The Wood Paneled Basement

The Man Who Loved Breasts

2008-08-13T21:14:00.000-07:00

The Man Who Loved Breasts is currently in the Diamond distributor catalog for an October release. Top Shelf has a 6 page preview of the title story up on their website. The pages are my roughs, but I think they may get switched out for the final version any day now. I suppose it might be interesting to see my grammatical errors, how poorly I spell, and also how I can't seem to draw my protagonist consistently. I think I corrected these in the final version. Anyway, I'm digressing...

I'm mentioning this now, because if you don't think your local comic shop will carry my comic, this is a good time to tell them that you want to get it. This is when they are ordering for October releases. Tell them you want the comic and tell them they need to carry it. Tell them that tits sell, especially to comic readers, and that it can't miss. Tell them that amputee fetishist comics are going to be the biggest thing since mutants. Tell them anything. I just don't want it to tank.

Typhon is here

2008-08-07T20:48:00.000-07:00

I received my copy of "Dirty" Danny Hellman's new comic anthology, Typhon, today. I did a one page story I'm pretty pleased with called: Pentaeuch Funnies Starring Abraham. The book also has some stories by R. Sikoryak, Rich Tommaso, Pshaw, Derek Ballard, and a bunch of artists I'm not too familiar with. I look forward to reading this almost 200 page monster to discover some new folks. More info about it here.

Commission

2008-08-06T21:56:00.001-07:00

At San Diego, a fellow asked if I did commissions. I'd never been asked before, but thought it might be fun. He wanted me to draw an animal. After being sick my first week after the show, I got to work this week. I decided to draw the monkey and the crocodile from the fable I drew a few years ago. This scene is of the two of them entering the river for a fateful trip at the end of the story. I was right at San Diego; it was fun. I hope you like the drawing, Joshua. It's in the mail.

New Postcards

2008-08-05T22:16:00.000-07:00

I've just added my 2 latest postcards to my online store. These debuted at San Diego a couple of weeks ago. Both cards are available here.

San Diego Comic Con: Part 2 Wonder Women

2008-08-03T13:02:00.000-07:00

I love looking through old comics at San Diego. The comic dealers have been getting squeezed out over the years for Hollywood, the Suicide Girls, and medieval armor manufacturers, but there are still some great finds out there. I came across two fantastic Wonder Woman comics while digging through the long boxes. The first one is a cover that I believe I first saw on The Comics Reporter and immediately fell in love with it. The image on the cover pretty much says it all. Wonder Woman is in a bridal gown holding the arm of a monster in a tux. Pretty clear. However, in case you are a little slow, we've got an Amazon thinking "Great Hera! Wonder Woman still doesn't realize she's marrying a monster!" Ok, she's marrying a monster. Got it. However, for the confused, we've got the comic's title "I Married a Monster!" plastered on the cover. Then at the top, in case you haven't yet realized who Wonder Woman might be marrying, we've got "Introducing... Mr. Monster!". Fabulous. The story is good too. Mr. Monster is a real dick and Wonder Woman can't help but to fall in love with the guy. I'd love to do a sequel to this.

The second issue I passed on buying, but I still love the cover. There's Wonder Woman, dangling from a ridiculously phallic building, while Giant Wonder Woman gives it a hug. Then, the finest touch of "Hate you" scrawled by some young girl (I hope) onto Giant Wonder Woman's chest. Add some demon eyes colored in for good measure and you have one of the best comic covers of all time. Thank you Comic Con.

San Diego Comic Con: Part 1

2008-07-28T21:17:00.000-07:00

My sisters birthday fell over Comic Con this year and for her birthday she wanted photos of people dressed up as the Joker and one of a sexy Joker. Kelly, these are for you. Happy birthday.

and a sexy Joker:

Rob and Cathy: At the Con

2008-06-25T19:50:00.000-07:00

A couple of years ago, Cathy Malkasian, my wife Georgene, and I shared a hotel room for Comic Con in San Diego. I thought of this comic then and in typical fashion, took 2 years to get around to drawing it.

