This photo of a comic shop, found on the Corvusfugit site, comes with the following caption: “12-year-old Freddie Lewis, left, and Marshall Beck, both of San Diego’s Normal Heights neighborhood, set aside superhero comics to check out a copy of Howard the Duck in 1976 (Dennis Huls / San Diego Historical Society).” I love looking at photographs of people reading comic books, especially photos that remind us of comics’ original child audience, and remind us how packed newsstands and drugstores were with comics in the past. On his blog, Marvel editor Tom Brevoort occasionally posts long strings of old pictures of people reading comics, under the blanket title “Comics in the Wild”: here’s where you can find all the “Wild” entries.
Coming to Netflix on September 28 is the animated cartoon Ada Twist, Scientist, based on the popular children’s books by writer Andrea Beaty and artist David Roberts. The Essence website describes the series as following “the happenings of 8-year-old Black girl and scientist Ada on her missions to learn any and everything about the world around her and solve mysteries with help from her best friends Rosie Revere and Iggy Peck.” Here’s the teaser trailer for Ada Twist, and while you’re waiting for the series, why not check out Beaty’s site, where she discusses her books, and features drawing and read-aloud videos? (And for parents, teachers, and other grown-ups: Beaty also provides lots of activity downloads available that teach kids about science.) Also visit Roberts’ Instagram for playful images from his books and sketchbooks.
Time to play catch up with some of our favorite sites and links. It’s difficult to keep pace with Steven Heller’s “Daily Heller” column—it’s every weekday, y’know?—but recent posts cover such topics as the chapbooks of designer and printer Sam Antupit (1923-2003), the new typeface guide HERE (which celebrates both visual and cultural diversity), and the career of Wolfgang Weingart (1941-2021), a “major figure in the pre-digital, post-New Typography movement.” And don’t forget that “The Daily Heller” appears on the PRINT magazine site, which carries such cool non-Heller content as Chloe Gordon’s Olympics-inspired article on sports illustrators to follow on Instagram. The above image, included with Gordon’s piece, is by artist Caroline Blanchet, from her “Sport is Poetry in Motion” series.
Another Internet series we follow here at the Club is First Second’s Sketch School on YouTube. Recent Sketch School videos showcase the following cartoonists and books: Evan Dahm (and the second volume in his Island Book series, The Infinite Land), Robin Robinson (the fantasy graphic novel No One Returns from the Enchanted Forest) and Mike Dawson (the basketball story The Fifth Quarter). Each of these talented artists have individual sites and feeds too, so check out the following links for more comics and illustrations: Dahm, Dawson, and Robinson (who provides us with the above active menagerie).
On Tuesday, August 31 from 8-10pm (EST), New York City’s Japan Foundation—charged with “cultivating friendship and ties between Japan and the world”—is hosting an online panel discussion titled “Godzilla: A Pioneer of Global Popular Culture.” The event is free, but you must register here. Scholars William Tsutsui, Takayuki Tatsumi, and Meghan Mettler, journalist and writer Norman England, and journalist and documentary producer Steve Ryfle will talk about the enduring popularity of the fire-blasting lizard. Be sure to check out the Japan Foundation’s other events too, many of which focus on Japanese popular culture. And just for fun, below is a fantastic Godzilla drawn by cartoonist James Stokoe, whose graphic novel Godzilla: The Half-Century War (2013), about one man’s obsession with the monster, is highly recommended for teens and adults.
Premiering at the Toronto Film Festival in September 2021 is The Electrical Life of Louis Wain, directed by Will Sharpe and starring Benedict Cumberbatch (Dr. Strange) and Claire Foy (the first two seasons of The Crown). Wain is based on the real-life experiences and tragedies of English freelance artist Louis Wain (1860-1939), who specialized in drawing cat portraits that, over the course of his career, became more feverish and abstract. (Some argue that Wain’s increasingly surreal cats were a result of mental illness, but there’s debate about that: as Wain’s Wikipedia entry points out, “Later in life, [Wain] was confined to mental institutions and was alleged to have suffered from schizophrenia. This claim is disputed among specialists. According to some psychiatrists, the onset of schizophrenia can be seen in his works.” Below are a few examples of Wain’s energetic, unique cats, as well as a photo of Wain petting (or trying to pose for a portrait?) a kitty.
This weekly blog post is written and compiled by Craig Fischer. To send along recommendations, ideas, and comments, contact Craig at [email protected] [.]
