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If comics is my culture, TCAF is my holiest day.

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This past week I finished a six page comic called So Many Ways as a submission for a comics anthology. It’s my first comic with words since 2012. I chose sea turtles as my subject because of @tjustmystuffpoetrymusic and @erikmissio . They both love turtles <3 <3 <3 Also thinking about that little green turtle that Fot @cloudysketches made for me!!!

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Review: Sound of Snow Falling by Maggie Umber

Sound of Snow Falling Cover

Sound of Snow Falling Spread

Sound of Snow Falling Spread

Maggie Umber is one of the unsung heroes of art comics. Her status as the assistant publisher at 2dcloud led to the expansion of an anthologies-based print collective to a significant force in alternative comics publishing. The micropress is a bustling, risk-taking enterprise that wouldn’t exist without Umber’s hard work. Over the course of 2dcloud’s 10-year history, Umber has published only a small amount of work, but her graphic novella Time Capsule was one of my favorite books of 2015. At the time I called it a punch in the mouth; it’s stark view of the natural world and the peril it faces due to the effects of the anthropocene, including encroachment, poaching, natural resources depletion or pollution, and climate change. This Spring, Umber published Sound of Snow Falling, another nature-inspired graphic novel from 2d cloud. In it, Umber details the lives of a mating pair of great horned owls in their natural habitat, along with other animals around them.

My first impression of Sound of Snow Falling is its darkness. Not, necessarily, in the telling of the tale, but in the colors and techniques Umber uses. Great horned owls, a very common predatory bird in North America, are crepuscular/nocturnal animals, and Umber has limited her color palette to match the surrounding darkness of her subjects.The book opens with a gorgeous set of pages, illustrating a flock of turkeys in various shades of grey and navy. Some maroon sneaks into the palette at places, but cool dark colors predominate. In this way the book feels cold, like opening the pages leads to a world of winter night.

Sound of Snow Falling is a wordless comic (except the foreword and afterword), which gives the comic a sense of quiet that predominates. The title recalls the muffled stillness of a snowstorm, how sounds are subdued and dispelled. Without the baggage (or crutch) of language, Umber must find a way to craft a compelling and propulsive narrative. Part of the way Umber accomplishes this is through careful color considerations. Scene by scene, the background color, often used in panel gutters, changes. There are also scenes where the animals are hard to see, their natural camouflage expressed in the dark paint tones.  I was mesmerized by Umber’s control.

Umber does a lot with two page spreads that I find compelling. There’s a challenge here, not a big one, but a meaningful one, of what comics look like and what they can be. Some of my favorite work in the book is early on, where owls perch in trees in a swath of blue. Above them, in a panel of light grey, a flock of birds (or bats) flies overhead; below them, in a similar panel, a herd of deer cross a snowy plain. The heavens above and the earth below, and Umber’s central characters, the watchful guardians of night.

As I read Sound of Snow Falling, a general question surrounded the work; How do we create compelling narratives of the animal world that do not humanize these animals and their lives?  Animal documentary film, with its over reliance on narration as a method of narrative propulsion, humanizes the wild. Other narrative work in comics gives animals names, human emotions, and human smiles, robbing the creatures of their majesty and their violence. Umber easily avoids this common pitfall in Sound of Snow Falling, and the result is astounding.

Sequential State is a nonprofit alt comics criticism project. We’re running a Patreon campaign that supports the website’s hosting costs. Extra money goes to paying cartoonists and other writers. That’s the gig. There’s no affiliate links, and no advertising. Was your reading experience today worth a buck? If you thought so, then please help me keep the site up and running. Thanks.

Review: Sound of Snow Falling by Maggie Umber was originally published on Sequential State

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Crow stencil monotypes by Maggie Umber for @tjustmystuffpoetrymusic

If you love my art support me on patreon.com/maggieumber <3 <3 <3 ! 

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I finally got myself together and updated my shop. You can get all of these (and more) as prints or phone cases!! 

https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/tillie/

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I went to this and it was great. Thanks, Annie, the Beguiling, and all three cartoonists -- really was a nice night out.

TONIGHT! TONIGHT! TONIGHT!

GG and Patrick Kyle and super special guest host Eric Kostiuk Williams!

BE THERE!

Patrick Kyle and GG Present Everywhere Disappeared and I’m Not Here

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San José Province | chrispoops

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Thanks @erikmissio for including Sound of Snow Falling in your article Finding The Right Comic For The Right Kid on the Parents/CBS Radio-Canada website:

A longer shot may be Maggie Umber’s Sound of Snow Falling — a fully painted (almost photorealistic), wordless comic about a family of great horned owls. Meticulously researched, it’s slow-paced. If some comics can be thought of as graphic novels, this one’s more of a graphic poem. In other words, it’s definitely not for every kid, but if you have an owl-obsessed birdwatcher in your house, it might be the perfect, unique gift.

Yay!

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I wrote a thing about kids comics (that are still totally great for non-kids) for CBC.

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This is me. These comics are great.

CBC Parents presents Ben Sears’ Double+ books as the perfect pick for the kid who loves a good mystery!

“Night Air  and Volcano Trash — Ben Sears’ stories about Plus Man and his robot, Hank — aren’t really mysteries, but there’s a weird noir feel to them, mashed up with sci-fi, action movies, comic strips and everything that’s cool. For older kids, these would be fun reads.” — Erik Missio, CBC Parents

Check out the rest of their picks for finding the right comic for the right kid here!

