Fantagraphics Blog Mike Baehr

BoDuley Bryant shares some advice he received as a young aspiring cartoonist in 1993 from the great Jim Woodring. Click to read the whole thing. Thanks to BoDuley (a.k.a. Dusty?) for sharing this on our Facebook page. (And Vol. 1 of the books Jim mentioned is still available.)

The programming schedule for the final day of Comic-Con 2011 (Sunday July 24) has been posted and… we got nothin'. Come hang out at our booth (#1718) and shop all day! If you've been keeping track you'll know that there's plenty of panels of interest on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. And Robot 6 has the scoop on our debut books (subject to change in one or two cases). Stay tuned for our complete all-in-one announcement.

Comic-Con keeps rolling out their 2011 programming schedule — today they've posted Saturday's lineup and it features our can't-miss 35th Anniversary panel which will include a couple of announcements that will knock your socks off. Here's what Fanta fans will want to catch: 10:00-11:30 50 Years of Comic Fandom: The Founders— It's hard to believe but it's been fifty years (more or less) since that peculiar institution called Comic Book Fandom was born. Meet some of those who were there at the inception, including Jean Bails, Paul Levitz, Dick and Pat Lupoff, Richard Kyle, Bill Schelly, Roy Thomas, and Maggie…

"Hey are you doing any more scary guys made out of tar ripping each other's dicks off? You know why I like those? Because you don't have to read all them stupid words and stuff. Right? Haa ha, hey Johnny wanna come over and play? Ha Ha!" – Tony Millionaire

Our weekly strips from Kupperman & Weissman, plus links to other strips from around the web. — Up All Night by Michael Kupperman (view at original size): Barack Hussein Obama by Steven Weissman (view at original size): And elsewhere: Belligerent Piano by Tim Lane: Cochlea & Eustachia by Hans Rickheit: Ectiopiary by Hans Rickheit: Humblug by Arnold Roth (3 new udpates!): Keeping Two by Jordan Crane: Lucky by Gabrielle Bell (daily diary strips all throughout July!): Maakies by Tony Millionaire: Les Petits Riens by Lewis Trondheim: Truth Serum by Jon Adams:

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "Though he was one of the genre’s pioneers, Roy Crane’s Captain Easy is arguably the most idiosyncratic of all the adventure strips. But it’s this blend of loud slapstick, young-boys-styled adventure and blatant sex appeal that make Captain Easy such a winning, fun strip to read." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6 • Review: "From any other culture this type of story would be crammed with angst and agony: gratuitously filled with cruel moments and shame-filled subtext, but Takako Shimura’s genteel and winningly underplayed first volume in this enchanting school saga [Wandering Son]… is resplendent with…

The Comic-Con programming schedule for Friday July 22 is up — it's a bit less hectic than Thursday, so this will be a good day to come spend some time browsing our booth (#1718)! (We will, of course, give a complete run-down along with our signing schedule and more info in the near future): 10:30-11:30 Comics Arts Conference Session #5: Critical Approaches to Comics: An Introduction to Theories and Methods— Matthew J. Smith and Randy Duncan (powerofcomics.com), co-editors of the forthcoming textbook Critical Approaches to Comics (Routledge 2011), moderate a panel of contributors including David A. Berona (Plymouth State University),…

This interview with Megan Kelso was conducted via email by editorial intern Hans Anderson, and proofread by Kristy Valenti. Thanks to all! Megan Kelso appears at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery tomorrow (Saturday, July 9, 2011) for the opening of The Quiet Rrriot, an art exhibit featuring Kelso, Stella Marrs and Nikki McClure. – Ed.

Megan Kelso’s career spans the ’90s to the present. In that timespan she has grown into a highly adept artist and storyteller. Her Ignatz Award-winning Artichoke Tales tackles the themes of power, feminism and the relationships that define our daily lives. In the early 2000s, she also spent time in New York, publishing her serialized strip Watergate Sue in The New York Times Magazine.

