Thursday Evening in Crown Heights: “Secret Identities Can Be So Hard On The Eyes: Gender Identities in Genre Comics” Panel Discussion at Hullabaloo Books

(Video courtesy Rich Johnston)

Wednesday Night in Williamsburg: Nordic Book Frenzy at Desert Island Comics

Tonight we were able to briefly attend the Nordic Book Frenzy at our great neighborhood store for the best comics and graphic novels, the wonderful Desert Island.

April 10 and 11 are the dates for The MoCCA Fest 2010 at the 69th Regiment Armory on Lexington Avenue. It's "a unique venue to experience comics, mini-comics, web comics, graphic novels, animation, posters, prints, original artwork, and more. Each year, the Festival invites dozens of established and emerging creators, scholars, and other experts to participate in two days of lecture/discussion panels on a variety of comics and cartoon topics."

The Desert Island event was to honor and welcome the artists from the Nordic countries who've come to MoCCA Fest, presented with the consulates from their respective nations. (The press material says "respective Scandanavian countries," but we are never sure about Finland, so we'll stick with "Nordic.")

Some of their books were on sale at the store.

There was food and wine and the always-wonderful atmosphere at Desert Island, made even nicer by the summerlike weather.

The artists there included Sara Granér,

Johan F. Krarup,

Anna Sailamaa,

Tommi Musturi

and many others. Here's the complete list:

Finland:
Tommi Musturi, Ville Hänninen, Anna Sailamaa, Mari Ahokoivu, Kaija Papu, Kaisa Leka.

Norway:
Per Jørgen Olsen, Martin Ernstsen, Erik Falk, Espen Holtestaul, Kristoffer Kjølberg, Sindre Wexelsen, Flu Hartberg

Denmark:
Ib Kjeldsmark, Johan F. Krarup, Ingo Milton, Cav Bøgelund, Henrik Rehr, Lars Jakobsen, Søren Mosdal

Sweden:
Jakob Hallin, Sara Granér, Sofia Olsson, Åsa Grennvall, Benjamin Stengård, Johannes Klenell

These artists do some terrific work, and it was nice to see it at Desert Island.

Tuesday Night in Williamsburg: John Porcellino and "Map of My Heart" at Desert Island Comics

On our way home from work tonight we stopped off at Desert Island, Williamsburg's wonderful store filled with comics, graphic novels and related stuff, for an event featuring John Porcellino, whom Entertainment Weekly has correctly called "a master at miniature poignance."

His new full-length book, Map of My Heart, celebrates the twentieth anniversary of John's seminal and influential comics zine, King Cat Comics, which he started self-publishing in 1989. As the Drawn and Quarterly website states:

In this collection, while Porcellino is living in isolation and experiencing the pain of divorce he crafts a melancholic, tender graphic ballad of heartbreak and reflection. Known for his sad, quiet honesty rendered in his signature deceptively minimalist style, Porcellino has a command of graphic storytelling as sophisticated as the medium's more visually intricate masters. Few other artists are able to so expertly contemplate the sadness, beauty, and wonder of life in so few lines.

We find his work low-key, sweet and melancholy and were not surprised to learn during the slide show and talk that began around 8 p.m. that most of his comics begin as poetry. He captures the little moments of life, the profound small details that never make it (thankfully) into Facebook status updates but whose signifance is much less empheral and which may haunt us for years to come.

Desert Island was crowded with his fans and some of his friends, and when we got there, John was signing books - both Map of My Heart and some of the issues of King Cat and other books and zines.

He had a lot of trouble with the computer during the slide show. The technical difficulties, which necessitated starting over, let him talk without any visual presentation for a while about the events of his life that were the fodder for the new book, which covers the years from 1997 to 2002, or King Cat numbers 51 to 61.

It was a pretty dark time in John's life. He suffered from a hearing disorder, hyperacusis, an extreme sensitivity to sound which made everyday noises intolerably loud and painful: "God forbid I heard a fork on a plate."

Before this, John had played in a band and was an avid punk rock aficiando. Indeed, it was the DIY ethos of the punk scene which had inspired his zine and its deceptively simple, unadorned line drawings. The ear disorder forced him to stop playing and listening to music and to isolate himself somewhat to avoid harsh sounds.

Then he got even sicker, spending a long time in the hospital and losing a lot of weight. The crazy rock 'n' roll life he knew became a quiet, reflective existence. Previously agnostic, he became more spiritual and eventually a serious practitioner of Zen Buddhism, involved in meditation and yoga after, as he described it, he had a kind of mental breakdown (John said he "went crazy") after his physical health rapidly improved.

During these years John and his wife were forced to leave Denver and return to the Chicago area to stay with her family. Later, they got a divorce that was very painful to him.

A lot of his physical, emotional and spiritual changes are reflected in the work in the book: "Ghost Eyes," "The Weight of My Bones," and other pieces that started as poems or prose poems.

We especially loved some of the sequences like "Hsueh-feng's Spiritual Light."

It was really a pleasure to see John Porcellino and hear him discuss his work, the interaction between his life and his art, and to take questions from people who were obviously longtime fans. We look forward to reading Map of My Heart and are grateful to the fabulous Desert Island, as always, for being close by.

