Fantagraphics Blog Mike Baehr

The Peter Bagge art show currently on display at Scott Eder Gallery in Brooklyn is online for viewing, with some great pieces still available for buying. Above: original art for the back cover of Neat Stuff #2.

A new pin-up by Beto, from the collection of Steven Weissman.

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: Amazing Facts… and Beyond! with Leon Beyond by Kevin Huizenga: Lucky by Gabrielle Bell: Maakies by Tony Millionaire: Mugwhump the Great by Roger Langridge (at Act-i-vate): Smashing Crayons by Steve Brodner at SlateV Truth Serum by Jon Adams:

This month's issue of Booklist brings a starred review for 21: The Story of Roberto Clemente by Wilfred Santiago and additional favorable reviews of 5 more of our recent releases, excerpted below: "Nearly every page brings a new compositional marvel, setting energetic, limber figures against stylized photographic backgrounds washed in sepia tones and Pirate-yellow highlights. The in-game sequences, though, are show-stoppers, taking advantage of dizzying perspective shifts to capture the fluid, whirling nature of the game as it moves in fits and starts through huge moments of pause into cracking shots of sizzling drama. It’s not a comprehensive biography by…

This interview with the creator of Eye of the Majestic Creature was conducted (twice, due to a recording device mishap, and hence the references to "last time") by Fantagraphics' Ian Burns, and proofread and formatted by Janice Headley. Thanks to all! Leslie Stein appears with Peter Bagge at Desert Island in Brooklyn tonight (April 8, 2011) and at the MoCCA Festival this weekend. – Ed.

Leslie Stein hardly needs an introduction… because it’s late and I’m tired and I have to get up at 4am tomorrow. So, I’m going to make this short.

Stein’s work appeals to me because it contains pseudo-biography, anthropomorphic silliness and impeccable craftsmanship into one delightful package. Her work is traditional yet fresh, drawing from comic strip history’s rich library of gestures, expressions and fantastical characters while presenting innovative ideas in composition and texture.

I like it a lot.

Thank you. Good night.

IAN BURNS: You grew up in Evanston, Illinois. Could you describe the town and what it was like for you growing up there?

LESLIE STEIN: Evanston is a large suburb of Chicago. It’s a college town that Northwestern University is in. It’s a nice suburb. I lived on the southern side near Rogers Park so I was really close to the city, so as I grew older I could go into the city easily and explore and go to punk rock shows when I was a teenager. Stuff like that.

BURNS: Where did you go to high school?

STEIN: I went to Evanston Township High School. It’s the public school there.

BURNS: You did not enjoy high school very much.

STEIN: (Laughs) Right. I was an odd duck there. I was like a punk rocker and most of the other people who went to school there didn’t look that kindly upon that. So I didn’t have many friends, and I mostly made friends from other schools when I went to shows in the city. I couldn’t wait to get out of high school, so I actually took double classes my senior year and graduated early.

BURNS: So what year would that have been when you were kind of getting into the punk scene?

STEIN: ’96.

BURNS: So it would have been well on the wane of the big time punk scene, but you got in with a fairly big punk community?

STEIN: At the time all the kids went to the Fireside Bowl in Chicago. So I went there to shows every weekend. And yeah, it wasn’t as cool as it was, but it was what we had at the time.

BURNS: You were drawing at a fairly early age.

STEIN: I started when I was two. The story my mom likes to tell, that I came home from a pre-kindergarten kind of class, preschool, and I guess I got in the car and I told her, “Mommy, I’m an artist!” I guess someone at school must have told me I was an artist because of the way I was drawing so intently. So yeah I was really focused on drawing for my whole childhood.

BURNS: Were your parents encouraging?

STEIN: They were neither discouraging nor encouraging. They bought me art supplies and they let me draw, which is what most kids do, but I definitely wasn’t encouraged to pursue it seriously.

BURNS: As you grew up did you pursue any academic training in the arts?

