My Blog

JANE'S WORLD RULES!

Justin — Fri, 18 May 2007 22:05:15 GMT

JANE'S WORLD RULES! One of my favorite people in the comics community is Paige Braddock, the creator of Jane's World, an Eisner-nominated humor comic that focuses on a sweet but clueless dyke and her eccentric cast of supporting characters. One of these characters is a gay cop named Rick... and since there's nothing more fun than illustrating a man in uniform (well, a man with no clothes at all, I suppose), I sent her a pin-up of Rick that's being printed in the upcoming Jane's World volume 7. The same issue also features Rick telling Jane a story about downing a fertility potion that contains a cobra's heart, which Paige based on the autobiographical story from my mini-comic Swallowing a Cobra's Heart and Other True Travel Tales. It's funny to have one of my tales adapted in someone else's comic, after doing the same to so many other people's stories in the pages of both True Travel Tales and Hard To Swallow. Turnabout's fair play, I suppose... Regardless, everyone should pick up a copy of Jane's World to check out Paige's special brand of funny, engaging character drama. Here's a pic of me and Paige at this year's Alternative Press Expo (APE):

READING AT PEGASUS BOOKS

Justin — Fri, 18 May 2007 16:03:20 GMT

READING AT PEGASUS BOOKS I'm doing a reading with a bunch of other fantastic, indy, Bay Area cartoonists at Pegasus Books in Berkeley! I'm really excited about this, and feel honored to be a part of such a stellar line-up. Check it out if you can... The cartoonists featured are: Scott Campbell (Hickee) Justin Hall (True Travel Tales) MariNaomi (Estrus) Shannon O'Leary (Pet Noir) Joe Sayers (Thingpart) Jason Shiga (Fleep) Geoff Vasile (Track Rabbit) Julia Wertz (Fart Party) Pegasus Books (the downtown branch) is located at 2349 Shattuck Avenue in Berkeley. The event is on Friday, May 18th beginning at 7pm, and is FREE. The poster is designed by the uber-talented Fred Noland (Black Sheep).

GOING APE!

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:50:13 GMT

GOING APE! On the evening of Saturday, April 21st is the first annual Going APE! event at the 3 Dollar Bill Café at the LGBT Center at 1800 Market St. It’s a reading and signing by five of the best, independent, queer comics creators around, all of them well-experienced in working a crowd… These are all personal heroes of mine, and it’s been a thrill to help put this together. The event runs from 7-10pm, with readings beginning at 8pm. The event is planned to coincide with the Alternative Press Expo (A.P.E.) here in San Francisco, a wonderful, annual, indy comics convention that I'll be tabling at as well. The line-up of talent for Going APE! is as follows: Paige Braddock (Jane’s World) Abby Denson (Tough Love) Tim Fish (Cavalcade of Boys, YBIL) Justin Hall (True Travel Tales, Hard To Swallow) Robert Kirby (Boy Trouble, Curbside) After the reading, you can also swing by Isotope Comics Lounge’s famous “APE Aftermath” and watch a bunch of cartoonists get raging drunk… It’s only a five-minute, stumbling walk away!

ALTERNATIVE PRESS EXPO 2007

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:49:11 GMT

ALTERNATIVE PRESS EXPO 2007 Oh, yeah, the time is upon us again. A.P.E. is coming up this weekend, on Saturday, April 21st and Sunday, April 22nd at the Concourse Exhibition Center at 620 7th St. in lovely San Francisco. It’ll be the usual raucous collection of independent creative types… This is my favorite show of the year, and an amazing display of the vitality of the indy comic/mini-comic/zine scene. Each year the show gets better and better, and it’s been wonderful watching the convention evolve and mature in the 7 or so years I’ve been coming to it. It’s honestly the most inspiring weekend of the year for me, creatively. I’ll be tabling during the convention of course, sharing a table with Steve MacIsaac and, on Saturday only, Dave Davenport. We’ll be in the gay ghetto overseen by daddy Tim Fish. Come by and say howdy, at table 344 on the ground floor. The new books I'll be showcasing that I've done since last year's APE are Hard To Swallow #2 and the Swallowing a Cobra and Other True Travel Tales mini-comic. QUEER CARTOONISTS PANEL I’ll also be moderating the Queer Cartoonists Panel for the fourth year now, on Sunday, April 22nd from 4:45-5:45pm in the APE conference area. Please come by! It’s a pretty stellar line-up of LGBT creators... Here's the APE program blurb for it: For the fourth installment of this annual, popular panel, yet another gaggle of LGBT cartoonists gather to gab irreverently about weighty issues. Should artists be socially responsible? What's happening in the world of queer cartooning? And just how gay are comics anyway? Abby Denson (Tough Love) Robert Kirby (Boy Trouble, Curbside) Andy Hartzell (Monday, Fox Bunny Funny) Brad Rader (Harry and Dickless Tom) Leia Weathington (Bold Riley) Moderated by Justin Hall (True Travel Tales, Hard To Swallow)

