Artist Warren Craghead drew this for me in order to cheer me up. It is titled "Carrie dancing on a flower with candy and a bag of money."

It worked.

Some people in comics [in the world] live under rocks and should stay there. However, it is important that their ways are brought to the harsh light. That way no one can say they didn't know, that that is the reason that they don't believe us.

Read MariNaomi's account of being harassed at a comics' convention by another panelist. Then read Rachel Edidin's examination of the pathetic apology by the perpetrator. 

Then never wonder why we are full of rage, but never surprise.

{}{}{}

{}{}{}

I imagined my cool green cards appearing in the mailboxes of my friends and becoming a kind of signature. Whereas my old picture postcards were about the ephemeral land of dreams and potential, these new postcards were about the vulnerable space of now.

This love letter to postcards by Jamey Hatley is the perfect thing to read on a lonely day. She goes down so many trails in this short piece, that it left me wandering in the forest long after I finished it. The power of affordable art, the need for images of our idols, the desire for a connection: All these are combined in the simple postcard. I think about mail more than your average human, and wonder why I persist in the sometimes arduous task of making space for my friends in my mind, trying to tell a little story just for them, without the instant gratification of a response.

Dottie the foster dog!

After the nightmare of medical Switzerland, I decided that it might be nice to foster a dog again.  Luckily I discovered that a bunch of the dogs in the ACC have videos made for them that you can access through Urgent Pets on Death Row and Facebook. I am a sucker for spotted ears, and after seeing this girl's love of playing ball, I had to see if she was still available.

Meet Dottie! Dottie is a 3 year-old pit mix with an unusual spotted coat and beautiful golden eyes. At 51 lbs., she's a great size. She loves toys, playing ball, sniffing and exploring. She likes to be near us at all times, but not right on top of us, unlike our last foster. She doesn't seem to have any separation anxiety either, which is great for those that don't work at home.

Right now she has mild kennel cough, so she can't meet 'n' greet other doggie friends, but she seems interested.

Here is her listing on Sugar Mutts, the rescue that pulled her from the ACC for us.

Here is the video that won my heart.

MoCCA 2013

Due to everything else you read about on this blog,  I was really thinking of skipping MoCCA this year. I did skip Saturday--a very good idea considering how much life stuff I got done.

On Friday I hit up the hic + hoc party here in my neighborhood. I thrust B at Matt Moses and got the hard sell on Tumblr from Alabaster. I picked up the Unknown Origins & Untimely Ends: A Collection of Unsolved Mysteries anthology, edited by Emi Gennis, and then sat at the bar trying to tell B who people were in an unintelligible undertone.

Hot foot

On Sunday I put on my walking shoes, grabbed my camera and made my way to Murray Hill. The entry was still $15 for the day and still too expensive. The $5 for the show's brochure was laughable. I busted a chuckle when the poor MoCCA volunteer let me in on that great deal!

After I completely lost my shit over the OMG CURTAINS, like any sane person would, I noticed that the armory was not too crowded. I tend to list like a sinking ship when I am in crowds so this airiness allowed me to bump into many fewer people than normal. I didn't hear a ton of bitching about it being a "bad MoCCA" or anything; many books sold out before my eyes from big publishers and one-man-bands alike. Since cartoonists love to bitch, I am going to take this as a good sign.

As usual, I missed all panels. Sadly, good intentions rarely trump oversleeping and general reluctance to force a smile. One of these days! Was that even worth saying? Well, no, not really, but I already typed it and this needs to get out before next year's MoCCA.

The back of the space was set up as a mini-gallery of the Society's collection (formerly the Museum of Cartoon and Comic Art's holdings?). I loved the interaction between old newspaper work and new stuff. I was psyched as usual to see Eleanor Davis's work, originals from In Our Eden. Some other standouts for me were Nora Krug, Adam McCauley, Miriam Katin (who Robin interviewed at inkstuds recently) and Natalya Balnova, whose work reminded me of Wendy MacNaughton's illustration.

The schools were out in full force. There was a ton of amazing student work available from usual suspects SVA and CCS as well as some surprises, like Kutztown University.  I was especially intrigued by SAW's table. They ran out of the awesome-looking student anthology, but I did pick up a 3-part mini by visiting instructor Ron Rege because I was told it was about grief.

And now on to the only part that anyone cares about: The pictures! Help me fill in the blanks.

Intrepid concession workers

Happy crew: Pat Barrett, Aaron Cockle and L. Nichols

Every year I take a picture of Three-Armed Squid and every year I miss a member. Pictured here: Estrella Vega, Alden Viguilla and Alexandra Beguez

Guest of honor Jillian Tamaki

Happy crew member Darryl Ayo says Hi!

Whit Taylor likes plants and doesn't deserve this horrible photo

CCS-er Amelia Onorato sells selkie stories

Greg Means says he can find pictures of my face on the internet. He means it!

Nikki Desautelle. I wish I had picked up more here!

Award-winner Kenan Rubenstein and Neil Brideau battle comics ennui

Gabrielle Bell choosing not to hide while doing a sketch for me.