If you live in Williamsburg and haven't checked out the store, pay them a visit.

Friday Night in Cobble Hill: Launch Party for Adam Suerte's "Aprendiz" #4 graphic novel at Rocketship comic shop

Thanks to our friends at Brooklyn Heights Blog, we were alerted to attend tonight's release party for volume 4 of Aprendiz, Brooklyn Tattoo owner and all-around great artist Adam Suerte's graphic memoir of his apprenticeship in the tattoo biz. The party was at the unparalleled Cobble Hill comic book store, Rocketship, where we get all our Justice League of America T-shirts and mo' better stuff too.

We got there via the G train from Dumbo Books HQ in Williamsburg. We were excited to see about the extension of the line starting on Sunday.

This Sunday the G train can take us to Church - Avenue, that is. One seat for us now to Park Slope and Kensington and every place in between.

To get to Rocketship, of course, we take the G to Bergen Street, making sure to stay at the front of the train so we can set out at the north Warren-Smith Streets corner (where's Septimus?)

As we said, Adam is the head honcho at Brooklyn Tattoo at 99 Smith Street.

But he's a total artist, with more than the body as his canvas.

He makes paintings.

Here's Cobble Hill Park:

Adam designed this wonderful Grand Army Plaza arch glass

and this glass with the Williamburgh Savings Bank clock tower.

And he's achieved incredible success, justifiably, as a graphic novelist. Here's a review of Aprendiz #1 at Midnight Fiction:

Aprendiz follows Suerte's artistic journey on his path to becoming a tattoo artist in NYC. The first issue chronicles his early days as a evolving cartoonist, tracing his development from art school in late '80's through a 7-year stint as part of an artist's collective called Urban Folk Art. The group struggled to stay afloat printing T-shirts and indie comics; and painting murals. At times, they supplemented their income working retail or production day jobs to pay the rent. About this time Suerte met a couple of tattoo artists who eventually gave him a shot at an apprenticeship at their shop.

Suerte is a wonderful cartoonist and storyteller. Aprendiz provides a fascinating glimpse into the development of a tattoo artist set in the rich countercultural streets of South Brooklyn.

Here's a short version of his bio:

Adam Suerte grew up in South Brooklyn where the streets were his canvas long before he was putting the streets on his canvas. He went to Music and Art High school where his graffiti flourished, and his love of underground comics psychadelic art and illustration began to bloom. At Rhode Island School of Design, he studied illustration, even though he is more of a painter. Dutch masters, Impressionism, Op Art, Pop Art, Hudson River Valley School , and the art of ancient Mexico were a few things that caught his eye. Upon moving back to Brooklyn he founded the artist cooperative Urban Folk Art© where the group ran a silkscreen studio, published their own comics, curated openings, participated in murals projects, guerrilla art projects, and taught art to kids. As they shut down the Printing aspect of the group 8 years later. Adam apprenticed at a tattoo shop in the late 90's, and opened and operates Brooklyn Tattoo, the first ever tattoo studio gallery in Cobble Hill Brooklyn, where he still resides. He is also continually painting makking comics, murals , and teaching art to kids.

There was a good-sized crowd at Rocketship early in the evening.

Adam was patiently talking to fans and friends and signing books.

He let us take a pic with our crappy cell phone camera,

and then he signed our copy of Aprendiz, book four.

Just a few panels from the latest issue to show you what a terrific graphic artist/writer Adam Suerte is:

The four volumes of Aprendiz deal with Adam's apprenticeship as a tattoo artist. In the last volume he tells of his final years toiling for and learning from the temperamental partners Myke and Jeff.

Badly in need of just a little iced tea, we devoured Adam's new book a couple of blocks north of Rocketship at the Smith Street Starbucks. To give you an idea of critical reception of Adam's work, here's a review of the intial volume at the Comics Journal:

Being a tattoo artist, it is not surprising that Adam Suerte can draw. What is surprising is that Suerte knows his way around a comics page the way your dad knows his way around the liquor store.

The most prominent trend in Aprendiz is the integration of elements typical to tattoo design into Suerte's compositions; Skulls, daggers and 40-ounce beer bottles are recurring images. The most impressive application of such imagery is the use of a flowing banner to display narrative captions. The banner serves dual purposes: Being a tattoo-related image, it strengthens the bond between art and subject. It also fills the more practical role of visual traffic controller. Banners overlap from panel to panel, directing the eye and creating a smooth visual flow. The result is a seamless page. The effect provides for as graceful a visual reading experience as one could ever want.

Hey, we got one of the lucky copies and won a free T-shirt!

At the end of the latest volume, Adam and his former bosses, Jeff Ortega and Myke Maldonado, who until recently were estranged, each discuss his memoir and the real-life events behind it.

It's a nice peek behind the curtain of the themes and plot of the opus. Jeff writes that

the one thing that Adam can claim in this industry is being the master of true Brooklyn tattooing ince there is no one within the borough (or on the planet for that matter) that can lay out a better homage to the County of Kings and New York City on skin than Adam.

It was a great evening, and we wish Adam Suerte ¡Mucha suerte! with the new book. Drop by Rocketship and you can get a copy and see for yourself how good he is.