Jelly Boy The Clown Needs Help!

Jelly Boy The Clown performed at The F Independent Literary Festival that I put together in the Cleveland, Ohio USA area back in 2006. He's kept clowning around in subsequent years, most recently appearing in sideshows at Coney Island and Time's Square in New York City. Sadly, he was burned and apparently suffered smoke inhalation in a housefire on July 2nd. He's in the hospital and expected to recover (a man that can swallow a sword is quite hardy), but he's going to need some help with his medical bills. Friends of his in the sideshow community have set up a donation fund. I wish Jelly a speedy recovery! Thanks to King Wenclas for spreading the word!

Big Toledo Reading Shindig!

The details are still sketchy, but I'll be participating in a big underground lit reading in Toledo, Ohio USA on August 6, 2011. It's sponsored by Red Fez and Zygote In My Coffee and at Collingwood Arts Center. It will start at 4 p.m. and, if it's like any other large reading I've attended, end when the last poet passes out from drinking. I'll pass on the details as they arrive, but so far the lineup looks good with Leopold McGinnis, Pat Simonelli, Lynn Alexander, Karl Koweski, and many more. Maybe we'll even get New Castle, Pennsylvania's second greatest contribution to the culture of the world (after Jack Cole, creator of Plastic Man), Ron Androla, to sail over from Pennsylvania to Ohio on Lake Erie for the event!

Rest In Peace Steve Kostecke

This week the world became a less interesting place.

Steve Kostecke is dead.

I don't know the details but I know it was too soon. Steve couldn't have been older than 45 or so. I met Steve a decade ago at The Underground Literary Alliance's Amato Opera House Show in New York City. It was one of his rare times on his native country's soil. He spent most of his adult life overseas, usually in Asia, seeking a freedom that he thought was extinguished in the USA. His travel adventures were documented in a series of travel zines. Over the years, I have read thousands of zines. Most of them I donated to libraries or gave away to other people. A select few I kept because I wanted to read them again someday.

I kept Steve's zines.

I hold in my hand a copy of Auslanders Raus!, which tells the story of Steve's time living in a tent in the woods in Germany while working at Burger King on an American military base.

Steve didn't write fiction. He didn't have to. His life was a novel.

It was a good read too for those of us who got to experience it secondhand through his zines. In addition to Auslanders Raus!, I also have Destination: Absolutely and Third World Blues, chronicles of his adventures in Asia and the South Pacific.

I was looking forward to reading more of Steve's zines someday.

Steve would probably say in response to that something like "That's what you get for looking forward instead of looking at where you are."

In any case, I'm glad I got to read the ones I did, and that I got to know Steve.

Most of my correspondence with Steve was via email, usually in the context of planning some Underground Literary Alliance (ULA) event or other undertaking. It was always interesting to see which Asian country Steve would be emailing from this time. He taught English and used the language as his ticket to explore Asia.

Steve was the editor of the ULA's group zine The Slush Pile and was hoping to publish a greatest hits collection from it as a book. The project was continually getting shelved due to infighting in the ULA (I lost track of Steve when I quit the group a few years back, though my exit had nothing to do with Steve; in fact, one member even accused Steve and I of being in league against him, something Steve and I had a good laugh over via email since we both liked that member and weren't in league against anybody), publisher difficulties, and even Steve's conscience (he pulled the book from one publisher because he thought the ULA and the publisher were a bad combination). With Steve's death, the long-delayed book is probably dead as well, since if he couldn't shepherd it through to publication, no one else could likely come close (arguments within the ULA could literally become barroom brawls--thank goodness, most were conducted safely via distant email).

I love self publishing but one hazard is that when the zinester or self-publisher dies, without an ongoing publisher to keep the work available, her or his work often passes as well. It would be great is Steve's zines could be more available, but at least some of his work is available on the blog Pat King and I edited for the ULA. You can read "Hi, I'm Jack" and "Decades Of Debauchery And The Human Animal", both by Steve to get a feel for his writing.

I'm sorry there will be no more of it, but at least his last work, a translation of Plato, is available (in fact, it just came out and I wondered if the news of Steve's death was just a hoax to help promote it, but that's just vain hope).

I was also happy to be published alongside Steve in the ULA's Books line, but Steve's zines are a better read than that book, so please don't judge his work based on it.

Steve, I'm sorry I never got to drink another beer with you, and to hear more of your wonderful stories in person. The next beer I drink will be raised in your honor. Cheers!

An Interview With Cartoonist Mark Justice

I've known Mark Justice since 1988 and I have enjoyed discussing cartoons and comics, among other things, with him over the years. In the past few years, Mark has started creating his own comics, at first employing his writing skills to create Grammar Man and Fanboy, and now expanding to drawing with his mini-comic Fun With Diabetes! from Eureka Comics!. I interviewed him recently about his cartooning.

1) What inspired you to make a comic about diabetes (besides the obvious catalyst of discovering you had the condition)? Why a comic though?

