Minneapolis will soon have its first independent comics festival! It’s called the Minneapolis Indie Xpo and it’s happening on Saturday, August 21, from 9am-5pm at the Soap Factory. We’re offering free admission, prizes, radical donuts and access to independent exhibitors and publishers from across the nation. Hope you can join the fun! For more information please visit our website: http://mplsindiexpo.com

And don’t forget about the awesome SCOTT PILGRIM screening!

And don’t forget about the awesome pre-party!

And don’t forget about the awesome after party!

You’ll never forget how great the inaugural MIX was if you attend any and all of these events!!!

It was a pretty fun challenge. Lance laid down the rules to me for drawing a TTDM strip… work small on some paper he provided with panels already drawn (both strips are 5.5″ x 8.5″), and use no pencils… just straight up ink. Also, the writing had to be spontaneous, with no writing or planning in advance… which is how I usually work. I cheated and used a couple dots of white-out where I had committed accidental illegibilities, but otherwise I stuck to the plan.

I decided to do the intro in this format as well. Here is the intro:

Thanks to The Library of Congress, you can now read Frederic Wertham’s actual funnybooks, complete with his notes on inserted sheets of onionskin! Article here. I wonder if Fred doodled in the margins?

If you don’t live near the LOC, you may want to check this out instead: Go here to view The Dr. Fredric Wertham Memorial Funnybook Collection: The Comics Featured in Seduction of the Innocent. No onionskin notes, unfortunately.

• Soapy the Chicken
• Bottomless
• Skull Lover
• Nicknames
• 24 Hours
• The Amazing Nipple Box
• The Mighty Media
• Cutesy Wootsy
• Donut Demon
• Take Me Away From the River
• Screwy Songs and Dumb Dirges
• FCC Funnies
• Anti-Communist Comics
• The Comics Trip
• 23 Skidoo
• The Electric Plastic Inflatable
• The Family Carcass
• More comics

The Lutefisk Sushi Volume D bento boxes include work by over 50 Minnesota cartoonists, have a hand-silkscreened 3D cover by featured artist Danno Klonowski, are limited to 150 copies, and sell for only $25. Hard to believe we have put together four of these monsters already.

3D and dinosaurs are like chocolate and peanut butter to me.

Here is a version with the art moving to give a glasses-free 3D effect.

I’ll also have a 2′x3′ digital print of the piece hanging on the wall at the gallery (there will be plenty of 3D glasses around to view it with, and there are glasses included in the boxes). In the event anyone wants to own one, I’ll be selling them for $40 (frame not included).

In addition to this, I printed six issues of little funny up for the show, which will be in the small boxes from the vending machine along with comics by many other artists (I’ll have a gallery of photos of all of them up sometime soon). The ones I printed include one by my oldest daughter, two I made with my good friend, Lutefisk Sushi featured artist Danno Klonowski, and three that are solo books. The little funny boxes each include a dozen or more micro-comics by different artists, and sell for $4 each… there are around a hundred of them this time around, and they will go very fast, I think.

Hope to see you there! Please tell your friends!

I have work in the Lutefisk Sushi Volume D show opening up this weekend (on the walls, in the Sushi bento box, and in the little funny boxes)… more information about the show below. It was just written up in City Pages here… I was excited to see the print edition included the above image from my Sushi comic, EEK! DINOSAURS! Hope to see you there!

Lutefisk Sushi Volume D opens this Friday! The show features a limited-edition (150), hand silkscreened, 3D bento box full of mini-comics by over 50 Minnesota cartoonists for only $25! See original art and other work by the cartoonists all over the walls of the gallery, including a bunch of work by featured artist Danno Klonowski (Manly Tales of Cowardice). Also, don’t miss little funny Series II, small boxes of micro-comics sold out of an old cigarette vending machine.

The show has been included in the A-List in this week’s City Pages.

Please tell your friends, blog readers, social networking website compadres, co-workers, parents, cousins, casual associates, and random people on the street of the opening this Friday, August 6th from 7 – 10 PM at Altered Esthetics!

Altered Esthetics • 1224 Quincy St NE, Mpls MN 55413 • 612.378.8888

Promotional materials below.

Postcard Resources!

Postcard front, small jpg

Postcard front, large pdf

Postcard back, small jpg

Postcard back, large pdf

Misc Show Sites

Sushi Website

Facebook Event

LSD – Facebook website

Confused? Read this. Get more confused.

See the Soapy the Chicken archive here. Get downright perplexed.

Subscribe to the Chicken Feed. Understand less on a sometimes regular basis.

Confused? Read this. Get more confused.

See the Soapy the Chicken archive here. Get downright perplexed.

Subscribe to the Chicken Feed. Understand less on a sometimes regular basis.

I haven’t posted any strips online in way too long… so here is a new Soapy the Chicken for you.

Confused? Read this. Get more confused.

See the Soapy the Chicken archive here. Get downright perplexed.

Subscribe to the Chicken Feed. Understand less on a sometimes regular basis.

There is a lot of evidence piling up that this will be the best year ever to be a Minnesota cartoonist! Open your calendar now and write yourself down some dates…

• We will be doing more Cankeratures this Friday (May 14), starting around 6:00, at Altered Esthetics for Art-A-Whirl. If you want to show up and draw people, please do!
• Springcon is this weekend! (May 15-16) (please note that we are still looking for more volunteers to help out at our table)
• The Graphic Novel & Comic Book Writing and Illustrating Conference June 19th
• The Lutefisk Sushi D show August 6th at Altered Esthetics (participation deadline June 15th)
• The Minneapolis Indy Expo (MIX) August 21st (tables still available!)
• The City Pages 4th Annual Comics issue (participation deadline August 9th)
• Britt Aamodt’s book from the Minnesota Historical Society Press, Superheroes, Strip Artists, & Talking Animals: Minnesota’s Contemporary Cartoonists coming out this fall
• 24 Hour Comic Day October 2nd
• Fallcon October 16th
• As always, The Cartoonist Conspiracy will also be hosting jams twice every month in the Twin Cities… first Thursdays at Diamond’s Coffee Shoppe 1618 Central Avenue NE Minneapolis, and third Thursdays at 6:30 at Cahoots Coffee 1562 Selby Ave St. Paul. We also have an open studio a different Saturday every month at The Minnesota Center For Book Arts.

I’ve heard rumor of some other things as well. Get ready to be busy and have a lot of fun.