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By Winsor McCay

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Lovely Helm is now available to buy online.

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at Third Beach

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NEW BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT:

THE IDEAL COPY ISBN: 978-1-927668-56-6 $12.00 6.5 x 9”, 88 pages, full colour, trade paper May 2018 from Koyama Press

read more here

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I loved this comic. Read it twice in rapid succession and am now going to leave it alone for a little bit before returning.

PopMatters reviews I’m Not Here by “one of the most exciting new voices of 21st century comics” GG.

“The novel is one of the richest and gently disturbing I’ve read in recent years.” — Chris Gavaler, PopMatters

Check out the whole review here!   

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Ferris, Nowak, Fink and more take home 2017 Ignatz Awards

My Favorite Thing is Monsters by Emil Ferris continued to rack up accolades this weekend as it took home two Ignatz Awards last night. Other winners at the annual awards presentation included Jess Fink’s Chester 5000, Ben Passmore’s Your Black Friend and Carolyn Nowak’s Diana’s Electric Tongue.

Named after the brick-throwing mouse from Krazy Kat, the awards honor “excellence in independent comics” and are selected by a jury of five creators and voted on by attendees of the Small Press Expo. The jurors for this year’s nominations were Neil Brideau, Glynnis Fawkes, Sara Lautman, Trungles and David Willis.

The complete list of nominees can be found below, with the winner in bold.

Outstanding Artist Karen Katz — “The Academic Hour” (Secret Acres) Emil Ferris — “My Favorite Thing is Monsters” (Fantagrahpics) Manuele Fior — “The Interview” (Fantagraphics) Barbara Yelin — “Irmina” (Self Made Hero) Pablo Auldadell — “Paradise Lost” (Pegasus Books)

Outstanding Anthology “ELEMENTS: Fire — An Anthology by Creators of Color” — edited by Taneka Stotts (Beyond Press) “POWER & MAGIC: The Queer Witch Comics Anthology” — edited by Joamette Gil (P&M Press) “Spanish Fever: Stories by the New Spanish Cartoonists” — edited by Javier Olivares & Santiago Garcia (Fantagraphics) “Comic Book Slumber Party’s Deep Space Canine” — edited by Hanhah K. Chapman (Avery Hill) “ALPHABET: The LGBTQAIU Creators,” from Prism Comics — edited by Jon Macy and Tara Madison Avery (Stacked Deck Press)

Outstanding Collection “The Complete Neat Stuff” — Peter Bagge (Fantagraphics) “Johnny Wander: Our Cats Are More Famous Than Us” — Ananth Hirsh, Yuko Ota (Oni Press) “Time Clock” — Leslie Stein (Fantagraphics) “Boundless” — Jillian Tamaki (Drawn & Quarterly) “Hip Hop Family Tree, Vol. 2″ — Ed Piskor (Fantagraphics)

Outstanding Graphic Novel “Eartha” — Cathy Malkasian (Fantagraphics) “March: Book 3″ — John Lewis, Nate Powell, Andrew Aydin (Top Shelf) “My Favorite Thing Is Monsters” — Emil Ferris (Fantagraphics) “Band for Life” — Anya Davidson (Fantagraphics) “Tetris” — Box Brown (First Second)

Outstanding Story “March: Book 3″ — John Lewis, Nate Powell, Andrew Aydin (Top Shelf) “My Favorite Thing Is Monsters” — Emil Ferris (Fantagraphics) “Small Enough,” from “Diary Comics” — Dustin Harbin (Koyama Press) “Too Hot to Be Cool” — Maddi Gonzales “Diana’s Electric Tongue” — Carolyn Nowak (self-published)

Promising New Talent Isabella Rotman — “Long Black Veil” (self-published) Margot Ferrick — “Yours” (2D Cloud) Aud Koch — “Run,” from the Oath Anthology (Mary’s Monster) Bianca Xunise — “Say Her Name” (self-published) Kelly Bastow — “Year Long Summer” (self-published)

Outstanding Series Chester 5000, by Jess Fink (self-published) The Old Woman, by Rebecca Mock (self-published) Maleficium, by Sabin Couldron (self-published) Frontier, edited by Ryan Sands (Youth in Decline) Crickets, by Sammy Harkham (self-published)

Outstanding Comic “Public Relations #10″ — Matthew Sturges, Dave Justus, Steve Rolston, Annie Wu (1First Comics) “Libby’s Dad” — Eleanor Davis (Retrofit/Big Planet) “Canopy” — Karine Bernadou (Retrofit/Big Planet) “Your Black Friend” — Ben Passmore (Silver Sprocket) “Sunburning” — Keiler Roberts (Koyama Press)

Outstanding Minicomic (self-published) “Tender Hearted” — Hazel Newlevant “The Man Who Came Down the Attic Stairs” — Celine Loup “Reverse Flaneur” — M. Sabine Rear “Same Place Same Time” — Ann Xu “Our Tale of Woe” — Keren Katz & Geffen Refaeli

Outstanding Online Comic The Meek by Der-shing Helmer Disability in the Age of Trump by Amanda Scurti Normal Person, Perfect Maine Vacation by Lauren Weinstein That’s Not Who We Are by Mike Dawson Woman World by Aminder Dhaliwal

Via Comics Worth Reading