JAPAN!

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:45:54 GMT

JAPAN My partner Nash and I just went on an incredible trip to the land of the rising sun… which is also the land of shopping, superior sushi meals, black-suited salary men, cherry blossoms, cartoon mascots, shopping, rockabilly dance-offs, Buddhism mixed with Shintoism, spectacular high rises, wonderful wooden temples and raked rocked gardens, polite but reserved people, spotless subway cars which run on time, sculpted trees and elegant moss gardens, shopping, drunken ass-grabbers, married closet cases, pedophile porn, costume play outfits, nourishing noodle soups, tumultuous fish markets, technologically advanced toilets, spikey-toed shoes, big glam-metal hair, an exhausting degree of fashion consciousness, eel liver soup, shopping, obsequious waiters, bicycles riding on the sidewalks, hospital-style face masks, repetitive bowing, shopping, polite people, ethnocentrism and elitism, cleanliness, more shopping… …and manga, of course. Japanese comic books make up nearly 40% of the national literary output, and are read by the largest (by far) comic book market in the world. Very, very inspiring… Here’s me in front of the Kyoto Manga Museum. I was delighted to find in their small room devoted to American comics a copy of the Houghton Miflin Best American Comics under glass. So, I’m actually represented in the museum! How cool is that…

WALL O' MANGA

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:37:19 GMT

A wall o’ manga from a random book store in Kyoto. So many titles! And in so many genres… sports stories, fantasy, romance, sci-fi, historical fiction, toilet humor, erotic, spy thrillers, samurai stories, biography… Japan is so cool!

PRISM GUIDE

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:30:38 GMT

PRISM GUIDE The new PRISM Comics: Your Guide to LGBT Comics 2007 edition is out, and it looks beautiful! It’s a square-bound, 144 page book, with plenty of full-color pages, and includes comics from me, Paige Braddock, Joe Phillips, Leanne Franson, Ellen Forney, and others, as well as interviews, reviews, humor, etc. You can pick it up soon on the PRISM website, or ask your neighborhood comic book store to order some. PRISM has been publishing a Guide virtually every year since their inception, as well as the occasional Unsafe For All Ages (their adults-only book), and I've had pieces in all of them. They're a wonderful organization promoting queer comics, creators, and fans, and I really enjoy contributing to their publications and helping support their cause.

PERSONA NON GRATA

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:29:45 GMT

PERSONA NON GRATA In a couple of months I’ll have the full version of the Cambodian Comics article printed in the German magazine PNG (Persona Non Grata). I’ve been a regular contributor to PNG for the last several issues, with comics and some prose, all lifted from my True Travel Tales series. The magazine is mostly about indy music, and is all in German except for my pieces. I think it’s an excellent publication… though of course I don’t read German and have no idea what they’re writing about… I met Joerg, one of the guys running PNG, on a trip to Indonesia last year. We wound up on a harrowing motorcycle trip together on Flores, an intensely beautiful, Catholic island out past Bali on the Nusa Tegara chain. After that, we hired a fishing boat with a few others to take a trip out to see the komodo dragons for a few days, and by the end were good friends. I was even able to visit him and his girlfriend Antjie over in Tokyo (where they’ve been living for the last couple of years) last week. He’s intent on publishing a European collected edition of True Travel Tales, which I’m really excited about. Oh, and speaking of European publications, my character Glamazonia: The Uncanny Super Tranny made a surprise appearance in the French lesbian magazine La Dixieme Muse. I warned them that Glams was really into men, and not even a real girl, but they didn’t seem to care. C’est un peu bizarre, mais c’est la vie...

