#ourcomicsourselves

[ourcomicsourselves]

Artist Spotlight: Carolyn Nowak

Hi! My name’s Athena Naylor, and I’m a cartoonist and recent graduate of the George Washington University. I currently live in D.C., and I got involved with Our Comics Ourselves while the exhibit was at George Mason University this fall. I’m excited to contribute to the blog this week!

The first cartoonist I want to highlight this week is Carolyn Nowak, whose recent work has been on my mind ever since this year’s Small Press Expo. 

I first stumbled upon Nowak’s work here through tumblr, particularly when her comic “Rungs” achieved some notoriety through the reblogging circuit. But it’s really her mini-comics that stand out to me. I picked up “Girl Town” at Small Press Expo in 2015 and quickly fell in love with Nowak’s cartooning and storytelling style.

 Nowak’s characters, along with the world she pens in around them, are endearingly strange. In “Girl Town,” the main characters are women who were rejected as astronauts because they were considered to be “too distracting” for their male counterparts (too painfully typical and relevant), and now they live together in a grungy community of outcast women.

This soft sci-fi set up, however, is really a backdrop for the tale of a crush between our nameless narrator and the source of her romantic obsession, Betsy, her next-door neighbor.

Betsy is not a typical love-interest. She and her roommates are mocked as “lunch-ladies” for their looks, and besides her common-place appearance Betsy’s personality is hardly warm or welcoming. Unlike in many love stories where female romantic interests are portrayed as soft and vulnerable, the narrator of “Girl Town” is enamored most of Betsy’s bold and blatant rage. I don’t know if I’ve ever read another story quite like this where a woman’s anger is cast as her most attractive attribute, rather than a “bitchy” or “shrewish” personality trait. I kinda love it.

I think the sequence that really sold me on Nowak’s story was the one below: any cartoonist who incorporates a line like “her nipples rattled against the windowsill in an odious rhythm” has earned my upmost admiration and respect. How can anyone not pause and grin after this scene?

Nowak’s most recent mini-comic, “Diana’s Electric Tongue,” only shows how much her work has progressed.  “Diana’s Electric Tongue” won an Ignatz Award at this year’s SPX, and the initial plot seems fairly straightforward: a woman buys a robot boyfriend, shenanigans ensue. It sounds like a comedic premise, and Nowak’s work does always maintain an undercurrent of humor. But what I did not expect was how much heartache this comic made me feel.

 The real driving force behind “Diana’s Electric Tongue” isn’t how Diana navigates a relationship with a robot, though that is certainly explored. The focus is instead on the main character’s motivation for buying the robot. Diana is dealing with the aftermath of her previous relationship, which closely coincided with a disastrous motorcycle accident that caused her to lose her tongue (thus the title). The story becomes more a meditation on heartbreak and how the impact of relationships can be insidious and encompassing, all while suggesting parallels between emotional loss and physical injury. It’s the kind of story I would want to write—one that finds its narrative tension in well-timed disclosures of information and the accumulation of small details that snowball into a final emotional punch. Every time I pick up the book I find new layers to contemplate and I become engrossed, even though I know the story by heart.

Besides all this, Nowak’s artwork with all its organic, fluid linework and pastel candy colors (props to Nowak’s coloring assistant Lisa DuBois) is completely captivating.

I’ll leave it at that since I don’t want to spoil anything else. Know that these review blurbs I’m posting below are correct and that I highly recommend the book.

More of Carolyn Nowak’s work can be found at her website: www.carolyncnowak.com

[adastracomix]

A masterful compilation by the NYC-based Interference Archive, “Our Comics Ourselves” is a catalog of comic art and essays from an exhibition of the same name, including work by Elvis B., Paul Buhle, Leela Corman, Edie Fake, William H. Foster III, Ganzeer, Nils Hanczar, Jay Odjick, and more. From IA: “The primary goal of the exhibition Our Comics, Ourselves is to generate open conversation and deep discussion about the power of comics to address issues of identity, expression and representation. As organizers, we’re doing our best to present works that will help us get there... “We wondered what identity-based works inspired [these creators], angered them, or at least motivated them enough to want to start making comics themselves. So we asked, and we got some very thoughtful, and very heartfelt answers. Some folks—like Sophie Yanow and Elvis B.—answered in comic format, while others wrote short essays and sent us some fantastic full-color images of comic books we had never seen before.” With only 500 copies printed, this 60pg catalog is one of the most thoughtful and valuable meditations on #identitypolitics in the comics world. We encourage you to order one from the Interference Archive’s website! #ourcomicsourselves #sjcomix365 #comics #identitycomics #representationmatters #autobiographicalcomics https://www.instagram.com/p/Bs_OKCoHTwi/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=8a5e0jg00djv

