San Francisco Zine Fest From François Vigneault, SFZF 2007 organizing committee:

"The San Francisco Zine Fest is returning October 5th and 6th. The Bay Area’s most beloved conference for zines, comics, and crafts, the Zine Fest is celebrating its sixth anniversary with a move to a beautiful new location, the Women’s Building. As always, the Zine Fest is free and open to the public! Over 50 small-press and DIY creators will be selling, trading, and otherwise sharing their work with over a thousand attendees. The exhibitors, from elder statesmen of the DIY movement such as RE/Search Publications to first time self-publishers, showcase the diversity, vitality, and ongoing exuberance of the small press movement. While the majority of the exhibitors hail from the Bay Area, creators from across the West Coast and country will be present.

Special guests this year are John Marr, writer of the seminal zine Murder Can Be Fun, a cavalcade of bizarre and often very funny tales of untimely death; and Joe Sayers, the cartoonist behind the weekly strip Thingpart and the recently released Teen Power!, a collection of hilarious comics all drawn in five minutes or less. Q&A sessions will be held with both special guests on Saturday. Several panel discussions and hands-on workshops will be held throughout the day on Saturday, including a class on the basics of silk screening taught by John Isaacson, whose book Do It Yourself Screenprinting was recently released by Microcosm Publishing. Other events include ongoing raffle drawings throughout the Fest and a special awards ceremony.

The San Francisco Zine Fest was begun in 2001 by Jenn Starfiend, and is currently run by a hard-working group of volunteers, including members of Family Style, Just Visiting and 327 Market, along with many others.

The San Francisco Zine Fest will be held from 2:00pm-8:00pm on Friday, October 5th, and from 11:00am-7:00pm on Saturday, October 6th. Admission is free on both days.

The Women’s Building is located at 3543 18th St. #8 San Francisco, CA 94110 (between Valencia and Guerrero in the Mission).

For more information, including a full list of exhibitors and workshop schedule, visit the website."

Trains are Mint #3 by Oliver East

Hey look, it's another issue of Trains Are Mint! If you don't already read Oliver East's wonderful mini-comic, then take a glance at these pages.
I prattled on about Trains Are Mint Issue 1 in this post. From last Neovembert:

Trains Are Mint is a great example of what mini-comics do so well. East takes something important or interesting to him, and puts it on the page for a small audience to discover. What I like about East’s effort is the extra touches. The watercolor art is gorgeous. He uses a neutral, stiff card stock for the cover with plenty of information for the reader inside the back cover.

This goes triple for issue three. Oliver is a little more adventurous in his panel layouts this time around. There's a very funny bit where he encounters a lady jogging; he throws you off a bit until your eyes hit the last panel at the bottom of the page.

Oliver's website is here. Click on any of the three issues (the man is leaning on them) for page samples and ordering information.

This is Still America: Part Two by George
Last September, we took a look at This is Still America. I recall being very surprised by the line art. George has a very distinctive way of drawing his lines, especially in the background. Forms are not fully drawn; they're more like suggestions of a drawing.

That's been toned down a bit in the second issue, subtitled "Where the fuck is everybody?"
This issue is much more grounded in reality than the previous one. George concentrates on the dreary past with his overbearing and physically abusive father. There's less of the soaring dream sequences and more pain. The father is mentally and physically abusive to the son, showing you how easy it is for the child to seek an alternate reality.
Things do get very weird in the end when the father makes a bonfire with his son's toys. Any reality melts under the pressure of so much anger.

Like the first issue, this one is only $2. It's 32 pages of black and white art with a very cool blue edge to each page. The first issue featured red bleeding edges on all the pages. These little details really make George's minis stand out. You can get your copy at Bodega Distribution.

Only Skin by Sean Ford

Only Skin: New Tales of the Slow Apocalypse is a pretty large mini-comic. It's oversized comic size, kind of like a Golden Age comic. It's designed well, from the Chester Brown inspired cover to the title page echoing Anders Nilsen's Big Questions. I also like the recycled off-white paper that reminds you a bit of newsprint.

Inside, Sean crafts a 36-page mystery involving grisly disappearances at a remote gas station.

Single mother Cassie and her son Clay tend to the gas station. Meanwhile, folks in the town are starting to organize and discuss the disappearances. Sean has a wonderful night scene where Clay is woken by a ghost. The ghost is of the "charming Peanuts ghost at Halloween" variety and makes a nice contrast of white against the black of the woods.

Only Skin is a great start to a well made comic series. It ends with a heck of a cliffhanger, so I can't wait to see issue #2. You can check out Sean's blog for more samples of the art. He's even got some cool color pages on display. You can get a copy of Only Skin at Quimbys or I Know Joe Kimpel for only $4. I think you'll probably be seeing a lot more of Sean Ford.

Okay, I love this - Self Comics
Got an email from Luca Genovese, who wanted to point out his mini-comics website Self Comics.

We are translating, slowly but surely, all our catalouge but now there are just some. We produce 8 page stories that can be read, downloaded and printed for free. The PDF files of each story are ready to be printed out, folded and stapled, so you can physically have our minicomics, if you want to.

This a fantastic idea and they have several gorgeous minis that you can read online or print and savor. They are also in the process of translating more stories. So, bookmark them and check back often.