PUNK PLANET

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:27:37 GMT

PUNK PLANET Punk Planet #78, which features my article “Cambodian comics: Fading Stories,” is out on the shelves and for sale on their website. I’m pretty happy with the article, though they forgot to put in my references and “thank you”s… ah well. The article will also be up soon on ZineWiki, the Wikipedia site for independent publications.

TOILET SEAT LOVE!

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:25:47 GMT

TOILET SEAT LOVE! I finally finished my toilet seat art for Isotope Comics Lounge... They have an amazing gallery of toilet seat covers drawn on by various comics creators, that they've hung along the top of the back wall of the shop. Apparently a soused cartoonist once went to their bathroom and drew all over the seat during a party, so James Simes (the owner of Isotope) promptly hung the thing on his wall, thus starting one of the world's strangest cartoon art traditions. I felt so honored to be given my own toilet seat cover! The image I drew is of 80's porn star Jon King... and the flowers were to make it more kid-friendly. I'm always thinking about the children, after all... Isotope is really one of the best things about San Francisco, and I always send anyone who comes from out of town over there. It's a unique comic shop experience, with friendly, knowledgeable people, a beautifully designed space with couches to lounge upon and plenty of comics to read, and some of the best comics parties and events ever (if you enjoy watching cartoonists get shitfaced, and who doesn't?).

TO TEACH OR NOT TO TEACH

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:24:53 GMT

TO TEACH OR NOT TO TEACH I just helped teach a class at San Francisco State University. My friend Dr. Robert Thomas asked me to come to his Values and Culture (now there’s a vague name for you) class and talk to them about comic books. I started off with the lecture on superheroes and comics that I did on the cruise ship, and then ended it with a rather ramshackle discussion about independent cartooning and the formal aspects of comics. Almost my entire family are, or have been, professors… I am officially an academic brat. I’ve spent much of my life running from the calling, but I do have this draw to teaching and the classroom. It feels natural, and I know that I’d be good at it. I also know of the heartbreak, bad pay, and tedious paper grading that goes along with the academic life. Would I have what it takes? I don’t think I’d deal well with being a full-time professor (when would I have time to do my own art?), but the slave labor feel of being adjunct faculty would get to me for sure. Hmm… I don’t know. Here’s another picture of me in my Green Lantern outfit, since I don’t have a photo of the class. And no, I did not teach the class in my costume.

PORN UP!

Justin — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 14:23:33 GMT

PORN UP! The short piece about me in Porn Up!, the German gay porn magazine, was finally published. PU! is a Bruno Gmunder production, the same publisher who came out with Stripped, the (very well-done) book of gay male erotic art that I was in earlier. PU!, however, stinks (PU, indeed)… It’s all bad stills from trashy porn films starring young twinks. Boring, and a little disturbing at the same time… definitely not hot, unless you’re into ugly 15 year old boys. And there was my two-page spread, with illustrations from Hard To Swallow looking very much the opposite of twink porn. Ah well… At least it was printed in English, German, and French, so I can feel cool and international. Here’s a piece of the illustration that was printed in the magazine (it’ll be the back cover of Hard To Swallow #3):

SUPERHERO CRUISING!

