Fantagraphics Blog

Eeeeuuughh! Jim Blanchard, who along with J.R. Williams will be our table-neighbors at the Alternative Press Expo this weekend in San Francisco (as usual), put together his own version of the show poster.

Eyeworks Festival 2010 trailer from Lilli Carré on Vimeo. Lilli Carré writes: "I'm organizing a new experimental animation festival called Eyeworks with Alexander Stewart, and we're very excited to announce the details! It will be a mix of abstract animation and unconventional character animation, shown on 16mm film and video. It's taking place November 6th in Chicago, at 247 S. State Street at the DePaul CDM Theatre." To paraphrase Tom Spurgeon, if I were in Chicago, I would totally go to that. Trailer above; more info and programming details here.

Howard Stern can't shut up about Drew Friedman! From yesterday's show. Starts after about 1:30 of setup. Nice mention of Al Jaffee too. (YouTube link.)

Charles Burns was among a trio of gifted cartoonists to emerge from The Evergreen State College in the mid-1970s. Together, Burns and fellow Evergreen alumni Matt Groening and Lynda Barry altered the course of contemporary comix and left an indelible mark on regional culture. Burns makes a rare return visit to his native Seattle on Saturday, October 30 to celebrate the publication of his amazing new graphic novel X'ED OUT with a slide talk, art exhibition, and book signing at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery. His idiosyncratic horror-story sensibility is perfect for the Halloween-eve occasion. Burns began his career as a…

Thanks to The Daily Cartoonist for reporting this: CBS recently re-presented the 1999 60 Minutes segment on Sparky and Peanuts in commemoration of the strip's 60th anniversary, available to view online embedded above or in higher-def here.

ALTERNATIVE PRESS EXPO 2009 from chris anthony diaz on Vimeo. From über-fan Chris Diaz comes this all-star montage of clips filmed at last year's Alternative Press Expo, just in time for this year's show! Among others you'll see Dash Shaw, Frank Santoro & Jon Vermilyea showing off Mome Vol. 16 at our table, Esther Pearl Watson & Mark Todd at their Funchicken setup, and our very own expo expert extraordinaire Janice Headley rocking her Jad Fair glasses. We'll see you in San Francisco in a couple of days! Get all our APE info here.

Jim Flora doyen Irwin Chusid writes: "JimFlora.com is offering an open edition fine art print entitled Night-Sky Moonswinger. The image of an overalls-clad boy on a rope swing strung from the moon originally appeared on the back dust jacket of Pishtosh Bullwash and Wimple, Flora's 12th children's book, published in 1972 by Atheneum." As a lad I would have liked having this on my wall. Click on for more details and purchasing info.

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "Love and Rocktober" continues with Sean T. Collins at Attentiondeficitdisorderly: "…[T]he comics in Penny Century look less dense and read that way, too. Maggie and Hopey seem to have settled down, somewhat — no longer careening from adventure to adventure or disaster to disaster, still involved in the lives and schemes of their eccentric friends but no longer completely swept up by them, still romantically (or at least sexually) entangled with one another but not to the all-or-nothing extremes of the past." • Review: "Released at last, Blake Bell's biography [Fire & Water]…

The Late Live Show – Ep 102 – Paul Hornschemeier & David McMillin from The Late Live Show on Vimeo. As Paul (who has returned to the online world from a short hiatus after such real-life activities as getting married and moving… whatever, dude) describes it on his blog, "…you can hear me discuss the origins of my comics as a cum-rag, debate the muse of gay mummies, and perform rather poorly in a game of 'Win, Lose, or Draw.' I take the stage around the twenty minute mark, but roughly half the references I make are about bits from…