“Kazu Kibuishi is the comics creator who makes Copper (and other comics). In this three-page tutorial, Kibushi gives us a detailed look at the process of creating a comic from pencilling to inking to coloring, with great photos and descriptive material.”

“Brian Walker has been organizing museum and gallery exhibitions devoted to comics for the last 30 years and he recently wrote an acclaimed two-volume history of newspaper strips, The Comics Since 1945 (Abrams, 2002) and The Comics Before 1945 (Abrams, 2004). He was the co-director of The Museum of Cartoon Art from 1974-1992, and will be again working with the museum in its forthcoming reincarnation as The National Cartoon Museum to be housed in the Empire State Building. Son of Beetle Bailey creator Mort Walker, he often remarks that he was born with ink in his veins.”

“Originally delivered at the Festival of Cartoon Art, Ohio State University, October 27, 1989. The text of Watterson’s speech is presented here in the spirit of intellectual discourse.”

“A reference site for collectors and fans of Mad Magazine… I am sharing my images so collectors will have an easier time identifying which issues they need to complete their collections. A side benefit for collectors who already have the issues is that viewing covers in this manner helps to preserve their precious originals.”

“One ‘Gasoline Alley’ Sunday page from 1930 offers a typically bittersweet moment. As father and son take a walk in the fall, Skeezix asks Uncle Walt why the leaves change color. (King was the first cartoonist to forgo the convention of comic strip time and let his characters age.) The answers that Walt provides are less important than the tone and texture of the scene, a leisurely communion between parent and child marked by an undercurrent of sadness, the feeling that even when the idealized world of comics brings fathers and sons together, they will not be together forever.”

Shows Batman logos from the 40s to the 70s, gathered by “This is Pop!”

“Indie Comic artist Johnny Ryan, known for his ‘Angry Youth’ Comics and general poor-taste, has been skewering the elder statesmen of indie comics in his ‘Shouldn’t You be Working?’ strip. These strips are mostly not safe for work, and are archived on his website, though some URL-archaeology was necessary to get to some of the older ones. You should probably have an unhealthy knowledge of the indie comics ’scene,’ and a high tolerance for extreme vulgarity to appreciate most of them.”

“Chosen by The Webcomics Examiner Advisory Board.”

“The McSweeneyís phenomenon is a force to be reckoned with in American graphic design. It began as ñ and still is ñ an online journal with an admirably understated visual presentation: while website designers worked themselves into grand mal seizures of hyperactivity in the late twentieth century, McSweeneys.net never abandoned its plain vanilla format. But it was when founder Dave Eggers moved into the world of conventional publishing with McSweeneyís Quarterly Concern that the design world took notice. Simultaneously intricate and restrained, the dense-packed all-Garamond pages of the Quarterly refracted Victorian foppishness through a prism of ironic cool, and provoked Andrew Blauvelt to take to the pages of Eye to proclaim the arrival of a new movement: Complex Simplicity.”

“We are building a simple database that will be easy to use and understand, easy to add to, and easy for people to contribute to. We will include information on creator credits, story details, and other information useful to the comic book reader and fan.”

“The cartoon with its sheer endless humoristic allegories is among the oldest of trades, and a creative one at that. We want to breathe new life into all those used and out-laughed witnesses of human tragedy ó but how? We have asked our friend algorithmic random generator to give us a hand. We split the image from the text and shove the gag into a new interpretation (with an element of sadism, one might add).”

“A History of Picture Stories: Over 350 scrolldown pages of comics, or comics-related illustration, dating from 300 A.D. to 1929.” (Thanks Beautiful Stuff)

“Howtoons are one-page cartoons showing 5-to-15 year-old kids ‘How To’ build things. Each illustrated episode is a stand-alone fun adventure accessible to all, including the pre-literate. Our Howtoons are designed to encourage children to be active participants in discovering the world through Play-that-Matters ó fun, creative, and inventive ó and to rely a lot less on mass-consumable entertainment.”

This is supposed to be an interesting show! Features work by Ted May, Andrew Robbins, Kevin Huizenga, Dan Zettwoch, Matt Kindt, Jeff Wilson and others. Artists’ reception: 6-8 p.m. March 19, 2004 at Forest Park Community College, 5600 Oakland Ave., St. Louis, Missouri. On display through March 26, 2004, at the Gallery of Art in the Library Building. Hours: 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday; noon-8 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday. Admission: Free. Information: 314/644-9350, 314/644-9231. Here’s a PDF map of the campus: fpmap.pdf.

“Exercises in Style was inspired by a work of the same name by the French writer Raymond Queneau. In that book, Queneau spun 99 variations out of a mundane, two-part text about two chance encounters with a mildly irritating character during the course of a day. He started by telling it in every conceivable tense, then by doing it in free verse and as a sonnet, as a telegram, in pig latin, as a series of exclamations, in an indifferent voice… you name it. The goal of this project is to apply the same principle to comics by creating as many variations as possible on a simple one-page non-story: different points of view, different genres, different formal games, and so on.”