Mark Delboy sold me Pizza & Sex but I didn't tip

Sabrina Elliott, Jensine Eckwall and Dilek Baykara present a united front

Yao Xiao,  Judith Kim and Judy Wong(?) are consummate saleswomen

???

Ran out of money then ran into Katz Sisters and Andrea Tsurumi. Bad timing.

My haul

My tip top item: This letterpress print by Nikki Desautelle

So what was your pick from the show?

31 DRAWINGS THAT HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH BEING IN LOVE AND NOT BEING IN LOVE by Eleanor Davis

It is no secret that I love Eleanor Davis. When I discovered that she'd be making a mini of her pieces for the most recent Giant Robot Post-It show I felt the gimme-gimmes overtake me.

I rarely allow myself to submit to such clammy passions, but it seemed a win-win situation. Sure the black of the stapled spine is already creasing away and there are a few unexpected blank pages, but considering that a pencil drawing of baby by Davis was included--like a best and most unexpected autograph--this $5 treat is all-ok with me.

Davis' usual botanical flourishes are a lush and almost furtive presence in these small, black and white drawings. It is almost as if the branches, leaves, flowers and berries want to distract the viewer from the things that the human figures are doing to one another, or sometimes the things that they refuse to do.
 

Some drawings are subtly heartbreaking >>>
Some are so sweet that you let out a breathe that you didn't know that you were holding in >>>

One of the things that draws me again and again to Davis' work is the way pain and hope are entwined in even her simplest images. You can feel the struggle to find answers to why we should persist. She often focuses on sex, love and the body and, unsurprisingly, all of those themes are present in 31 DRAWINGS THAT HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH BEING IN LOVE AND NOT BEING IN LOVE. Sometimes, especially in her sketchbook work, anger or disgust with, well, human beings, comes through first, but instead of feeling like a reminder of horrors, there is an interrogation of relationships that challenges and inspires me.

sandy sandy sandy

I worked from home most of last week on a very frustrating project. One of the ways that I deal with being glued to the computer for most of the day, and the subsequent loss of reading time, is to listen to podcasts. I've been catching up with my Inkstuds and loved the Pat Grant interview. It starts off with a roadtrip elopement and goes so many places from there. Grant has a kickass process blog that all lovers of self-published comics should check out.

zzzzzzzz

I don't know how else to illustrate the word irresistible than this dollar rack find:

 With illustrations by Tanith Lee herself!

zzzzzzzzz

I'm sure that you already know about the newly revived The Memory Palace, being the kind of discerning folk that hang out in tryharderland. But, if not, just know that little nonfiction stories about history are found there. (See also 99% Invisible.) 

zzzzzzzzz

This posey is made from some of the last of the flowers from the roof. Well, not the last, but probably the last untouched by Scary Sandy. With the storm a ragin' or whatever, let's write one another some letters and emails, ok? Ok.

cleaning, cleaning my brain

Comics from one or two years ago to read and shelve, or read and recycle:

|||||||||||

Found this paper doll by Susie Oh and put it together, sans two grommets. Check out her animations with the dolls. Botanical boojangles.

||||||||||| 

I found a first draft of a poem I wrote deep in my grieving:

Hello?
No.
I meant to say yes, but,
you're too late.
I'm sorry that you are stuck,
a few years behind.
The train still goes there, yes,
all the way to the end of the line,
but what was there
isn't anymore.
Yes, I was a mother but now I am just a mouth.
Were you in bed, were you wrapped up tight,
were you dead for minutes that stretched and stretched?
No.
Not sorrier than I.

|||||||||||

Titular:

"archive dust"

An excellent essay about letters, choices, writers, grandmas and Martha Gellhorn over a The Millions by friend-o-tryharder, Amy Shearn: A Goofy State of Mind

<<<>>>

The Vatican, yes that Vatican, has opened, and is sending out, a portion of their massive "Secret" archive. The real, live items will be exhibited in Capitoline Museums in Rome, but you can see some very intriguing tidbits here: Lux In Arcana

<<<>>>

I started buying magazines. So many subscriptions bought, forgotten about, then appearing, regularly in the mail. B did the same during the contagious fugue state where credit cards flashed to the sound of glossy pages flip flapping. It was a good idea: Cabinet, Gastronmica, wax poetics, bitch, BOMB, The Coffin Factory, and more now come to our door.

<<<>>>

I grew these and now they are gone.

The rest of the summer is waiting.

tids

"'Hello Aimee, it’s your dad. I was just calling to say hello to you and your family. I miss you. I love you. When will you come see us again?'"
The Disciples of Memory by Aimee Phan over at The Rumpus is beautiful and vicious essay about parents and Alzheimer's.

For all you academics and responsible writers out there, the MLA has answered an important question: How to cite a tweet.

I've been spending a lot of time on 50 Watts recently checking out the gorgeous book art and illustration. It used to be called A Journey Around My Skull--this one, not this one.