Justin — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 15:56:33 GMT

SUPERHERO CRUISING! Last week I had perhaps the strangest gig of my life, doing a lecture on the history of superheroes and comic books on a seven-day-long, gay, Caribbean cruise that featured a superhero-themed party. The trip was put on by RSVP cruises, a large gay cruise line that was recently bought out by planetout.com. Planet Out is a San Francisco-based company, and I have a number of friends who work there, so I managed to weasel my way on board as a guest lecturer and comic book expert. The lecture itself was really fun to put together... I already knew a lot of the comic book lore, of course, but it was absolutely fascinating to dig deeper into the back stories of many of the important figures of the early comic book industry. The primary text I used was Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters, and the Birth of the Comic Book by Gerard Jones, a truly fantastic (and Eisner-Award-winning) book that delves deeply into the complex and shady past of American comics. As an indy cartoonist, I have a love/hate relationship with superheroes... They're how I got into comics, and are my first love, but I also resent how they have such a stranglehold on the American comics market, making it so difficult to find a sizable audience for any material that doesn't contain muscular guys with tights shooting laser beams from their eyeballs. Doing the research for this lecture, however, actually let me fall in love with superheroes again; digging into their history in all its messy glory made me appreciate how strange and wonderful this distinctly American icon really is. Some random, interesting points from the lecture: 1) Superheroes (at least those created during the Golden and Silver Ages) are virtually entirely a product of second-generation, Jewish-American imagination. Even the creators with WASPy names are usually Jews who Anglicized their names (Bob Kane who created Batman is Bob Kahn; Stan Lee and Jack Kirby who created the Fantastic Four, Hulk, X-Men, etc. are Stan Lieber and Jacob Kurtzberg, for example). The precursor to D.C. Comics was actually in part a front for the Jewish mob to smuggle Prohibition-restricted alcohol and goods. 2) Most comics creators were screwed by the system. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, who created Superman, were paid $130 for their creation, and spent most of their lives in poverty. 3) Wonder Woman's creator William Moulton Marston was a psychologist who helped create the lie-detector test (magic lasso of truth, anyone?), a polygamist who believed that the world should be ruled by strong women, and a bondage fetishist (bullet-proof bracelets/manacles, anyone?). 4) Before the sudden censorship crackdown of the mid-1950's, comic books were growing away from superheroes and diversifying and expanding in a remarkable way. Every genre was available, millions of books were sold, and almost half the readership was women. The market here probably looked a lot like the Japanese market looks today. Comics, for a brief moment in American history, were mainstream. Then came the comics code authority, and the industry was slashed down back down to whitewashed, superhero fare. 5) Superheroes remain a distinctly American phenomenon. While other cultures have plenty of super-heroic characters, superheroes with all their distinguishing traits (superpowers, distinctive costumes, secret identities, vigilantism, etc.) remain entirely American. If you can crack the mystery of the superhero, I think you can crack a significant part of the mystery of the American identity. As for the cruise itself, I had a blast. 3000 faggots (with a small smattering of dykes) trapped on a boat on the open seas does lead to some drama, of course, and by the end of the seven days I was pretty gay-ed out. I just wanted to blast punk-rock to get rid of the dance music stuck in my head, and only talk to straight people for awhile. Also, the whole concept of a cruise is pretty shocking for someone like me who's used to staying in $3 a night hotels with a pit toilet down the hall when he travels. The ship was 18 stories tall and contained close to 10 pools (I couldn't even count them all), and everything was set up to insure maximum pampering... you never had to cook your own food, wash your own plates, hang up your own towels, clean your own bathroom... they practically wiped your ass for you. While I know this is many people's idea of paradise (and indeed I met many guys who are chronic cruisers, whose only vacations are cruises), it makes me feel a little uncomfortable, and ultimately sort of numb. A gay cruise is like a big bowl of cotton candy... sweet, colorful, pretty, but when you try to eat it, it vanishes in your mouth, and you're left with sticky hands, a sickly sweet sensation in your stomach, and wondering if you really had anything to eat at all. I had a fucking blast, with lots of sun, swimming, sex, superheroes, and hanging out with friends, but ultimately I prefer a trip that I can sink my teeth into in a different way. One of the best parts of the cruise was the superhero party. People TURNED OUT for the costumes, and we didn't even get into the running for the prize with our Green Lantern outfits. Still, I think we looked fabulous, thanks to John (who forged the rings himself out of silver), and Brian (who did the make-up masks). And by the way, spandex feels... sexy. Especially when rubbing up on more spandex. Now I understand a little more of what makes up a superhero...

CAMBODIAN COMICS!