[annasellheim]

OK SO QUICK RECAP OF MILESTONES FROM THE LAST 6 MONTHS:

Comics wise:

1) I was INVITED to participate in an anthology for the first time (the @comicsforchoice anthology- which I got invited to because I did this comic with @tilliewalden last year).

2) I did my first interview on @womenwriteaboutcomics which can be found here. My former PR exec mother assures me I did an ok job at it too!

3) I won my first grant (the @micexpo mini-grant to help publish more copies of Everything’s Fine Vol 2 for the show).

4) Everything’s Fine Vol 2 is nominated for a Broken Pencil Zine award (the first award I’ve been nominated for since I was nominated for a National Arts and Scholars award in sophomore year of high school- and def the first award a comic of mine was nominated for). 

5) I did my first reading of my comics at @fantomcomics as part of the @ourcomicsourselves exhibit co-sponsored by Fantom and George Mason University. I am writing this post before the event has happened, but it is being posted a few days after the event. ANYWAY I HOPE IT WENT WELL, HELLO FROM THE PAST.

Personal life wise:

1) I admitted my romantic feelings to a guy I actually like romantically for the first time in 11 years, which is how I started my first relationship. And that’s going well. 

2) I don’t know, there’s a bunch of personal growth I’ve done that I can’t articulate but is happening according to other people.

As good as all this is, it’s also INSANELY STRESSFUL. I can’t remember the last time I have been this stressed out for this long.

So yeah, personal growth is important and good but hard and stressful as hell. But it’s worth it. 

[raku---gaki]

@annasellheim hangs out behind the projector screen as @christopherkardambikis sets up a laptop for the @ourcomicsourselves  comics reading at @fantomcomics .

[witchpleaseandthankyou]

Oh god why ?!?!

So im running the Our comics Ourselves Tumblr this week and I need to figure out quickly how  the heck to function on Tumblr because lets be real i’m not exactly tec savy here. 

So if you want to see what I enjoy reading and want to give me constructive criticism on how to tumble ? tumbler ? whatever you call it ...  check out @ourcomicsourselves

[eriknebel]

i have been guest curator for one week (5/16-5/22) for the site for this awesome exhibition.

here’s some text from their show in new york:

“...these are the stories about all of us—either made by us, for us, or in our names. They are complicated, and sometimes messy. By attempting to narrate around mainstream standards and into uncharted territory, these comics let more of us know that we, too, belong to this world and that maybe, therefore, we are also able to participate in and shape it...

[annasellheim]

My @ourcomicsourselves posts are all done. What did we learn?

1) I procrastinate on doing anything that isn’t drawing a comic

2) Getting out of my comfort zone is ok I guess

3) Don’t make a post on a broken  computer (see Whomp post)

4) I’m the queen of typos anyway.

[annasellheim]

Okay so REAL quick

At the end of August I received three rejections on some comics I had pitched. They were nicely worded rejections, but these coming right after me having figured out that I could never complete the web comic I had spent 8 months writing a script for, it was a devastating couple of weeks. 

You can see how insecure I was in the interview I posted. It was not a good scene.

But I had applied for a bunch of other things during that time period, and kept applying to things. So by the beginning of September, I had found out I had won a @micexpo mini grant, had been nominated for a @brokenpencilmag-blog award, and was invited to read as part of the @ourcomicsourselves exhibition. I also went to SPX where I got to see a bunch of people I know. And the cool thing is, the more conventions I go to the more people I get to know, and the more I solidify my place in the comics community. Anyway, yeah SPX was super fun. 

