September 2010
Best of the Best: Matt Madden on The Best American Comics 2010
For the past three years, the Best American Comics series, edited by Jessica Abel and Matt Madden, has profiled a diverse and eclectic group of comics work and honored it for its achievements. Also each year, Abel and Madden work with a guest editor to make selections. This year’s edition featured guest editor Neil Gaiman. We talked to Madden about the experience.
Pika Don: The Latest Book from the Stanford Graphic Novel Program
Adam Johnson runs the prestigious Stanford Graphic Novel Publishing Program, a class wherein students work together for an entire semester to create a graphic novel. Every aspect of the book—writing, drawing, inking, publishing—is done by the students, and the results can be impressive. This year’s book, Pika Don, was just recently published, so we talked to Johnson about the work that went into it.
Inverna Lockpez's Cuba: Remembering a Revolution
Inverna Lockpez left her native Cuba in the late 1960s to seek a new beginning in America. Now a widely respected artist, she has crafted the story of her life in her homeland in Cuba: My Revolution, a semiautobiographical tale of what it was like to be a woman in Castro’s Cuba in the 1960s.
Temperance Unbound: The Cathy Malkasian Interview
With Temperance, Cathy Malkasian (Percy Gloom) takes her art to a whole new level. A dark tale of violence set amid a vivid fantastical land, Temperance is an allegory that works wonders. We talked to Malkasian to get her take on the book and what it meant to her to produce this monumental epic.
MoCCA Classes Begin This Month
If you're in the New York area, check out the Museum of Cartoon and Comic Art's new fall lineup of classes (and if you're not a member yet, sign up! It's a great organization!). For more details, visit their site.
Mark Waid Takes the Initiative
Mark Waid, editor-in-chief of Boom! Studios, has partnered with The Hero Initiative for a new program that will help a very worthy cause. The venture allows comics fans (and their friends and family) in California, Nevada, Illinois, and Indiana to align their supermarket rewards cards (including Ralphs, Food4Less, Cala Foods, and Bell Markets) with the Community Contributions program to help comic book creators in need of emergency medical aid, financial support, and other needs.
Claremont and Levitz: Together Again for the First Time
Two of my childhood comics idols, Chris Claremont and Paul Levitz, will be appearing together next week at Columbia for a talk entitled Claremont & Levitz: Jewish Influences & Themes in American Comics. Presented by the Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies, the talk will take place at Columbia University's Schermerhorn Hall from 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. on Wednesday, October 13.
FICTION REVIEWS:
The Night Bookmobile
X'ed Out
Charles Burns, creator of Black Hole, returns with the first volume in a vividly imaginative, creepily foreboding new series.