Some things I want to happen in 2012

1) Maureen F. McHugh writes another book and it makes her a household name.
2) Everyone reads this essay by Roxane Gay and takes it to heart: "When you really think about it, though, the condescension and trivializing in the faux apology are kind of outrageous. In the time it took Grossman to point at his list and acknowledge the lack of diversity, he could have simply added two or three books to his list by women or writers of color that also interested him. Surely such titles exist." Everyone reads everything by Roxane Gay.
3) Vanessa Veselka writes a short story collection and it is illustrated.
4) I make some homemade shelves and paint them red.
5) Pitching essays and reviews out again becomes a thing I do.
6) Eleanor Davis makes comics again.
7) I start reviewing minis again in a safe n sane way.
8) Shelley Jackson makes a comic or writes a novel or both!
9) After getting Breathers published in a nice edition by an awesome small press with a big PR team, Justin Madson busts out another big, smart book.
10) My friends and I-wish-they-were-friends keep on making things, no one feels defeated and we all know each other.

(((())))

This is not an exhaustive list by any means. I forget names all the time. The best things become part of my brain and lose their identifiers, but even so they are there. I will keep you posted if I think of anything else.

What's on your list?

arts from mocca 2011

I am just starting to plow through my MoCCA pile. In celebration of that, here are pics of the two arty art arts that I got at the fest.

Big:

Mountains I by Mark Burrier. I will frame this as soon as I get some framin' money.

Small:

A portrait from the G train. Are you the artist of this? Please contact me!

Still loving The Hearing Trumpet. I will be finished soon and was ruffled by the fact that unless I want to spend tens of dollars to buy a copy of her older work, my only other options for reading more Leonora Carrington is one copy of one book of hers in the BPL. Will somebody please, please reprint her other works?

While researching my reading options for Carrington, I looked more into the catalog of Exact Change, the publisher of the copy of The Hearing Trumpet that I am reading. They publish a ton of stuff that I am interested in, including the recent indie craze, Fernando Pessoa's The Book of Disquiet. I am thinking of picking up that and The Death & Letters of Alice James: Selected Correspondence by Alice James and The Heresiarch & Co. by Guillaume Apollinaire. If anybody has any suggestions, let me know.

***

A few nights ago, B came home very late. He went to his computer and, through my sleepy haze, I heard the sound of files being transferred at a rapid pace. What could he possibly be doing after a long night of sport and jazz?

Turns out, he was blogging.

***
Oberlin College has a 97-item online mail art collection. I was very excited about this until I actually looked at the collection. What is really available on the internet is basically a catalog record, with uninteresting and barely helpful object metadata exposed and only a thumbnail image available. Some entries have links to biographies of the artists and postal data, but the tiny representations of the pieces make it useless for anyone not able to make it to Oberlin to check out the physical collection. (But do check out the very good collection overview to learn about and see more mail art).

I am spending a lot of time thinking about digital collections right now for school. Mostly I've been thinking about what putting a collection on the open web means. How much do we need to take into account the needs of the remote, and possibly casual, use when thinking about displaying metadata, offering quality representations of works and driving users to physical locations? This is a frustrating question for me. I believe that researchers should be doing the research, but I also think access is vastly improved the more data about an object is attached and available. And if your objects are visual, you've gotta have good representations--otherwise I really don't see the point of putting more than an excellent finding aid on the open web.

What do you think?
(via Letter Writers' Alliance)

birthday bonanza

I forgot to tell you about the best gift I got for my birthday. Sorry for leaving you on the edge of your seat.

On the day we left for Portland, two packages awaited me in the pile of crap that usually constitutes my mail. They were both from my Mom and contained an assortment of well-chosen items of practical use, well, practical if you are me. Which you are not. (I hope!)

My mother and I have been reading Muriel Spark books--picking up whatever copies we find in thrift stores and used bookstores and trading them back and forth. My mother was apparently doing some research because, several months ago, she told me that ol' Sparky had once written a children's book. And, get this, the illustrations were by Edward Gorey, friend to odd children everywhere! We jokingly put it on the wishlist at Unnameable Books and went on with our day.

You know where this is going:




My mother never ceases to amaze me. The above is an enjoyable example of that trait, and I try to relish those.

home and away

night moves

Six

Some things I did today:

1) Wrote about leggings and big rigs
2) Had several dreams about phone calls that never happened
3) Saw this:


4) Planted a second round of basil and fennel seeds
5) Forgot several things several times
6) Practiced my cursing

What about you?

back of my neck gettin dirt(y) and gritty

i've been meaning to tell you

1) L. Nichols (whom you may remember from her contest win) is making some great garden comics right now. I must confess to envy, over here with my unhappy cucumbers and stunted greens.

2) "Were I asked (and I never have been), I would have to say that William Gibson is my favorite science fiction author, mostly likely my favourite "genre" author of all time, across all genres not labeled "literary", though I think that after Pattern Recognition, anyone trying to keep his work in the science fiction ghetto is a fool." August C. Bourré is writing about William Gibson's work--all of it, which is making me think it might be about time for a long reread.

3) Mary Phillips-Sandy is right, as usual, about why we love books about "humdrum objects." Aren't you glad she started blogging again?

4) Speaking of tumblrs, Ira Marcks' Morning in the Atelier is a great photo blog that takes place entirely in his studio. Ink water spill, pen's-eye-view and more.
photo by ira marcks, of course