That is a pretty accurate drawing of how Cathy looks naked, but these days she's sporting a brazilian.

New Postcards!

2008-06-14T18:09:00.000-07:00

I've designed some new postcards. You can order them and read more about them on my website.

MoCCA 2008

2008-06-12T21:29:00.000-07:00

I have returned from the MoCCA show in New York where I experienced some weather that I have not felt in a long time. Living in Los Angeles, I’m used to heat (but still don’t like it), but the humidity in New York last weekend was oppressive. On Sunday we got some rain, but instead of bringing relief, it only brought more misery. That said, I still had a great time in NYC. It’s hard not to.

The Indie Spinner Rack podcasting table.

Georgene and I managed to get some sleep on this trip, so we had the energy to go out and have some fun at night. Saturday night, the Indie Spinner Rack threw a party at the bar M-15. We had the opportunity to talk with Charlito and Mr. Phil, Monica Gallagher and boyfriend Dennis, Jesse Post, Rob Venditti, Keith Knight, Joey Weiser, and a young lady who is a cartoonist and Forbidden Planet employee whose name I can’t remember (sorry, ask Mr. Venditti about how good I am at remembering people).

Wife Georgene, Monica Gallagher, and Monica's Boyfriend Dennis at M-15.

After spending a hundred bucks on the Gary Panter’s new 2 volume monster book set the week before, I didn’t have much dough to pick up new stuff at the show. However, there were a few inexpensive things that I knew I wanted to get and I was also hoping for some new discoveries while browsing. My first purchase was issues 2 and 3 of Fred Chao’s by AdHouse Books. Fred just got a ton of Eisner nominations, but it’s still been difficult to find his comics at my local shops. His comic is a light-hearted action comic about a half-Asian, Chinatown busboy, who struggles with his girlfriend to make ends meet with his girlfriend. He finds himself in the middle of odd adventures involving giant monsters and irate restaurant employees. Its combination of love story, personal problems, and adventure is reminiscent of early Spider-man comics. It would have broad mainstream appeal, if the comics mainstream weren’t filled with insular superhero comics.

A mini-comic I wanted pick up is How To Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden. This recounts Sarah’s trip to Israel as she tries to understand the un-understandable situation over there. Her viewpoint portrays Israel more as oppressor than victim, but her likable tour guide offers an Israeli point of view without going to extremes. At their worst, mini comics can be crudely drawn, poorly conceived stories. But How to Understand Israel is a well thought out, satisfying read that I’m pretty sure will be collected by a mainstream book publisher when it is completed. It fits very well in the “socially relevant memoir” genre (Maus, Fun Home, Blue Pills, Persepolis, etc…) that book publishers have been going ape shit over for a few years now. I hope that when it is collected, it will be in color, which will help anchor Sarah’s clear line drawing style, much like it does for Herge, Chris Ware, or Rutu Modan.

The best thing about these shows are the new discoveries. My favorite purchase of the weekend was made within the last half hour of the show. Rui Tenreiro’s Høytiden is in Norwegian, but comes with an English translation sheet. The book reminds me a bit of medieval Ingmar Bergman movies (The Seventh Seal and Virgin Spring), Miyazaki’s Spirited Away, and the Japanese movie Kwaidan. It follows two travelers as they come across a large dead creature in the woods. The story is wonderfully mysterious and circular, perhaps representing the seasons. The art is in black and a gorgeous blue, which keeps the story feeling cold even though it takes place in spring. I think I’ll post a sample page because my description of the drawing would probably suck.

Other finds from the show are Garage Band and Notes from a War Story by and Three Shadows by Cyril Pedrosa. All three are published by First Second and I paid $20 for all of them (such a deal!). I also got Superior Showcase #3 with one story by Jim Rugg and one by Laura Park who can really draw. Her style is cartoony and uses cross hatching really well. Oftentimes, people like myself can find it difficult to find the right balance of cross hatching and comic pages can become too busy. Laura is able to use it to give her drawings weight, but nothing ever feels cluttered. I’ve got to find more stuff by her. Joseph Lambert came by and game me some of his latest books and one story you can read here. He is getting very good, very fast.

