say. But then one of them will bounce a brick of another's head and everything is ok again.

All hail to the clever kids at Fantagraphics who have been re-issuing all the old Krazy Kat strips with lovely Chris Ware illustrated covers. Keep up the good work.

Jeffrey Brown In London Town

Jeffrey Brown is doing a signing in Gosh comics this Saturday (5th May). Mr Brown makes excellent comics with amusing observations about life, relationships and the stupidity of how we behave. Recommended reading.

Chris Ware Puts On His Penguin Outfit

I love Chris Ware’s work. It’s quite simply always really good. Here’s a new book cover he produced recently for Penguin as part of their classic deluxe series.

Drinky Crow Cartoon

Oooh there's a new Tony Millionaire cartoon out. Here's clip of Drink Crow. Looks pretty good.

Beastly Book

Books have changed over the years, they’ve had to. At one time books were the source of all knowledge and people who had access to them were privileged and held in high esteem. As a result pride was taken in the design and construction of these valuable objects of power. Thick cloth and leather bound volumes with gold leaf-edged pages, sumptuous illustration on heavyweight stock meant books were beautiful as well as informative items.

This concept, of a book as a piece of art is something that has mostly been lost over the years. The disposable nature of modern culture, the prohibitive cost of hand crafted items and of course in recent years, the Internet have all knocked considerable weight out of the idea of the book being the gateway to knowledge and power. So now in this electronic age it seems beautifully fitting that this new volume; Beasts, put out by Fantagraphics harks back to a forgotten time to suit its subject matter.

Beasts, is an encyclopaedia of fantastical creatures that probably never existed and only feature in the mythical stories of old salty seadogs. The book in fact, takes it's cues from an ancient book called a bestiary. A bestiary would contain beasts, most of whom, had not been proven to exist by the not quite up-to-date scientists and botanists of the age. The book would also include some text detailing the abilities of each beast and information on it's nature. This modern version contains a huge variety of mythical creatures, from the well documented Vampire and Lock Ness Monster to the slightly less known Triton and Nuckalevee.

Asp Turtle By Souther Salazar.

Fantagraphics has published this volume and it’s been dreamt up, designed and curated by their art director Jacob Covey, so all the illustrations are by the very finest talent in the arenas of comics, skate art, children’s books, rock posters and Sci-Fi / Fantasy art. Containing work by Jeff Soto, Jay Ryan and Tony Millionaire to name a few, the list of the ninety contributors is pretty much a who’s who or who’s up and coming in the aforementioned disciplines. Every monster has its very own page and there is some accompanying text detailing the specific legend of each beast on the opposite page. The illustrations vary greatly in style from the bright playful Japanese-esque ‘Kudan’ by Mizna Wada to the playful amusing monotone ‘Minotaur’ by Jason.

Werewolf By Jordan Crane.

Beasts looks to be a real labour of love for Covey, the book is a beautiful thing – ten inches square, one inch thick with a matte black and gold cloth binding, guilt-edge pages and an extruded title illustration on the cover. With the comic book market awash with collections of comic strips by a plethora of talented artists Fantagraphics and Covey have done very well to come up with such an intriguing idea for a book, that outthinks the competitors so efficiently. Fantagraphics are on fire at the moment, no one can touch them. Books like Beasts are testament to that fact.