Here's a few pages to give you an idea.
Gloria by Luca Vanzella and Luca Genovese. Translated by Elisabetta Favalessa.

Persistance And Elegance by Paolo Parisi and translated by Alberto Corradi.

Tonight I’m Gonna Dream You Have Always Loved Me by Luca Vanzella and Lucia Biagi. Translated by Alexandra Uzunova.

Pursuit by Corey Bechelli
Pursuit is a silent 12-page black and white mini-comic. Corey manages to create a menacing mood without text. Instead of words, he uses heavy doses of black ink, sometimes inverting the black and white colors.

The art is photo realistic and very slick. His perspective shots are dizzying as you trace the lone bird soaring through the tall city buildings. Each face, whether human or animal, shoots an acusatory look at the reader. It feels somewhat claustrophobic until the last two pages. These pages eschew the direct gazes from the previous pages, reaching towards the open sky instead.

There's no price on this one, but you can visit Corey's website for information and lots of other comics. Look around while you're there. He's got some fantastic illustrations, inlcuding Muddy Waters, Angela Davis, and Marlon Brando. The Angela Davis one looks ready for a t-shirt.

Pitbull by Paolo Parisi
Paolo Parisi has created a fabulous mini-comic that seems ready to be snapped up by any of several small publishers. His book is fleshed out nicely, telling a complete story of interest to almost anyone. The art has a nice balance of detail and ambiguity, creating a pleasing page at an instant. The prose is as choppy and brutal as the subject matter - a tough street kid makes good pulverizing people in the ring. The Pitbull piles up wins, but the wear and tear on his body catches up. He uses drugs to numb the pain. His relationships outside the ring crumble and he's left facing an improbable comeback against a younger, quicker, and bigger fighter. Sounds a bit like the corny Rocky franchise, but Paolo doesn't take the easy way out with the Pitbull.

This is a high quality mini-comic from cover to cover. The thick, glossy cover is folded over a normal false cover and the interior art has a pleasing mix of black and white art with gray washed tones to lend depth to the backgrounds.

Pitbull is 56 pages and I think you can get your hands on it for 4 euros. Paolo's email is paolo.parisi1980@libero.it or paoloparisi80@gmail.com. Here's a review in Italian from one of my favorite websites, Canicola.

Smith Loves Wesson by Ratigher

Smith Loves Wesson is a wordless 24-page mini-comic printed on yellow paper. Ratigher’s art is tight and unadorned. Smith gets up, showers, and combs his hair a few times to get it just right and then… some other stuff happens.

I love this page with the t-shirts on the bed. Which one to choose?

Ratigher is in Italy, but I’m sure he would be happy to send some comics to wherever you may be. Smith Loves Wesson is only one euro, so that’s like a buck thirty the last time I looked.

Check out the DonnaBavosa website for this mini and several others.

Ratigher also sent a longer mini by Paolo Parisi. I'll look at that for tomorrow. Think Rocky Balboa but much seedier.

Two More by Chris Cornwell

First, Black Wings. This silent mini is done with what looks like a Sharpie. It even smelled kind of inky when I opened up the envelope.

Black Wings works best when Chris does a bit of background to clash with the character. The figure on the ground with the rock looks fantastic. The figure in the air is less convincing without the background.
The thing I like about this is it's mostly done with very short fat lines. Chris uses the occasional longer curved line to delineate the shape of the figure, but it's the short strokes that make up the bulk of the art.

It's unexpected and effective. Not sure how much Black Wings will cost you, but if you contact Chris at thefunkmunk@yahoo.com, he could probably help you out.

Quester

Quester is another silent mini that spans 40 sometimes awe-inspiring pages. There's much more of a visual kick to this one.


It's more like I Wanna Destroy You, but the art is more organic. Where Destroy had cut out art pasted together, Quester has thick inky lines making up the figures. The title of this mini is certainly apt; the main character goes on a mind boggling quest that transcends mind and body.

You can get a copy of Quester for $2.00 from Bill at the always fantastic Copacetic Comics website.

I Wanna Destroy You by Chris Cornwell On the first page of I Wanna Destroy You a Mat Brinkman like Oaf meanders through a Charles Burns tapestry. It's a peaceful introduction to a very conflicted story. Inside, a battle rages within the artist's head. Your typical whitebread superhero and your slacker monster engage in a sad battle. Although it's more apt to say that the superhero kind of freaks out and wants to hurt something to justify his existence. This is kind of a sad story, but it's always clear that the battle unfolds only in the artist's head.

Here are two fun pages that I couldn't stand to break up.

When you take a close look at Chris' art, you'll notice that there is more going on than you think. For starters, the characters are cut and pasted onto the simple background. This lends a weird depth to the art that takes a bit of time to sink in. As you take a closer look, you can't help but appreciate the time spent cutting and pasting figures onto the page.

Chris Cornwell is a talented and engaging artist. Flipping through his minis, I'm reminded of just why mini-comics are so fantastic. I Wanna Destroy You is 28 pages for the ridiculously low price of $2.50. You can get a copy at the fantastic Copacetic Comics. Copacetic is fast becoming one of my favorite comic stores and I've never even visited them. From the looks of things, this Pittsburgh shop is a hotbed of comics activity. The above link features Pittsburgh artists and writers. Please do youself a favor. Check them out. Now.

I'll feature two more of Chris Cornwell's comics this week, Quester and Black Wings.