There are more books that I haven’t had a chance to go through yet, but I’ve got to end this thing. Hopefully some of these books I mention will peek your interest enough so that you can make some new discoveries yourself.

Mr. Keith Knight at M-15.

Stuff Left by the Street on my Block 4

2008-05-08T21:33:00.000-07:00

Greetings from the most glamorous city in the world.

That's my little dog Toaster up in the corner there. He's quite the cute fellow.

New Wood Postcards

2008-05-03T12:16:00.000-07:00

I've got some new wood postcard designs and they are available on my website and my Etsy store. One is printed on cedar and the other on curly maple. Snazzy!

Stumptown 2008

2008-04-30T23:32:00.001-07:00

Georgene and I began Stumptown in a bit of a hole in regards to rest. It was a long drive from Los Angeles to Portland, spread over two days, and we did not get very good sleep when the opportunity arose. Again, we stayed at the beautiful home of Top Shelf publisher Brett Warnock. One of my favorite things about visiting Brett is that one small block away is a fantastic coffee/donut/gelato shop. I started off every morning with a warm maple and chocolate donut and an espresso. I can’t imagine how fat I’d be if I lived next to that place.

Because we were constantly exhausted (and I was getting killed by the pollen in Oregon), Georgene and I didn’t socialize a whole lot. We went to the party at Cosmic Monkey Saturday night, but it was so packed and we were so tired that we split after about 15 minutes. We were in bed by 10:30.

We did have a great time at the show, however. I picked up a ton of mini-comics, many by artists that I had heard of, but not read. One of those was Fart Party. I bought the recently published book and artist Julia Wertz was kind enough to throw in some of the latest minis, so I’ve got it all now. I’ve read through some of it and it’s some funny stuff. Another comic that I’ve heard a lot about, but never read was Alec Longstreth’s Phase 7. I picked up issue 13 and it was an enjoyable lesson on the history of common people represented by art. I’ll definitely have to pick up some more issues at my next show.

Probably the best drawn mini I got over the weekend was Sarah Oleksyk’s Ivy. I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but you can see by the cover that Sarah’s got some drawing chops. Getting the subtle foreshortening and perspective right aint easy, but she’s able to pull it off and keep the drawing lively. I can’t wait to read it.

Something that I have had a chance to read is Joey Sayers’s I’m Gonna Rip Yer Face Off! This is a collection of one page, crudely drawn, but very funny comics. They tend to be absurd and somewhat psychotic. If that’s your bag, check it out. Other funnies that I came home with are Cartoon Dialectics vol. 1 by Tom Kaczynski featuring some stories that have not been in Mome; MariNaomi’s Estrus Comics #5, Lauren O’Connell’s Thrillsville, and issues 7 and 8 of Liz Baillie’s My Brain Hurts. I also got some books by table neighbor’s Sabin (Ambassador Magma) Calvert and Jeff (Jimmy Trout) Chapman. Those are the lads flanking me in the photo.

The last little treasure was not purchased at Stumptown, but at my regular pilgrimage to Powell’s bookstore. It’s a children’s book from 1951 called Rosalinda. It has some fantastic modernist illustrations by Jan B. Balet. I had never heard of him before finding this book, so it was a nice discovery.

It was regrettable that Georgene and I had to miss out on many of the parties held around the show. Hopefully at our next show, MoCCA in New York, we will have better luck. I’m not optimistic however, since my flight will have 2 connections. With the way air travel is these days, I’m not even sure that I’ll get there within 24 hours.

This Weekend - Stumptown

2008-04-23T21:38:00.000-07:00

This weekend I will be at the Stumptown Comics Fest in Portland. I've got some new postcard designs as well as some new sketchbooks / Journals on maple plywood. None of these are comics, but I've got some new comics out soon, just not for Stumptown.

Star Wars by Anthony Vukojevich

2008-04-05T10:16:00.000-07:00

Here are some childhood Star Wars drawings drawn by Anthony Vukojevich back in the 70's. Go here to see more of his prolific prepubescent output as well as some recent stuff.