To answer, Fun With Diabetes first started as an idea I had for a stand-up routine. I was doing the Advanced Placement College Board reading last year, and the essays I read were about humorists, their roles, and how they were valued. I began thinking about what I would do if I were to make a stand-up routine. I thought, "begin with what you know," and since I became diabetic two years ago, I thought, "this might be fun."

What made the idea truly fun was that it was taboo, as most diseases are, but as SO many comics do politics and sex and gender roles, blah, blah, blah, I simply wanted to talk about having diabetes in a fun, biting way.

How it turned into a comic book started with my trip to SPACE (Small Press And Comics Expo) last year. I was amazed by the sheer amount of mini-comics out there, the creativity, the fun, at all levels of ability, from simple shapes to fully-painted pages. I can't draw to save my life, but I was inspired from SPACE that even I could draw simple shapes and tell a story. I can write. That's my ability. I knew that if I made a comic, the words would have to carry the brunt of the load, so I thought, "maybe it would be fun to do part of my stand-up routine about diabetes," and the idea was born.

I had a few really good punchlines, so I created the panels around a strong visual to go with those punchlines. "Strong" is a relative term, artistically, but when you see a panel of my pancreas in a wheelchair along with the line "I prefer pancreatic cripple," well, the reaction that I was shooting for is generally what I get.

This is my first mini-comic, and I'm happy with it. I'm working on more now, which is fun. I hope that my artwork improves with time, but I think I'll just have to be content to draw simple shapes and let my humor come through my writing. 

2) You've written comics before though, right?

Yes, I've written comics before. I've created a whole comics universe that I would love to see actualized some day. It's an homage to the Golden and Silver Age eras called The Golden Agers. I've got a large cast of characters and would really love to flesh them out into full stories.

I'm probably most proud of a comic I did that was published in 2005, called The Adventures of Grammar Man and Fanboy. It's really a grammar-teaching tool in the form of a comic book. I wrote the scripts, and an artists named Linda Ayala did the art. It covers four big issues with grammar with a lot of humor. It was inspired by the Adam West Batman series. When I wrote the dialogue for Grammar Man, I kept hearing it as if Adam West were saying it, which made it easy to capture that era and style. Fanboy was a smart-alecky me but sounded a lot more like Joe Pesci, haha!

Grammar Man has been very successful in helping kids learn grammar. Kids take a set of quizzes before reading Grammar Man and take the same set after reading. In an assessment of over 1000 quiz sets, scores went up 22% after reading Grammar Man. That's over 2 letter grades' worth of improvement, which is fantastic. I'd get notes from the kids, saying things like "I wish all my books were like this!" and "Grammar Man makes learning fun!" That makes me feel very proud.

3) Did comics interest you in reading when you were a kid?

Oh, yeah, I've loved comics for as long as I can remember. I've had them literally all my life. On the day I was born, my dad bought me issues of The Phantom, Mandrake the Magician, and Flash Gordon. I still have those very issues!

I've always been a reader, and I cannot separate my childhood from comics. I used to go every week and buy whatever I could with my allowance. I can't know for sure how many comics I've read, but it's got to be in the thousands, for sure.

Comics are wonderful in that they transport me to being a kid all over again. I can't help but feel like I'm 8 or 10 or 12 when I'm reading stuff from the 70s and early 80s. They're inextricably a part of my childhood and my life. I fantasize about not having to do anything but read comics all day. If I could read 15 comics a day, that be about 450 a month, almost 6000 a year. I can SO see myself doing just that for the rest of my life, hahaha!

4) Today's comics seem to be less accessible to kids.  Most of them are sold in comic book stores and to enter one of those one usually has to be into reading comics already.  Indeed, the average comic shop patron seems to be a middle-aged man.  One of the fears of the comic book industry is that their customers are getting older and older and they don't look likely to be replaced.  Perhaps online comics or graphic novels might change that, but I know that you're involved in an organization that connects kids with comics.  Can you tell us a little about the organization?

Before I answer your question, I'd like to chime in on your first point. I agree that comics are slowly getting to the point of "elite" culture in that you have only a few special places to get access to them. When I was a kid, every drug and convenience store had a spinning rack or two of comics. I'd go to two or three stores every week to buy my allowance's worth of comics. The way comics are distributed now, with only one or two major distributors--is it one, Diamond?-- well, that stranglehold is destroying readership. If comics are to see a resurgence in young readership, kids have to have easy access. Bring the comics back to the local stores. I bet sales would go up 15% in the first year.
 
Now, on to the ECBI. The Elyria Comic Book Initiative is a non-profit organization whose mission is threefold: get comics into kids' hands, promote literacy and creativity by teaching kids how to make their own comics, and create opportunities for writers and artists to be able to take their talent further--sort of a "comic book academy."

We do programs for after-school, during-school, library, and other settings. The ECBI will be two years old this Free Comic Book Day. We've done dozens of programs in grade, middle, and high schools; in libraries; and in alternative educational centers. Hundreds of kids have gone through our program.

