Tomorrow at high noon the sale begins for the limited edition — 50 only — prints by Adrian Tomine, author of Shortcomings and Scenes From an Impending Marriage.
The price will $250 in the United States, $260 in Canada. All proceeds will be donated to the Japan Society’s Earthquake Relief Fund.
The drawings were created as cover illustrations for the DVD release of the Yasujiro Ozu films The Only Son and There Was a Father. The images are melancholic and truly elegant.
“In addition to the two prints,” noted a statement released yesterday by Drawn & Quarterly, “all orders will include a small original sketch by Adrian Tomine, personalized to the name of the purchaser.”
You can find out more here.
Greg Rucka has not always been well-served by his illustrators. During the long run of his great comic books series Queen & Country, some of the artists did excellent, powerful work. Others weren’t so successful.
In fact, I recall in the first issue of Queen & Country I picked up (a Free Comic Book Day special), I had no idea the main character was supposed to be a woman until I noticed, some pages in, that her name was Tara.
Rucka is an exciting, nuanced writer. (The paperback edition of third Q&C novel, The Last Run, will be released this coming Tuesday.) And he proves it again with the hardbound collection of the Eisner Award-nominated Stumptown, just out earlier this month.
Stumptown is Portland, Oregon. The main character is a rush-addicted, low-rent private eye named Dex — short for Dexedrine, so imagine what sort of childhood she had — Parios, who takes her knocks from all sorts of down-and-outers. She’s plies her trade in The Rockford Files world, as Matt Fraction (what’s with the names?) points out in his introduction.
Art is by Matthew Southworth, who’s done work for DC, Marvel and Image Comics. His style, for some, will be ideal for the gritty, dangerous and out-of-focus-around-the-edges milieu Dex Parios inhabits.
For my taste, some panels seem rushed, not fully realized. Others made me stop and look — the two-ages spread where Dex meets Isabel at Mount Tabor. The sun rises as they discuss a shaky truce.
See for yourself.
Two quick items of note. (I’m still packing for our move to Iowa.)
First, this from a press release I just received from Drawn & Quarterly about Adrian Tomine’s appearance Feb. 09, 7 to 8 p.m., at my favorite bookstore, the Strand in Manhattan:
A loose, cartoony departure from Adrian Tomine’s previous work, Scenes From an Impending Marriage is a sweet-natured, laugh out-loud skewering of the modern marriage process, including hiring a D.J., location scouting, trips to the salon, suit fittings, dance lessons, registering for gifts and managing familial demands.
Leanne Shapton, author of The Native Trees of Canada and Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion and Jewelry, will join Adrian on the Strand stage.
You can read my posts on an earlier Tomine graphic novel, Shortcomings, here and here.
Also this from the Daily Cartoonist, about the people who bring you the wonderful Festival of Cartoon Art in Columbus ...:
The Will and Ann Eisner Family Foundation has pledged $250,000 over five years to support the new Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum facility, part of the Sullivant Hall renovation at Ohio State University. In recognition of this gift, the library’s seminar room will be named in honor of Will Eisner. The Eisner Family Foundation gift will be matched dollar for dollar by Jean Schulz, widow of Peanuts’ creator Charles M. Schulz, giving it a $500,000 impact on the project. Ms. Schulz has promised to match donations to the new facility up to $2.5 million.
The Sullivant Hall renovation is estimated to cost $24.4 million and is scheduled to be completed in 2013, at which time Sullivant Hall will house the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum as well as The Ohio State University Department of Dance and the Department of Art Education. Upon completion of the Schulz Challenge, the Sullivant Hall renovation will be completely funded.Read more
here.
While I prepare to move and start a new job, future posts for “The Sparrow Papers” might appear on a less-than-regular basis. We’ll see what happens after that.
In the meantime, volume 14 of Battle Angle Alita: Lost Order is now out. From what I’ve read so far, it appears Yukito Kishiro developed cameos for many of the long-unseen characters from his years-long tale. And that is playing to his strengths.
Today’s USA Today has brief interviews with comic book writers Ed Brubaker, about Incognito: Bad Influences, featuring the return of Zack Overkill, and Grant Morrison, about the Batman Incorporated series.
“The people who grew up reading comic books are now in charge of pop cuture,” Brubaker says. Which is the same contention made by and about Doctor Who fans who, now adult writers, actors, directors, producers, special-effects folk, marketers, et al., took over the BBC and re-launched the longest running — and best — sci-fi TV show. (The next season airs on BBC and BBC America this coming April.)
You can read my earlier post on Brubaker here, and see the USA Today stories here and here.
In case you missed it, Neil Gaiman was on Talk of the Nation on NPR this afternoon. You can listen to it here.
Host Neal Conan, who recently interviewed Robert and Sophie Crumb, gave himself away. When one listener noted she went to the comic book store “every month,” Conan piped up with: “Every month? New comic books come out every Wednesday.”
Conan also confessed he enjoyed Gaiman’s Sandman series so much he couldn’t bear to finish the last couple issues.
Gaiman was on the show to promote The Best American Comics 2010, which he edited.
It’s more like “Lost Order.” Volume 13 of this series came out way back in June.
I’ve mentioned this before, but Viz seriously tampers with the patience and, frankly, loyalty of fans of Yukito Kishiro’s epic tale. With seven months between English-language editions, we’ll never see the conclusion … or by then, we won’t have the mental faculties to comprehend what’s going on.
Sigh.
In any case, volume 14 of Alita’s/Gally’s/Yoko’s excellent adventure — it really is one long tale, filled with honor, horror, bravery, humor, fantasy and grit — is set to be published Jan. 11. I love this story and I strongly recommend it.
See some earlier posts on this series here and here, which have links to even earlier posts. (I also suggest reading that first post of mine before starting “Battle Angel,” as it fills in a lot of the back story.)