The Man Who Loved Breasts

2008-03-28T09:57:00.000-07:00

My new comic, The Man Who Loved Breasts, is available for pre-order here. It won't be out until the fall, so by the time you get the comic in the mail, you will have forgotten about it a long time ago. However, after coming home from a miserable day of school or work, this may be the perfect surprise to brighten up your day.

The Man Who Loved Breasts is a one-shot, 32 page black and white comic from Top Shelf. In the title story, Stanley DeMcMacsonianovskivich has been working a dead-end job his whole life and is looking for a way out. He has an epiphany that the secret to happiness is to make a living doing what you love, but his passion isn't exactly golf. The back-up stories are George Olavatia: Amputee Fetishist involving a fertility clinic and a man with specialized tastes and A 21st Century Cartoonist in King Arthur's Court.

Super Market

2008-03-26T06:04:00.000-07:00

Since I've been woken up at 5:30 by a moron and his car horn, I'll take advantage of my extra waking hours to mention that I'll be at Super Market this Sunday at Meltdown in Hollywood. Other than me, Tom Neely, Louis Del Carmen, Stuart Ng, and a bunch of other folks will be there. Fun starts at 12 and goes to 6. More info here.

Interview

2008-03-19T21:43:00.000-07:00

I've just been interviewed at Illustration.org. You can check it out here.

Coming Soon...

2008-03-14T19:46:00.000-07:00

I've been working on some new plywood sketchbooks to sell at the summer conventions. This is a picture of a bunch of covers as the polyurethane was drying.

Bibs by Malkasian

2008-03-12T17:54:00.001-07:00

Cathy Malkasian (cartoonist of Percy Gloom) has opened an Etsy shop and is selling some very fine bibs. Check it out here.

Wondercon '08

2008-02-28T20:12:00.000-08:00

For the first time, I attended Wondercon in San Francisco last weekend. I had heard that Wondercon was not a terribly friendly comics show for independent publishers, but I still went to check it out. I did this for two reasons. One is that I can stay with friends in San Francisco and it’s a 6 hour drive from L.A., so my expenses are low. The other reason is, although my main interest is in independent comics, I still like to buy old mainstream comics from time to time. The one place I usually do this is at the San Diego Comic-con. However, over the years, more and more comic dealers have gotten squeezed out of Comic-con for toys, videos, or anything else that’s not comics. With Wondercon, I hoped I could break even on selling comics and also feed that old nerd impulse with the long boxes.

I’m happy to say that after three days of Wondercon, I made plenty of money to justify the trip, met a lot of great people, and found some cool old comics. If anyone is going there for indie stuff, you are bound to be disappointed. There are no publishers like Fantagraphics, Picturebox, AdHouse, Top Shelf, or D&Q. There is a small press area, where I was at, but it was mostly genre type stuff. There were a few exceptions, but not much. I did pick up Keith Knight’s new book, which is really good and met a great artist, Joey Chou who was selling prints and an illustrated book. I also bought Dungeon: The Early Years by Lewis Trondheim, Joann Sfar, and Christophe Blain. This is a great fantasy series that doesn’t seem to get a whole lot of press. If you were going to start reading Dungeon, I’d recommend starting with this book since chronologically it is the earliest one in the series and also one of the best.

The rest of my money went to old comics. I’ve been on a little bit of a 1960’s Gold Key kick, picking up some comics with those wonderful painted covers. Last weekend, I bought a Space Family Robinson and an issue of Mighty Samson with interior art by Frank Thorne. The stories and art in them are pretty good, but not great. The real highlights are the covers and I think it is interesting to see how the future was envisioned by artists 40 years ago. In the case of Space Family Robinson, the future would be filled with very well-adjusted, square-jawed men living in a sterile, dirt free environment. It’s pretty typical of its era.