Justin — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 08:55:30 GMT

CAMBODIAN COMICS! So, I've recently joined the board of Siewphewyeung (Our Books), a Cambodian non-profit promoting the cause of Khmer (Cambodian) language comic books. This is cool stuff, as I'm a big fan of Khmer comics... It's a wonderful, local tradition that's in danger of dying out due to lack of intellectual property rights enforcement and competition from other media. I recently wrote an article on the subject for Punk Planet magazine (I'll be posting a version of the article on my site after three months, when their "first publishing" clause runs out), and because of that I was asked to be on the Our Books board. Right now, we're working on getting together a yearly Cambodian comics award that would publish a graphic novel in Khmer (and, if funds permit, in English and French). We would print the book in Cambodia, pay the cartoonist properly for his/her work, and distribute the book to the booksellers and libraries around the country (and perhaps abroad). After so many years of bumming around the world with a backpack, it feels good to actually be doing something positive in a country that I've felt a connection with... and it's especially amazing to be doing it through comics, my passion. The image is of the cover of an anti-corruption-themed comic book that Our Books published recently called Life's Choices.

S.F. CARTOON ART MUSEUM CREATORS MEETING

Justin — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 04:37:48 GMT

I'm going to be part of a panel on "Anthologies" at the next Creators Meeting at the S.F. Cartoon Art Museum, on Tuesday, January 23rd from 7-9pm. I'll be speaking on being part of various comics anthologies, as well as how we choose the guest creators for HARD TO SWALLOW. The cartoonists in the panel are: Shaenon Garrity (editor of MODERN TALES, contributor to FRIENDS OF LULU anthologies) Justin Hall (contributor to BEST AMERICAN COMICS, TRUE PORN, BOY TROUBLE, etc.) Shannon O'Leary (editor of PET NOIR) Nate Orman (editor of HAPPY MONDAYS) Plus one or two other creators to be announced... These meetings are open to comic creators of all skill levels, and represent an opportunity for artists in the Bay Area to meet and interact with others in the creative community. Past topics of discussion include preparation for conventions, webcomics, tax advice for cartoonists and animation. The suggested donation for these meetings is $3. The Cartoon Art Museum is located at 655 Mission St., between 3rd and New Montgomery Sts., and their phone number is (415) CAR-TOON.

MAGNET SIGNING

Justin — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 23:11:36 GMT

THE BOOK OF BOY TROUBLE signing and reading at Magnet went really well… We packed the place (OK, so it’s a small room, but still), and everyone seemed to have fun. I think I’ve finally figured out how to give a good presentation with comics. You need visuals, as reading directly is boring and inaccurate with such a visual medium. I projected slides of the pages I was reading from, which worked well. Each of the other cartoonists had their own techniques: Steve MacIsaac, for example, projected the images from his piece panel by panel without the word balloons, and Andy Hartzell blew up each of his panels onto cardboard squares which he read from and then tossed aside, like the old Bob Dylan video. Here’s a photo of all of us cartoonists from the event that ran in the Bay Area Reporter:

BEST EROTIC COMICS

Justin — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 23:10:16 GMT

I also just found out that my story “Birthday Fuck,” from HARD TO SWALLOW #1 was accepted for BEST EROTIC COMICS 2008, the first of a new annual series published by Last Gasp here in San Francisco. This is really exciting for me… Whenever Last Gasp publishes something, it’s worth noting, and the editor Greta Christina is filling a huge hole (pun intended) in the market, with the BEC series’ emphasis on literary, pan-sexual smut that’s challenging and titillating all at the same time. Last Gasp is also a local S.F. business (their offices, which are full of the coolest stuff ever, are right around the corner from me), so this honor gives me even more of a tingly feeling. I’ll send out an announcement when it’s on the shelves (supposedly in November 2007). “Birthday Fuck” is the true tale of my friend Mike, who used to be a porn star by the name of Jacob Scott. Back when he did erotic massage, he received a call from a woman to work on her bi-curious but inexperienced boyfriend for his birthday, and to fuck him as a surprise present. Hijinks ensued…

YOUNG BOTTOMS IN LOVE

Justin — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 23:09:21 GMT

A massive collection (368 full-color pages) of the greatest hits from the long-running webcomic YOUNG BOTTOMS IN LOVE is scheduled for a May 2nd release. The brainchild of the ultra-prolific Tim Fish, the online comic came out with a page a day on popimage.com starting in 2002. My four-page story “Oh Mighty Isis,” originally from the now-out-of-print TRUE TRAVEL TALES #1, is part of the collection, for the first time in full, glorious color no less. The talented Brett Hopkins did the color on it, and it really does look beautiful. Also represented in the book are some of the best queer cartoonists around, including Howard Cruse, Paige Braddock, Robert Kirby, David Kelly, etc. It’s even a charity book, with profits going to the Human Rights Campaign, PRISM Comics, and the Trevor Project, so you can feel even better about buying it.