Kelso’s latest release from Fantagraphics is a reprint of her Queen of the Black Black anthology, originally published in 1998. This book collects stories self-published from her zine Girlhero, which was written and drawn by Kelso between 1993 and 1998 in her hometown of Seattle. In this interview, which serves as a snapshot of early ’90s self-publishing, Kelso discusses her influences, her Xeric Award, and her development as a cartoonist. — Hans Anderson

Early Life

HANS ANDERSON: When and where were you born?

MEGAN KELSO: 1968: Seattle, Wash.

ANDERSON: Where did you spend most of your early life?

KELSO: Seattle, Wash.

ANDERSON: Did you have any siblings?

KELSO: One sister: two-and-a-half years older than me.

ANDERSON: What did your parents do?

KELSO: My father was an urban planner, and my mother was a college registrar. Both are retired.

ANDERSON: Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is an anthology of short strips, self-published as the serial minicomic (zine?) Girlhero?

Girlhero #1 (July 1993)

KELSO: Yes, mostly. “Whistle and Queenie” was never in Girlhero. It was for an issue of Dark Horse Presents, and there are two stories that I did specifically for the book, “Queen of the Black Black” and “The Daddy Mask.”

ANDERSON: What years were you publishing Girlhero?

KELSO: 1992-1996.

ANDERSON: How old were you when you started drawing these strips?

KELSO: 23.

ANDERSON: How old were you when you stopped publishing Girlhero?

KELSO: 28.

ANDERSON: Where did you go to school?

KELSO: I went to public school here in Seattle with a couple years of private school in the middle. I started college at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, but dropped out and finished my BA at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash.

Snapshots

ANDERSON: In many ways, this book is a snapshot of youth culture, in Seattle and elsewhere, in the mid-1990s. What were you drawing your subject matter from?

KELSO: I went to college in Olympia, Wash., which at the time was exploding with bands, zines and really amazing, ambitious art projects: people started galleries; organized music festivals; film festivals; elaborate art installations. People just went out and started these things, not really knowing how, but figuring it out along the way. Because it was a college town, a lot of this work was informed by what we were all studying in college: feminist theory, labor politics, postmodern theory. I started my comic Girlhero because I wanted to be a part of this explosion going on around me. The stories in Queen of the Black Black were not literally autobiographical, but I definitely drew from my life, my work, sex and relationship experiences, my dreams and memories. I was learning to draw comics in these stories, so many of them were kind of like challenges I set for myself — can I learn to draw a convincing bicycle? Can I pull off setting a story in the past?

ANDERSON: The book Queen of the Black Black takes its title from a short story in the middle of the book about a depraved old artist disillusioning a young one. Why did you choose to take your title from this comic?

KELSO: Depraved?! That seems a little strong! I think of her more as old, tired and a bit bitter and cynical. I have always been interested in power relationships: between women, mothers and daughters, teachers and students, babysitters and babysat, employers and employees. I think I’m fascinated by this because, while between women, the classic male/female power dynamic has been eliminated, other more mysterious power dynamics are still at work and are harder to pin down. The title, “Queen of the Black Black,” is from a poem written by the sculptor, Louise Nevelson, who is, in part, the inspiration for the Queen character in that story.

ANDERSON: Who were your artistic influences before and during the creation of these strips?

KELSO: I did not grow up reading comics very much, and when I did (Peanuts, Archie), I didn’t give them much thought. So as a drawer and a beginning cartoonist, I was much more influenced by book illustrators: Maurice Sendak, Doctor Seuss, Beatrix Potter, Tove Jansson, Ludwig Bemelmans, Arnold Lobel, Garth Williams.

I think the work of Julie Doucet’s is what really made me want to try making comics. Once I moved back to Seattle and started meeting other cartoonists, I learned a lot from my peers: Jason Lutes, James Sturm, Ed Brubaker, Jon Lewis, Tom Hart, Jennifer Daydreamer, David Lasky. We actually had a comics working group for a while and shared work, did critiques and helped each other problem solve. Later, I met more cartoonists who[se] work influenced me a lot — Ron Regé and Brian Ralph, who I mentioned earlier. Also, Marc Bell and Lauren Weinstein’s work had a big impact on me.