Our program is designed to teach both story telling and art. We cover the whole story arc, beginning-middle-end, setting, character, plot, rising action, climax, conclusion, etc. We help them understand why they need to have all of these elements to tell a good story, and we also help them as they create their characters, as well, so we give them the tools to develop their characters' background, motivation, their powers and abilities, their weaknesses, and personality traits that make the characters seem like real people.

The art lessons help them understand that all comics are drawn from simple shapes and that no matter what level of their drawing ability, they can create a great comic. It's all very hands on.

Our first pilot programs were at a local middle school. We did three programs there. We had 20 kids start the first program. About 12 of those kids stayed for the second and third programs, all wanting to do more on their books, tell more stories, all of them becoming better artists and storytellers. It was wonderful to see how they grew not only in ability but in confidence.
 
One of the coolest things about all of this is that kids get excited about comics. We always bring a few long boxes of comics into whatever program we're doing so that the kids can look at and read them while they work on their comics. Most of the kids we've worked with have never read comic books, so a whole new world is opened to them. What is the greatest joy is in letting the kids take a few comics for themselves, to keep. They are so excited, and we are thrilled to share our love of comics with them. I'd like to think that we are helping create the next generation of comic readers, writers, and artists. Hello, Marvel, DC, Image? We'd love to work with you.

We are really excited with a few projects we have going on now. I'm not sure how much I can tell you, so all I'll say is that we're working with some local comic book industry professionals and will be creating a project together. It's all very cool, and I'm really thrilled to see where this goes over the next few years.

I have to conclude with letting everyone know that as the ECBI is a non-profit organization, any donations they make are tax-deductible. We gladly take comic books, art supplies, financial donations, and donations of time. If you'd like more information, please contact me at mark AT elyriacomicbookinitiative.org.

5) Any last words of wisdom?

I don't know about words of wisdom, but I did want to thank you for the opportunity to talk about Eureka!, the ECBI, and about comics, in general. I LOVE comic books. What I'd really like to see is for comics to come down in price, for them to be distributed in more places, for more and more kids to get into comics and fall in love with the medium. The love of comics can last a lifetime. Life wouldn't be as sweet without comics.

An Interview With Artist Michael Dee

I've known Mike Dee for a long time and he's been making art for as long as I've known him. I interviewed him about the sculpture I showed a picture of last week, as well as what else he's been up to lately.

1) What inspired your latest sculpture?
Following the Melted Hearts And Deadly Force show in September 2009, I became interested in increasing the scale of the Heartsmelt series and employing elements of architecture. Last summer, Plastics Make It Possible contacted me about doing a plastic Eiffel Tower or arc for the Philadelphia International Flower Show, which was really cool, because I had just started a new series of drawings of St. John's Wort flowers to go along with the ongoing Jacketed Hollow Point series. I am always excited to do more accessible public projects that will be viewed outside of the standard gallery setting such as gardens, store windows, building facades, and rooftops.

2) Where will the sculpture end up after the show?
The multi colored Lexan tubes and the PVC pipe connectors will be recycled locally in Philadelphia, while the neon will be shipped back to Los Angeles for future projects.

3) Do you like the finite nature of such sculptures? Is that part of their beauty that they don't last long? Do you approach such sculptures differently than more longer-lasting works?
I like the finite nature of these types of projects, because it becomes more about the experience, like seeing a band live, or going to watch an eclipse or meteor shower. You were there and you were engaged with the lights, sounds, and movements for a limited amount of time. People remember where they were and their enthusiasm. Longer lasting works of mine are generally produced at more of a human or home-related scale and don't involve complex interactive or hardware components. I've recently found that I like the immediacy of photography and drawing for producing archival works which reference the concepts and materials used in the installations and large sculptures

4) What are you working on now?
Right now I am working on a suite of drawings, a suite of photographs, and two interactive sculptures, as well as doing freelance photography of bands and playing fuzz bass in a new "punk rock" project. The newer art and music has taken on more of darker tone and recalls the earlier work that was produced in New York and Ohio. Between my job as a vis com professor and being a new homeowner I have been very busy since November.

5) That's a wrap! Any last words of wisdom?
I guess in the words of Augustus St. Gaudens and Jeff Koons: "To the beauty in simple things." But then again there is always Oscar Wilde and The Jesus And Mary Chain, "We may have been in the gutter, but we were looking up at the stars."

Watch Mike make a sculpture on this video!

Mike Dee's New Sculpture

My pal Mike Dee has graciously allowed me to post a pic of one of his new sculptures. It's pretty cool!

Story Opening Contest

King Wenclas is running a contest on his American Pop Lit blog. The contest is to determine who has the best opening lines of a short story. The rules aren't entirely clear but I'm pretty sure that the story has to be your own (for example, you can't turn in the opening of a Hemingway story) and something previously unpublished. I entered and so far I'm the only entrant which probably means I should shut up about the contest but it'd be more fun if others entered. It's free! C'mon, sharpen up those pencils!