GLAMAZONIA

Justin — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 23:06:41 GMT

GLAMAZONIA: THE UNCANNY SUPER TRANNY is back with yet another origin story (that ho blabs a different secret origin every time you get her talking), to be published in PRISM COMICS GUIDE 2007. Just to give away the punch line of the four-page tale parodying the origin of another, less fabulous superhero, it involves a bite from a radioactive drag queen… The new GUIDE should be out in time for the Alternative Press Expo in April, but I’ll let everyone know when it hits the shelves.

CAMBODIAN COMICS

Justin — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 23:05:05 GMT

I have an essay entitled “Cambodian Comics: Fading Stories” coming out in PUNK PLANET MAGAZINE #78, due out in mid-February. This is an excellent and well-respected independent media rag, and I’m thrilled that they’re running this piece, which was truly a labor of love for me. When I was traveling in Cambodia (see my mini-comic about the experience, TSUNAMI! TRUE TRAVEL TALES OF SOUTHEAST ASIA), I was lucky enough to meet John Weeks, an American expat cartoonist who has been living in Cambodia for many years, trying to save the impressive Khmer (Cambodian language) comics legacy from dying out due to the lack of intellectual property protection. He even introduced me to Em Satya, a Khmer comics master who still lives in poverty in Phnom Penh because his work has been persistently stolen out from under him. It’s surprising, I suppose, that a magazine with the name PUNK PLANET should run an article about the dangers of copyright infringement and how it can kill creative enterprises (isn’t punk all about subversive appropriation of culture and images?), but I give credit to my editor Anne E. Moore, who was also the series editor on the Houghton Miflin BEST AMERICAN COMICS that I was in last year. It’s always a good, interesting challenge for me to write a research article; it kind of shakes the dust off of areas of my brain that I don’t use very often in my life anymore. Virtually all of my writing is devoted to comic books, travelogues, and other creative enterprises, so I’m not used to writing analytical text anymore. I hope to do more of it in the future… though not too much, really. It’s kind of hard.

STRIPPED

Justin — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 23:03:32 GMT

I’m in the new anthology STRIPPED: THE ILLUSTRATED MALE, put out by Bruno Gmuender, the venerable German publisher of all things gay and erotic. I have my four-page story “Porn Star: Long Time Cumming” from HARD TO SWALLOW #2 in the beautiful, enormous, hard-cover book, which reads like a “who’s who” of gay male erotic artists. I’m in between the same covers as Ralf Koenig, for god’s sake! That’s cool shit… Some of my peeps are also in the book: Dave Davenport, Steve MacIsaac, Brad Rader, Hector Silva, Sean Platter… I’m also scheduled to be the featured erotic artist/cartoonist in an upcoming issue of one of Bruno Gmuender’s porn magazines, PORN UP! More on that as I learn more of the details…

BOY TROUBLE: GAY BOY COMICS WITH A NEW ATTITUDE

Justin — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 01:40:19 GMT

Five Bay Area cartoonists join forces to read from and sign THE BOOK OF BOY TROUBLE: GAY BOY COMICS WITH A NEW ATTITUDE at Magnet in S.F.’s Castro district on Saturday, December 2nd at 7pm! From its first photocopied edition in 1994, BOY TROUBLE has emphasized personal stories and viewpoints outside the mainstream, with subject matter that ranges from sex, love, and longing to porn, drugs, and punk rock. THE BOOK OF BOY TROUBLE compiles the greatest hits from the zine’s first ten years, plus 24 pages of spanking new work from both regular contributors and up-and-coming talents. The cartoonists at this event are: Jaime Cortez (Sexiles/Sexilos) Justin Hall (True Travel Tales, Hard To Swallow) Andy Hartzell (Monday, Fox Bunny Funny) Nick Leonard (Holy Titclamps) Steve MacIsaac (Sticky, Shirtlifter) THE BOOK OF BOY TROUBLE is a 120-page book, edited by Robert Kirby and David Kelly and published by Green Candy Press, which sells for $15. Magnet (http://www.magnetsf.org) is located at 4122 18th St., at Castro St in San Francisco, CA. The event takes place on Saturday, December 2nd at 7pm. For more information, please contact: Justin Hall Justin@allthumbspress.com (415) 608-8011

