Last Day to Vote!

Today is the last day to vote for who will be the next Lutefisk Sushi Featured Artist. And you don't have to be a member of the Cartoonist Conspiracy to vote, just make sure you're a Minnesotan, or have strong MN ties (the Doc Pop scenario).

Voting is HERE.

Learn more about the Lutefisk Sushi HERE.

Voting for Lutefisk Sushi Vol. D is OPEN

Lutefisk Sushi is an art show celebrating Minnesota cartoonists (hence the "lutefisk") who create minicomics. For the show, their minicomics are collected in silk-screened bento boxes (hence the "sushi").

Altered Esthetics gallery in NE Minneapolis will be organizing the fourth Sushi show in August 2010. Each Sushi show has a featured artist who designs the bento box and showcases their artwork during the show. I was thrilled to be chosen as the featured artist for the previous show, but now it's time to pass the tiara to the next artist.

Please VOTE HERE (you will need to register to be able to vote):

And you can read more about the voting process HERE.

THE NOMINEES:

   Jesse GILLESPIE

   Danno KLONOWSKI

   Bob LIPSKI

   Britt SABO

   Tim SIEVERT

   Mike TOFT


Thanks to Steven Stwalley for organizing the poll and collecting the nominations.

Examples of Arctic Wildlife

Just finally getting around to digging through luggage from the trip to San Diego Comic-Con, and stumbled upon this. I usually have a lot of sketches from all the hours I spend sitting behind the booth trying to kill time, but this year was pretty much nonstop handshaking and left little room for sketching.


Click to enlarge

Comicopolis Art Show Opening This Friday

FrameUps in South Minneapolis has put together a fantastic comics gallery show with several local cartoonists including yours truly. Please come by this Friday for the opening reception! The details:

Comicopolis:
Low life, high art

Opening reception:
Friday, August 28th from 6-9pm

Location:
FrameUps Minneapolis
4325 Nicollet Ave
Minneapolis, MN 55409
(612) 870-1292

Artists:
Kirk Anderson
Ken Avidor
Shannon Brady
Kevin Cannon
Will Dinski
Roger Lootine
Brittney Sabo
Andy Singer
David Steinlicht
Steven Stwalley

City Pages Third Annual Comix Issue

Copies of the Comix Issue are on stands now -- and are free -- so grab a handful. This year's contributors include Conspiracy regulars, Big Funny veterans, and newcomers like New Yorker illustrator Mitch Loidolt! And of course the Cajones Award goes to Danno for speaking truth to power in the best way possible: through the magical medium of comics.

Thanks to Nick Vlcek at City Pages for putting this all together for the third year in a row, and thanks to editor Kevin Hoffman for his and CP's continued support of the local comics scene.

You can read all the cartoons on City Pages' website.

Help Determine the Next Comics Show at Altered Esthetics!

On the heels of a successful Big Funny show, Altered Esthetics has generously offered us a spot in the gallery next August. That may seem far away, but we need to figure out what the show's theme will be, and who will curate it.

Please voice your opinion in the comments section of this blog post on the Cartoonist Conspiracy Site.

NOTHING about the show has yet been decided (except for when and where the show will be: August 2010 at AE), so now's your chance to voice your opinion of what the show should be about.

The grizzled team of curators from the past few years are also hoping that new people will step in to take leadership roles. Those roles may include website & postcard design, guerilla marketing, keeping track of submitted artwork, hanging the show, etc. Interested parties should be prepared to donate a lot of unpaid hours to meetings and emails -- it takes a lot of time to put these shows together!

Samuel Beckett's Favorite Teen Movie*

Zander and I have had the pleasure of working with Walden Media recently to produce educational books that coincide with Walden's films. Walden is the company behind movies like the Narnia series, Holes, and Aliens of the Deep, and they have a deep commitment to educating students about the science and history behind their films.

For example, when Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D came out recently, Walden hired us to design and illustrate a 20-page booklet that explained everything from earth science to Jules Verne to how 3D optics work. The film clearly has little to do with reality, so these booklets -- printed and mailed out to schools across the US -- serve as a nice educational supplement.

Anyway, we recently wrapped up a book for Bandslam, Walden's new teen rock & roll coming of age comedy. Our book explores the history of American music as well as the history of recorded sound and spotlights of various musicians. So if you're looking for something to do this weekend, why not go see Bandslam in theatres? I doubt that anyone reading our blog (with the exception of Shad) is into teen dramedies, but I've read the script for this one and it's actually really funny, and the soundtrack is supposed to be pretty great. I haven't see the final cut yet, but Rotten Tomatoes has it hovering around 80%, which bodes well.

