If you’re in Los Angeles and love comics, there’s only one place to be this Saturday, December 6, and that’s Comic Arts LA (CALA) at Think Tank Gallery, 939 Maple Avenue, from 10am to 6pm. Free to the public! This is one of those big moments as a significant comic arts festival launches in LA. Comics Grinder has the travel bug and will be there! Will you be there?
Details follow:
Comic Arts LA (CALA) is a free, public event promoting the appreciation of comics, graphic novels, and sequential arts among the broader Los Angeles public. CALA aims to engage the public and foster interactions among creators and readers alike by providing the community a space to connect creatively and discover new work. The inaugural festival will take place December 6th 2014 at Think Tank Gallery in lively Downtown Los Angeles.
CALA is organized by Jen Wang, Angie Wang, Iris Jong, and Jake Mumm.
FEATURING SPECIAL GUESTS:
SAM ALDEN
Sam Alden is a cartoonist and illustrator from Portland, Oregon. His work has appeared in Best American Comics 2013, from Houghton-Mifflin and is the author of several books published this year including “It Never Happened Again” from Uncivilized Books, Frontier #5 from Youth in Decline, and “Haunter” published by Study Group Comics. He is the 2013 Ignatz Award Winner for most Promising New Talent.
MIMI POND
Mimi Pond is a cartoonist, illustrator, humorist and writer. Her first long form graphic memoir “Over Easy” detailing her post-art school waitressing career in the late 1970s in Oakland Ca, has just been published by Drawn and Quarterly. She has created comics for the Los Angeles Times, Seventeen Magazine, National Lampoon, and many other publications too numerous to mention, and has written and illustrated five humor books. She has also written for television: her credits include the first full length episode of the Simpsons, “Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire” in 1989, and episodes for the television shows “Designing Women” and “Pee Wee’s Playhouse”.
PROGRAMMING SCHEDULE
Comics in Animation
11:30 a.m. – 12:15 p.m.
As methods of visual storytelling, comics and animation are natural bedfellows. Among the legions of cartoonists-turned-animators in Los Angeles are Lisa Hanawalt (Bojack Horseman), Natasha Allegri (Bee And Puppycat), and Ryan Pequin (Regular Show), who will be talking to Phil Rynda (Adventure Time) about their experiences coexisting in the comics and animation worlds, how they create work unique to each form, and how comics and animation have cross-pollinated techniques.
Spotlight on Sam Alden
12:30 p.m. – 1:15 p.m.
Hotshot cartoonist Sam Alden draws with a starkness that belies the nuanced humanity of his comics. His works include It Never Happened Again, Household, and Hawaii 1997. Listen in as he and Ryan Sands (Youth in Decline) discuss his past and future work, his aims as an artist, and how he got so damn good.
Spotlight on Mimi Pond
2 p.m. – 2:45 p.m.
Mimi Pond is a triple threat, having long been a fixture in the comics, illustration, and comedy writing communities. Her long list of accomplishments includes: publishing Over Easy, a long form graphic memoir, creating comics for the Los Angeles Times and National Lampoon, and writing for The Simpsons. In this spotlight, Vanessa Davis (Make Me A Woman) will engage Mimi in a lively conversation on Over Easy, as well as her long and esteemed crossover career.
Form & Structure
3 p.m. – 3:45 p.m.
From uniform grids to intricate architectural blueprints, there are limitless ways to carve up a page. As the possibilities of form and structure expand ever outward, how do you decide when to select from conventional layouts and when to liberate your panels? How do you harness the panel and other formal elements to reckon with time, space, and life itself? Join Malachi Ward (Vile Decay), Roman Muradov ((In a Sense) Lost & Found), and Sophia Foster-Dimino (Sex Fantasy) in conversation with Angie Wang (Girl Apocalypse), as they unlock these comics enigmas and more.
The Lifelong Artist
4 p.m. – 4:45 p.m.
Trying to make it as an independent comics creator is hard enough — once you’re established, how do you turn your success into a lifelong career? Hope Larson (Mercury, Chiggers), Lark Pien (Long Tail Kitty), and Ron Rege Jr. (The Cartoon Utopia), in conversation with with Jen Wang (In Real Life), will reveal how they’ve stayed relevant through the years, what to do when you grow out of the style you became known for, and branching out beyond your original creative field.
Visit our friends at CALA right here.