Anyway, long story short, if you are interested  in stuff, apply to it. Keep trying to do things. Apply to everything. I just applied to do a reading for a @dczinefest event for Halloween, hopefully I’ll be able to do it. And if I don’t, it’ll be a bummer, but I’ll pick myself up and apply for more things. There’s no guarantee that you will get what you want, but the only way for them to possibly ever happen is to actually try to get them. If you do nothing that is a GUARANTEE nothing will happen. 

[annasellheim]

HEY DC PEEPS! I will be doing my first reading of a bunch of Everything’s Fine strips at @fantomcomics as part of the @ourcomicsourselves exhibit this Saturday at 7pm. This is being co-hosted by Fantom and George Mason University. You should come if you can. I’m theatrical as fuck so I should be able to bring something good to the reading. Even if I haven’t acted since middle school. 

But a few of you have found me through buying my zines at Fantom so it’d be cool to meet you. Hope to see you there!

[annasellheim]

This review I did for @ourcomicsourselves got a note so it’s reblog time!

Deep Girl by Ariel Bordeaux

Hello! My name is Anna Sellheim and I will be curating the Our Comics Ourselves tumblr this week. I write comics about mental health and progressive politics. This will be a mix of both comics that were important to me growing up and helped shape my creative voice, as well as work that I find particularly exciting now.

I first discovered Ariel Bordeaux when reading From Girls to Grrlz by Trina Robbins as a middle schooler in 1999 (Yes, I’m not old in the grand scheme of things but I am old in terms of tumblr) which highlighted Ariel’s book No Love Lost. I fell in love with it immediately. It is a fictional story about a bad relationship but mostly about the power of female friendships and their importance. It received poor reviews but I genuinely believe it’s because the subject matter was seen as trivial in the 1990s due to sexism. 

So cut to 2 years ago, I buy Deep Girl at a zine show in Providence Rhode Island.

I just starting to do autobio comics seriously at the time, and had just dealt with some sexist faculty over the summer at my grad school. Deep Girl was a revelation to me. It was funny and raw and unabashedly feminist.

(I actually own the original of  this page ^). Ariel talks about things like screwing up potential relationships in high school, horrendous roommate situations, and body insecurity. Every topic is tackled in total honesty, often making Ariel the butt of the joke, but in a way that is relatable. Even the fiction in later issues is used has a universal quality to it. There’s a particular fictional story about two women growing apart that is very well done. 

Unfortunately Deep Girl is out of print and Ariel has virtually no online presence, but if you can find an issue or two I highly recommend you get it. And No Love Lost is available used on Amazon for less than $3. 

You can see Ariel’s abandoned tumblr at @arielbordeaux and you can find me @annasellheim . I will leave you with a message from Ariel herself:

[ourcomicsourselves]

LINEWORK NW 2016 comix show May 21-22, portland, oregon!!!!

erik nebel, wally catton, ann matsusima chiu, theo ellsworth

i love you, comix community!!!

[ourcomicsourselves]

amazing comics from portland, oregon, comix show LINEWORK NW 2016.

[ourcomicsourselves]

amazing comics from http://neoglyphicmedia.tumblr.com

(from a comix show in portland, oregon: LineworkNW)

[annasellheim]

This got a note abd I wanted to share it here- read more of my reviews at @ourcomicsourselves (its an awesome project!)

Loneliness in Comic Zines: “Incompatible,” by Mary Shyne and, “Can You Believe We Only Get One Life” by Anna McGlynn.

Hello! My name is Anna Sellheim and I will be curating the Our Comics Ourselves tumblr this week. I write comics about mental health and progressive politics. This will be a mix of both comics that were important to me growing up and helped shape my creative voice, as well as work that I find particularly exciting now.

THIS IS IT! THE FINAL DAY! LET’S DO THIS!

People have called my work brave. As mentioned above, my work often deals with my mental health struggles (anxiety and depression). I’ve not only done solo work about it but I’ve been part of projects like @sweatypalmszine. Or my work is political. Again, I haven’t just done my own political comics, but I’ve been part of other projects like @comics-for-choice. I am a very open book, I’m willing to write comics about almost any part of my life…

except loneliness. 

Loneliness is a subject that I find too painful to acknowledge in my day to day life, let alone sit down for hours to draw a comic about it. Two zines I picked up this con season talk about loneliness in a totally raw, honest manner. I find both of these zines took a lot of bravery to create. 