BEST AMERICAN COMICS

Justin — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 01:37:42 GMT

Houghton Miflin’s Best American Comics 2006 has been a revelation for me, in two important ways. First, it’s amazing to see my work (my story “La Rubia Loca” from True Travel Tales #3) printed well, on really nice paper with really nice ink in a really nice, hardcover package, and alongside some comics greats (I’m in the same book as Robert Crumb, Linda Barry, and Chris Ware, for god’s sake). As foolish as this is, it validates the work, and makes it look a lot more professional than when it’s presented in my self-published comic books. I’ve noticed the same phenomenon with my fine art… when I put something in a frame it suddenly asks to be taken seriously, both by an audience and by myself as an artist. Ridiculous, really. The work is the same, but clearly, packaging matters. The second revelation is that the big book publishers are now interested in comic book material. This changes everything. To this point, my highest aspiration with comics has been to either become a successful self-publisher (hah!), or to get my work published by the indy comics press, like Fantagraphics or Drawn and Quarterly. But now I realize that I could conceivably get a book deal from a publisher that actually pays me real money, and sends me on book tours where they pay for hotels and food and loose men. Good lord! I want to sell out so bad, I can taste it! Of course that means I have to get off my ass and make that graphic novel I’ve been threatening forever… Houghton Miflin put together a small book tour for BAC, flying Harvey Pekar, who was brought in as editor, and Anne E. Moore, the series editor, to a few cities where they hooked up with the local creators in the book to do signings and readings. I came along for the two Bay Area events, at Cody’s Books in Berkeley and Booksmith in the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco. The experience was fantastic, especially hanging out with all the creators, ie. Harvey (who really is that much of a curmudgeon… his shtick is no act), John Porcellino, Esther Pearl Watson, Eli Bishop, and Anne, who totally rocks. I definitely hope to work with her in the future.

SMALL PRESS EXPO

Justin — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 01:35:39 GMT

On October 13-15th, I headed East for the Small Press Expo (www.spxpo.com), which I’ve had a table at for the last 4 years. SPX is, with APE, one of the two comic book cons I attend every year. Part of the reason for this is that it takes place near my mom’s home in Virginia, so I can kill two birds with one stone by tacking on a visit with her. But I really do like SPX… It’s the most creator-centric of the cons, partly because it’s in the center of fucking nowhere (sorry, Rockville, MD) and there aren’t the big-city distractions of San Francisco or New York City. We creators have to either hang out with each other or hole up alone in our hotel rooms like sad, little puppies. There is this peculiar giddiness to being in a hotel full of comic geeks. In our everyday lives most of us are on the down low, in the closet so to speak, about our comics obsessions. Most “civilians” (as Al from Al’s Comics calls non-comics people) tend to respond with an “Oh, that’s nice,” when I tell them I’m a cartoonist, but then glaze over when I go into particulars, or they start telling me about some Hanna-Barbera cartoon they loved when they were five. So it’s exciting to be in a place where everyone you meet will know that Love and Rockets was a comic first, and understand your joke about R. Crumb and his fetish for big ass. I remember having the same kind of excitement going to my first gay parties in college, to suddenly be in a completely safe space where you didn’t have to censor yourself… though of course there was much more of a possibility to get laid at those parties than at the comic cons. I shared a table with Robert Kirby, David Kelly, and Craig Bostick, who were peddling the new Book of Boy Trouble: Gay Boy Comics With a New Attitude (in which I have a 10-page story as well). They were delightful tablemates, and a good time was had by all. I was unsure how my new gay porn comic Hard To Swallow would go over at SPX… It’s not as queer a con as APE in general. But I actually did fairly well, selling about 2/3 of the HTS I sold at the APE and Tom of Finland shows, on top of a number of True Travel Tales. My favorite sales moment was when this very-straight dude came over and, glancing at my stuff, threw his hands up and said “Whoa, pirates! That’s nasty, man… I’ll be right back…” and lumbered off. I thought maybe he was going to bring back some friends of his to play “smear the queer,” but instead he arrived with his girlfriend, a high femme in heels and make-up who giggled and came running over to tell me that she thought pirates were hot too. He bought her a copy, said “Thanks, man,” and she flashed me a smile. I’m proud to say I probably helped that guy get some that night. The only thing cooler than straight women buying gay porn is straight men buying it for their girlfriends… Right on! I told her she had to write me a letter for the letters page of the next issue. This year I was also one of the five judges for the Ignatz Awards, the biggest (only?) awards in indy comics, which get presented at SPX each year. My apartment was flooded with boxes of comics, graphic novels, minis, etc. for months before the con… It was a tremendous (though fun!) amount of work to go through them all and make my choices for the various categories. They were then tallied up with the choices of the other judges to determine the nominations presented at the con, where the creators and attendees vote on who wins. There’s no real procedure to the actual voting… People can easily stuff the ballot if they want to. All they have to do is fill out multiple forms and drop them in the box (though it politely asks you not to do so). The whole thing makes Florida seem like a paragon of justice. In a way, I think the Ignatz nominations (done by creators who have made a commitment to read all the material and consider it carefully) are more indicative of artistic merit than the actual awards. Essentially, the awards turn into a popularity contest within a fairly cliquish scene… and indeed, not one of my first-ranked nominations won any. Ah well… Still, the whole experience was a blast, and it was great to see a really comprehensive cross-section of indy comics for a year.