STEIN: No, I attempted… I was so unhappy at my high school that I attempted to go to an arts high school, I applied. And I went through the whole process of applying for the school, and I got in. What they told me upon accepting me was that I couldn’t draw what they considered the cartoons I had shown them to get in. That was stuff I had to do on the side and I would have to do “real” art there. Because I thought my cartoons were real art, I didn’t understand what they were talking about, and I didn’t like being talked to like that ’cause I was already a little rebel. So I decided not to go to school there. I really blocked out most of high school. If I see people on the train from high school… they remember me and I have no idea who they are.

BURNS: Did you move to Brooklyn before you attended college?

STEIN: No, actually I went to school… I got accepted to the San Francisco Art Institute, and I went there for a year and a half; my major was interdisciplinary, so I figured I could get away with doing whatever I wanted to do. I took painting classes, drawing classes and print making classes, but what I ended up doing, I was just trying to draw comics, that’s what I wanted to do, because it was a conceptual art school, people really looked down upon that. I actually had someone in a critique ask me why I was even going to school there. (Burns laughs) So I transferred to the cartooning department at SVA as a sophomore, and that’s when I moved to Brooklyn.

BURNS: Ok. And that’s where you were the only girl in your department, correct?

STEIN: (Laughs) Right, right. Actually, when I first started as a sophomore there were two other women in the department and they both dropped out by the end of the year, so for the last two years I was the only woman in the department.

BURNS: You’ve got to tell the story about the Wolverine bust. I made a special note about that.

STEIN: (Laughs) So… (Laughter) I was thinking, I don’t know why I was thinking this, but I was thinking, “I’m gonna go and I’m going to find all these kindred spirits doing really really interesting comic work,” but it turned out that most of everyone in the department was drawing superhero comics. I don’t know why I didn’t assume that would be the case. So a lot of times I’d be sitting in class, and I’d be sitting behind a guy who I noticed would be drawing Wolverine over and over and over again. (Burns laughs) In different… He would draw him like a character study: From the side, claws out; from the front, claws in; from the side, claws out. Now, it wasn’t the same guy, but during one class, I actually was, I guess, forced to critique a bust of Wolverine.

BURNS: So he was a popular character at that school.

STEIN: (Laughs) Yeah, everyone liked Wolverine! I guess he’s probably one of the most popular superheroes, but yeah people REALLY loved drawing Wolverine. So yeah the bust was a full bust of Wolverine, and it was really quite impressive, it was a very nice piece of sculpture. It was, you know, him looking very muscular with his arms out to his sides and his claws out. But it was cut off right mid thigh, and the funniest thing about it was that he had the hugest package I’ve ever seen on a bust (Laughter), and the whole time, you know we’re trying to critique this, and I’m sitting there with my hands over my face just laughing so hard. And I think I actually raised my hand and said it was a beautiful piece of art.

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "Former Haligonian and Coast contributor Ray Fenwick’s latest book [Mascots] extends the work that he began in this city: typography-heavy painting on found book covers. The books’ loose cloth weave is clearly visible through the paintings, and even though Fenwick’s lettering skills should be studied by scientists, there’s a refreshing sense of the typographer’s hand and thought. Using the traditional idea of mascots as symbolic figures, Fenwick’s collected creatures, characters, mantras and messages, some of which are connected through broken narratives, and others just appear like a slap to the head. Not for…

At Examiner.com, Christian Lipski has a great writeup of the "Comics for Social Justice" panel at Wondercon last week which featured Shannon Wheeler (recent recipient of an Eisner nomination) and Steve Duin, creators of our forthcoming book Oil & Water, about the impact of the BP disaster on residents of the Gulf Coast. (Photo: Deborah Curtis Lipski)

The list of nominees for the 2011 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards has just been announced and we are pleased to report that our artists and publications received 11 nominations in 7 categories for 9 titles: It Was the War of the Trenches by Jacques Tardi: • Best Reality-Based Work• Best U.S. Edition of International Material Special Exits: A Graphic Memoir by Joyce Farmer: • Best Reality-Based Work You’ll Never Know Book 2: Collateral Damage by Carol Tyler: • Best Reality-Based Work• Best Painter/Multimedia Artist (interior art) — Carol Tyler Captain Easy, Soldier of Fortune: The Complete Sunday Newspaper Strips…