I also managed to find a 1969 Gold Key reprint of a 1959 Dell adaptation of Darby O’Gill and the Little People drawn by Alex Toth. Toth drew a bunch of movie and TV adaptations for Dell in the late 50’s / early 60’s and I’ve wanted to check some out. It was worth the hunt because Toth’s work in this is really gorgeous. The way he varies making his marks (depending on if he’s drawing a rock wall, the folds of a jacket, or indicating the blades of grass in a field) is so seductive and so well composed. The color tends to overpower the drawing a bit, but a least it isn’t filled with horrible computer gradients. He truly was a master, and sadly, over his long career, the comics he did for Dell may have been the best written, and that isn’t saying much. I would love to see these stories get reprinted with less intrusive color or just in black and white, but since the rights would be tied up with film studios, I doubt it would ever happen.

Another comic I dug up was a 1969 first issue (of 2) of Heroes, Inc. Presents Cannon by Wally Wood with one story drawn by Steve Ditko. A dealer had a box of these for $3 each. I’m not much of a Wally Wood fan. Although he could do some nice composing with blacks, I think his drawing is stiff and can be cloying. I do like Steve Ditko, however. Sadly Wood inked Ditko and the result is Ditko’s typically wacked out gestures become almost as stiff as Wood’s art. This is quite an accomplishment, just not a good one. There are three stories, two adventure and one humor and I don’t like Wood’s sense of humor either. There were a couple of interesting panels involving a white alien that left me wondering if Wood was dropping a little 1969 satire, but I’m not really sure.

Other than that, I picked up some old Kirby comics which are always great. I also bought a Bizarro 2-parter that was in All-Star Superman because it was included in the Comics Journal’s best of 2008. After reading it, I don’t see what the big fuss is over. Quietly’s art is nice when it isn’t completely obscured by muddy computer coloring. Beyond that, I think I’m going to have to disagree with the Journal on this one.

So with Wondercon behind me, I have Stumptown in Portland, MoCCA in New York, and Comic-con in San Diego over the next 5 months.

I gotta save more dough.

George Olavatia: Amputee Fetishist

2008-01-29T17:07:00.001-08:00

I've been doing some production work on my upcoming comic The Man Who Loved Breasts and thought I would post the back cover. It's of the title character from the second story, George Olavatia: Amputee Fetishist. As I've been scanning all the pages and cleaning them up, some of my drawings bug me. They seem a little awkward and clunky. I figure this is typical of artists and if I redrew everything that bothered me it would take 5 years to do 30 pages of comics instead of 1. I'm just going to have to let them go. I did, however, like this back cover drawing, so here it is. Hopefully I can get this all finished so it can debut at MoCCA in NY in June.

Workin' Hard

2008-01-12T17:00:00.001-08:00

2008-01-08T15:04:00.000-08:00

One of the best arguments I've read on getting money out of politics was in this article in the Los Angeles Times. Chamber of Commerce president Tom Donohue threatens to punish all political candidates who promise to do something about reigning in corporate behavior by spending over $60 million to defeat them in the elections. He says, "I'm concerned about anti-corporate and populist rhetoric from candidates for the presidency, members of Congress and the media. It suggests to us that we have to demonstrate who it is in this society that creates jobs, wealth and benefits -- and who it is that eats them."

I guess he's forgotten about the people who work for these corporations and who need a living wage. In response to his threat I did a drawing of him. It's about as subtle as a brick to the face, but I find that he's such a caricature of the greedy, white capitalist, that it was appropriate. I'm selling it on comic art collective and will give the proceeds to my populist of choice, Barack Obama. It's not exactly something anyone would want to hang on their wall, but it's for a good cause. You can line your bird cage with it, the point is that it's now $35 vs. $60 million. Take that Donohue!

Merry Christmas

2007-12-25T09:39:00.001-08:00

The Little Guy that Lives in My Armpit

2007-12-08T13:19:00.000-08:00

Since I'm out of a job, I thought it might be fun to try and submit a design to Threadless. At this point I have put it up for critique here and it's not going too well so far. I'll still submit it for the official vote, so I'll keep you all posted.

In a completely unrelated note, I would like to thank all of my female friends that do not wear velour track suits.