TOM OF FINLAND SHOW

Justin — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 01:27:51 GMT

I attended the Tom of Finland Erotic Art Fair in West Hollywood on Friday and Saturday, October 6th and 7th. David Davenport, my co-conspirator on my new gay porn comic Hard To Swallow (www.hardtoswallowcomics.com), scored a table at the Fair, so I flew down to help him, sell a bunch of our sleazy comics, and check out the festivities. I had a blast. The Fair itself was fun... I got to see people I already know and dig, like Steve MacIsaac and Brad Rader, as well as meet guys I've always wanted to, like the talented Belasco and Sean Platter. I always enjoy sticking my nose into another subculture... and the gay erotic artists are an especially fascinating and friendly bunch. It's also great to see a new comics movement growing within that world. But the coolest part of the weekend was the chance to see Tom's house in the Echo Park neighborhood of L.A. He spent the last years of his life there, and it's now owned by the Tom of Finland Foundation, which maintains it and the incredible trove of erotic art treasures housed there. I got the tour of the house (though I was forbidden to check out the dungeon, which was a definite disapointment!), and got to see original sketches and lithos of Tom's, as well as originals from a who's who of erotic artists who have donated work to the Foundation over the years. I had never thought of my own work in the context of a history of gay erotica, and doing so was both intimidating and inspiring. It makes me want to improve artistically, for sure, to be worthy of even setting foot in that house. I've always had mixed feelings about Tom's work. On the one hand, it's an amazing display of virtuousity, done in times when such open images of sexuality were acts of tremendous courage. He in many ways single-handedly created the leather aesthetic, and launched modern gay erotic comics and art. On the other hand, his men are all the same, with the same bodies, monstrous cocks, square-jawed faces, and silent, bland personalities. I don't like that kind of homogenized look with its fascistic take on male beauty, and it isn't really hot to me either. It's not exciting to watch your hero run into some sexy, willing biker with a beautiful body when every single man in that world has the same beautiful body, where the only difference between the biker and the lumberjack who'll show up in the next panel is the clothes. Where's the surpise and tension when everything is the same? Now, making all the men look the same is a danger for all erotic artists, myself included. We tend to draw what we're into. But I think it's important as an artist to try and broaden one's erotic archetypes, which ultimately provides drama and excitement for the reader and hopefully the artist as well. The thing that makes cruising in the real world exciting is precisely the diversity of men out there, whereas Tom's drawings leave me a bit... depressed, actually, with their vision of a world of perfect uniformity. I also find myself resenting a bit the sheer weight that Tom's work has on the world of gay eroticism. He's to gay erotic art what Tolkein is to fantasy. It's only with effort that an artist can step out from his shadow. All that being said, no one, and I mean no one, has ever been able to do a drawing with the sheer skill of Tom of Finland. He was an illustrative genius, no doubt.