Mary Shyne’s Incompatible looks at Mary’s abysmal dating history, talking about 12 different romantic encounters, each corresponding to a different astrological sign. You see Mary in all sorts of horrible situations, because she’s insecure and afraid of being alone. She talks about unrequited crushes, dealing with jerky older men, men that use her, etc. It’s a brutal book, but if you’ve felt the insecurity and loneliness that so many young 20 something single people do, you totally understand why she’s getting into these situations (even if you handled it the opposite way like me and coped with those feelings by avoiding dating pretty much completely for fear of being rejected). This book would be beyond depressing but Shyne saves it at the last moment, giving us a little bit of hope. This zine is my favorite thing I picked up at SPX and is the reason I agreed to write posts for this exhibition. 

SPEAKING OF LONELINESS AND HOPE, LET’S MOVE ON TO ANNA MCGLYNN!

(I am going to warn you straight up- these shots are crappy phone photos because when I tried scanning pages they looked CRAZY).

Can You Believe We Only Get One Life is a collection of diary comics from McGlynn’s summer. It is my favorite zine I picked up at @micexpo (and let’s be real here, I picked up a LOT of good stuff at MICE). I am not a fan of 90% of diary comics out there, it’s hard having something worthwhile to write about in the day to day. McGlynn’s comics show the day to day drudgery of life but the comics feel full of hope and very much ALIVE.

They are all honest and real. Some are really funny (^”Cool! What a great feeling it is to be loved and driving”). 

(^ Let me tell you, as someone that makes a 3 hour drive to see her boyfriend  every weekend and just has time to sit and THINK, the second panel is ON POINT). 

Others just show the experience of having lonely moments, but there’s hope in all of these strips. Sometimes you have good days and sometimes you have bad days, and McGlynn’s comics show us both and there’s a real beauty in that. 

Anyway, two cool brave ladies doing cool brave comics. A good thing all around. You can follow Shyne at @citygrump and her website is here. Anna McGlynn at @annamcglynn . I’m on here @annasellheim and my website is here. 

MY GOODNESS! IT’S OVER! Thanks for reading ya’ll! I hope you check out the stuff I’ve talked about this week! Time for me to go draw my own comics again.

xx

-Anna

[ourcomicsourselves]

Do Anything (2010) by Warren Ellis

I’m going to set the stage for this week by talking about a book about comics.  Do Anything is an essay by Warren Ellis, originally serialized by bleedingcool.com in 2009.  It is a meditation on and an exploration of comics and connections as viewed through the head of Jack Kirby.  The burgled robot head of Jack Kirby - which is the reprogrammed robot head of Philip K. Dick - just in case you didn’t yet understand this to be a science fiction story.  It traces a specific spider-webbed history of comic books through the life and influence of Kirby, The King of Comics.  But, it is also about how comics are made - the daily nuts and bolts of the medium, yes, but also, and most importantly, the craft of comics.  

Warren Ellis is a favorite writer of mine for many reasons.  One of which is just how much he puts his interest in the craft of writing and story telling out into the world on a regular basis.  You should sign up for his newsletter, Orbital Operations, to read his weekly thoughts on what he’s working on, what he’s reading, what concepts and news he’s interested in, and what he wants to murder.  Morning, Computer is his blog where he types at briefly in the morning, I imagine, before he’s fully caffeinated and still toying around with what he wants his gears to be turning towards for the day.  He speaks regularly and makes his talks public and if you’re interested in creative people talking about the things they are interested in and why/how they work you owe it to yourself to download Cunning Plans, his e-book that collects his talks from the past couple years.  

One of the talks in Cunning Plans I heard him deliver in person, in a shitty barn in someone’s backyard in LA.  And his interest in place and space as inseparable with time (ghost roads) shines through the barn speech, and through much of his writing.  And through Do Anything as well.  Do Anything is a work that reveals itself in layers and I have made a point to re-read it annually.  A way to refresh the paintings on the cave-walls of my brain.  A ritual to recharge the series of connections that are comics and to think about the medium and creators that I love from a different angle.  

And if I haven’t sold this book to you enough, know that the climax of the essay is framed by Bowie singing “Heroes.”  And it makes my head buzz and my hands shake every time I read it.

~ Christopher Kardambikis