Fantagraphics Blog Eric Reynolds

  As so often happens with good intentions, I realize I'm quickly running out of steam when it comes to doing a big blog post about my week on the east coast for the MoCCA Festival and a trip to the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, VT. I came back with more minis and other comics than I have from any trip in years, so the idea of highlighting the highlights has proven to be too daunting. One thing that strikes me after attending MoCCA, and being given so many decent submissions, and see much of the work on display, is…

Northwesterners unite! Fantagraphics will be heading down I-5 tomorrow to take part in the Pacific Northwest's premiere art comics event, The Stumptown Comics Fest! Staffers Jacq Cohen and Tony Remple — both former Oregonians — will be on hand all weekend to answer your questions and sell you some books. We'll have a few new releases on hand as well as signings with Dame Darcy and T. Edward Bak (MOME). Also, our own Jason T. Miles will also be in town for the show, pimping his Northwest-centric zine concern, Profanity Hill. Come check it out!

British magazine 125 has a pretty wild feature in its latest issue, No. 15: a photo tribute to Charles Burns' BLACK HOLE, featuring seven re-creations of Burns' classic mutant yearbook photos from the book/comic book series. The photos were taken by Max Oppenheim. Here's a couple:

From Beware the Creeper No. 5 by Steve Ditko, DC Comics, 1969. 

The Creeper No. 2 by Steve Ditko, 1968, DC Comics.

The Homewood Art Workshops wraps up its 35th anniversary celebration with a slide talk by legendary cartoonist Kim Deitch on Monday, April 26. Deitch's talk, "The Search for Smilin' Ed and Other Tales," will begin at 5:30 p.m. in Room 101 of the F. Ross Jones Building, Mattin Center, on the Homewood campus at 3400 N. Charles St. in Baltimore. Deitch's latest book, The Search for Smilin' Ed, will be published by Fantagraphics in June. He will sign advance copies of Smilin' Ed at the Johns Hopkins Barnes & Noble, 3330 St. Paul Street, on Sunday, April 25, from 4 to…

My pal Hernán Migoya sent me this cover to his new novel, Quitame Tus Sucias Manos de Encima (a.k.a. Get Your Hands Off Me), being published in Spain this summer. The book tells the story of an obscure, fictional movie from the '70s written by Rod Serling and Richard Matheson and directed by Tom Gries and sports an original cover by our own Peter Bagge (and, I might add, a title page by yours truly)! 

The Strand Book Store, School of Visual Arts, TOON Books, Drawn & Quarterly and Fantagraphics Books are pleased to announce the winners of the Strand Tote Bag Design Contest, which kicked off on March 1 and concluded on March 31, 2010. The winners were chosen by a prestigious panel of judges, including Françoise Mouly (art editor of The New Yorker & Editorial Director of TOON Books), Art Spiegelman (Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist & Strand tote artist), Stephen Heller (Co-Chair MFA Designer as Author Program, SVA), Adrian Tomine (author of the bestselling book, Shortcomings & Strand tote artist) and R. Sikoryak (creator…

This weekend (April 10-11), Mike Baehr, Janice Headley, Gary Groth and myself head out to the Big Apple for the annual MoCCA Arts Festival. I haven't been to MoCCA in a few years, so I'm especially looking forward to the trip. We have a slew of signings all weekend long as well as a remarkably potent lineup of new books debuting at the show, including:  Artichoke Tales by Megan KelsoBest American Comics Criticism, edited by Ben SchwartzBilly Hazenuts and the Crazy Bird by Tony MillionaireCaptain Easy Vol. 1 by Roy CraneDungeon Quest by Joe DalyCulture Corner by Basil WolvertonBlazing Combat s/c…

A couple weekends back I sat down on a Friday night and read thru printed proofs of Tim Hensley's WALLY GROPIUS and was absolutely blown away. So much so that immediately afterward I emailed most of my coworkers to tell them how much I envied the pleasure that awaited them in reading the book in its entirety. I was so excited by a Fanta book that I was pimping it to my own coworkers. That's like telling your pregnant wife that, boy, she's really going to love that new baby that's on its way. Probably a bit unnecessary. But I couldn't help myself….