You can read pdf versions of our booklets online:

Journey to the Center of the Earth


Bandslam


* ... And I'll give a prize to anyone who can make sense of the title of the blog post.

T-Minus reviewed by Todd Klein!

Todd Klein, comics superstar and letterer of (among many, many other things) Top Ten, has reviewed T-Minus: the Race to the Moon on his blog! Thanks Todd! A quotation:

Ottaviani and the Cannons make excellent use of the comics format to tell this complex story in interesting ways. (...) Parts of the story are told simultaneously through the clever use of large panels and small panels on the same pages, each telling a different narrative.

You can check it out, as well as his other reviews, tips, observations, and dissections of the finer points of comics lettering at kleinletters.com.

KFAI T-Minus Radio Spot

In case you missed it, here's the link to download the KFAI radio spot on T-Minus that local journalist and comics historian Britt Aamodt produced.


Britt also produced a KFAI spot on Far Arden, which you can read about here.

We Are Five

Hard to believe that Big Time Attic officially turns five years old today. But even MORE amazing is that the sh**ty graphic you see above turns FOUR today! So happy fourth birthday to the craptastic culled-from-google image of a kid in a party hat that we drag out every year on this special day. It's your time to shine.

Big Funny Opening Reception TONIGHT

The Editors & Curators of Big Funny. From Left: Jamie Schumacher, Steven Stwalley, Hillary Berg, Bjorn Rolvaag, Danno Klonowski, Zander Cannon, and Kevin Cannon

Opening Reception for Big Funny
Friday, August 7, 2009
7:00pm-11:00pm
ALTERED ESTHETICS
1224 Quincy St NE, Minneapolis, MN 55413
CartoonistConspiracy.com/BigFunny


SHOW RUNS AUGUST 7-29, 2009

GALLERY HOURS:
TUESDAY & THURSDAY 1pm-7pm, SATURDAY 1pm-5pm

1 DAY UNTIL BIG FUNNY

The Roe Family Singers, who will entertain the crowd at tomorrow night's opening reception:



And, from some Finnish printing press to your eyes:

2 DAYS UNTIL BIG FUNNY

Some links for today, in preparation for this Friday's opening reception:

Danno presents more photos from the hanging party:


Click on Steve for the link

Jamie presents a [hopefully] false news story, inspired (I imagine) by the very real flood that nearly destroyed all 2,000 copies of Big Funny a few days ago:

Click on Guy for the link


BIG FUNNY in the media (updated!):

• City Pages
  
• Optical Sloth
  
• Little Hokum Rag
  
• Twin Cities Daily Planet
  
• The Onion AV Club
  
• Poopsheet Foundation
  
• Newsarama
  

3 DAYS UNTIL BIG FUNNY

Enjoy some snapshots from last night's hanging party:


Steve carefully protects his century-old comics collection in plastic. A bicycle keeps watch.


In addition to original artwork from the Big Funny newspaper, visitors to Altered Esthetics will be able to see prints and drawings from Jenny Schmid and Ursula Murray Husted.


Bjorn and Steve hang vintage newspaper strips -- some were printed as early as 1902. Sneeze all you want -- they're protected by plastic!


Jamie and Danno take a break from hanging to work on the Big Funny brochure.


Visitors to this Friday's opening reception will be able to see an actual printing plate used in the production of the newspaper, as well as videos showing how newspapers are printed.

4 DAYS UNTIL BIG FUNNY

Hard to believe that it was well over a year ago when a few of the Lutefisk Sushi C curators sat down to ask the all-important question: "What's next?"

Well, what's next is BIG FUNNY -- the hybrid gallery show and 48 page comics section. The printed newspapers have been sitting quietly in a secret location on Quincy Street, with only a handful having been released to the media. The paper will be released to the public (for a measly $5) at the opening reception this FRIDAY, AUGUST 7.

So come down to the opening this Friday and join over forty artists and their friends and family, as well as the Roe Family Singers. In addition to the long-awaited newspaper, you'll be able to check out original artwork from the paper, century-old newspaper strips (thanks to Steve Stwalley!), and never-before-seen original work from cartoonist William Ede.

Plus, the first 70 people to buy a copy of Big Funny at the opening get THIS.

BIG FUNNY in the media:

• The Onion AV Club
  
• Poopsheet Foundation
  
• Newsarama