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R. Sikoryak at MoCCA: How Classics and Cartoons Collide

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R. Sikoryak
How Classics and Cartoons Collide
June 15 – August 29, 2010

Original drawings from the book “Masterpiece Comics,” which adapts literary classics in the styles of famous cartoons.

Curated by Bill Kartalopoulos

Sikoryak and Kartalopoulos in Conversation
Thursday, July 15, 7pm

Comics chameleon R. Sikoryak inventively adapts canonical Western literature using the visual styles and characters of historical American comic books and comic strips. Among his many works produced over the past twenty years, Sikoryak has adapted Kafka’s The Metamorphosis in the style of Charles Schulz’s Peanuts, Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights in the style of Tales From the Crypt, and the Book of Genesis in the style of Chic Young’s Blondie. “More than a gag or a parody,” said exhibit curator Bill Kartalopoulos, “these thoughtful and intricately constructed dual adaptations suggest resonances that reflect upon each story’s pair of sources.”

R. Sikoryak: How Classics and Cartoons Collide: examines the artist’s intensive process by showcasing a selection of notes, sketches, and reference material from one of his longest and most ambitious narratives, 2000’s “Dostoyevsky Comics,” which adapts Crime and Punishment in the style of a mid-century Batman comic book. The exhibit also includes all ten original art boards for the final story, recently collected alongside Sikoryak’s other adaptations in his book Masterpiece Comics, published in 2009 by Drawn and Quarterly.

There will be a conversation between Sikoryak and Kartalopoulos on July 15 at 7PM. Admission for this event is $5, free for members of MoCCA.

About R. Sikoryak
R. Sikoryak is the author of Masterpiece Comics (Drawn & Quarterly).  His cartoons and illustrations have appeared in The Onion, The New Yorker, Nickelodeon Magazine, Mad, Fortune, and many other publications; he’s drawn for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and Ugly Americans. Sikoryak teaches in the illustration department at Parsons The New School for Design and is an alum of the program. Since 1997, he has presented his cartoon slide show series, Carousel, around the United States and Canada.

About Bill Kartalopoulos
Bill Kartalopoulos teaches classes about comics and illustration at Parsons The New School for Design. He is a frequent public speaker and is the programming coordinator for SPX: The Small Press Expo and the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival. He writes about comics for Print Magazine, where he is a contributing editor, and reviews comics forPublishers Weekly. He is a member of the Executive Committee for the International Comic Arts Forum (ICAF), an annual academic conference devoted to comics. In 2008 he curated Kim Deitch: A Retrospective at the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art in New York, NY. He lives in Brooklyn.

About Masterpiece Comics
Masterpiece Comics adapts a variety of classic literary works with the most iconic visual idioms of twentieth-century comics. Dense with exclamation marks and lurid colors, R. Sikoryak’s parodies remind us of the sensational excesses of the canon, or, if you prefer, of the economical expressiveness of classic comics from Batman to Garfield. In “Blond Eve,” Dagwood and Blondie are ejected from the Garden of Eden into their archetypal suburban home; Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray is reimagined as a foppish Little Nemo; and Camus’s Stranger becomes a brooding, chain-smoking Golden Age Superman. Other source material includes Dante, Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, bubblegum wrappers, superhero comics, kid cartoons, and more.

Post-it Show at Giant Robot New York

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Post-It Show 5 open through July 7, 2009
Giant Robot Gallery
437 East 9th Street Between 1st Ave. & Ave. A,
in the East Village New York, New York 10009
(212) 674-GRNY (4769) | grny.net

Giant Robot is proud to present Post-It Show 5 at GRNY. Curated by artists Mark Todd and Esther Pearl Watson, the show is slated to feature roughly 1,000 works by noted contributors for only $20. These pieces will be on standard-sized 3″ x 3″ Post-It notes. (Larger sizes of 4″ x 4″ and 6″ x 6″ will cost a bit more.) The pieces will be cash-and-carry.

Thus far, the ever-expanding list of contributors includes the following:

Trevor Alixopulos, APAK, Andrice Arp, Scott Bakal, Melinda Beck, Mike Bertino, Tim Biskup, Jon Boam, Pakito Bolino, Michelle Borok, Aaron Brown, Jude Buffum, Chris Buzelli, Christine Castro, Martin Cendreda, Kris Chau, Louise Chen, Marcos Chin, Chris Clayton, Tim Cochran, Eric Collins, Jen Corace, Matt Curtius, Kelsey Dake, Eleanor Davis, Vanessa Davis, Nathan Doyle, Seth Drenner, Susan Fang, Korin Faught, Nina Frenkel, Shannon Freshwater, Matt Furie, Nick Gazin, Frieda Gossett, Katherine Guillen, (Parsons Illustration Adjunct) Peter Hamlin, Jon Han, Jaime Hernandez, Andrew Holder, (Parsons Illustration Alum) David Horvath, Patrick Hruby, Rama Hughes, Mari Inukai, Yellena James, Hellen Jo, Nathan Jurevicius, Andrea Kang, Dan-ah Kim, Hawk Krall, Lamour Supreme, Travis Lampe, Blaise Larmee, Sarah Lavoie, Jesse LeDoux, Dongyun Lee, Eli Lehrhoff, Bill Main, Jacob Magraw-Mickelson, Ben Marra, Ted McGrath, Mark Allen Miller, Mike Miller, Brendan Monroe, Mark Murphy, Andrew Neyer, Tru Nguyen, Anders Nilsen, Saejean Oh, Saelee Oh, Martin Ontiveros, Sidney Pink, Luke Ramsey, Ron Rege, Jesse Reklaw, Martha Rich, Joe Rocco, Brooks Salzwedel, Anna See, Raymond Sohn, STO, Deth P. Sun, Gary Taxali, Team Macho, Gina Triplett, Twerps (Greg Mishka), Edwin Ushiro, Jing Wei, Steven Weissman, Gillian Wilson, Calvin Wong, Jaime Zollars, Trevor Alixopulos, Peter Arkle, Matthew Bandusch, Karen Barbour, Angie Clayton, John Cuneo, Bob Dob, Nathan Doyle, Austin English, Jason Fischer, Anne Ishii, Claire Johnson, Terri Fry Kasuba, Phillipe Lardy, Sarah Lavoie, James McShane, Dave Plunkert, Jason Polan, Jarret Quon, Deth P. Sun, Francesca Tallone, and more!

For more information about the artists, the show, GR2, or Giant Robot magazine, please contact: Eric Nakamura Giant Robot Owner/Publisher eric@giantrobot.com (310) 479-7311.

From the Vault: Gareth Hinds interviewed by School Library Journal

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Parsons Illustration Alum Gareth Hinds was interviewed by School Library Journal back in January.  With a final release date (October 12th!) set for his upcoming graphic novel adaptation of The Odyssey, we thought it would be great to revisit that interview.  Here’s a snippet:

Are there some stories that won’t work as graphic novels?

There are stories that don’t lend themselves quite as well to the graphic novel medium, but there are no stories that can’t be done. I’ve put off doing certain books because they were just too huge—War and Peace, for example, is not only incredibly long, it covers a very long period of time, includes a lot of characters, and would require a tremendous amount of historical research. I may adapt War and Peace someday, but not in 2010!

I’ve never hit an actual dead-end once I started working on a book, but occasionally difficult scenes can bog me down, and I have to walk away from them and work on something else for a while. For example, the very end of The Odyssey is rather abrupt in the original. I wanted to somehow slow down the last few pages and tie up some of the themes and plot threads, but I didn’t want to add any new material or change the story. That took a while to figure out.

…

What’s special about your version of The Odyssey?

For one thing, at 256 pages it’s a lot longer than anything else I’ve done, or most graphic novels for that matter. It has a more expansive, epic feeling than my other books, with a lot of landscape, open ocean, and crowd scenes. What I think distinguishes my books from other graphic novel adaptations is the way I approach the classics. It’s very important to me that my adaptations do justice to the originals, and to me that doesn’t just mean not changing the story too much, it also means bringing a high level of art, craft, and sophistication to the way the story is told in the new medium—like the original author did. That’s a tall order, of course. I don’t think it’s enough to give a classic story the gloss of a modern comic or dress it up with special effects. To whatever extent my adaptations succeed, it’s because I have equal dedication to the source material, the craft of telling a story in pictures, and the creation of a beautiful book.

Read the rest of this interview here.  And over on his blog, Gareth has posted tons of progress updates about The Odyssey so can follow his creative process.  Definitely check them out here.

Congrats to Gareth on his new book!

Garrett Pruter is a Grand Prize Winner!

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Parsons Illustration graduating senior Garrett Pruter
was chosen as the GRAND PRIZE winner of
Macy’s First Annual Fireworks Design Contest,
sponsored by Macy’s Parade and Entertainment Group.

Garrett’s illustration was chosen out of numerous entries
from Parsons and other art/design schools
in the New York City area.

Congratulations, Garrett!


Quick Hit: Rachel Nolasco on Threadless!

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Parsons Illustration Rising Senior Rachel Nolasco is a winner!  She was chosen by her classmates in Isabelle Dervaux‘s Junior Concepts class as the winner of a classroom competition based around the creation/design of a t-shirt design for the mega-cool and creative Threadless.  The t-shirt design was featured in a Threadless newsletter!  Rachel calls the shirt, “Mutual End” and describes it thusly: “The concept for this design is the juxtaposition of life and death and how they both exist together and are shared by every living thing.”   You can see Rachel’s design on the Threadless site here.

Congrats on your success, Rachel and luck in the future!

George Bates creates public art for the MTA

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Parsons Illustration Alum and current Adjunct Faculty member George Bates has a lot going on these days.  He sent along images from a project he’s working on for the MTA and we wanted to share them all with you!  Here’s the scoop from George’s blog:

Recently I traveled to PETERS GLAMALEREI STUDIOS in Paderborn Germany to oversee a public art project for the MTA subway station in Rockaway Beach, New York. Directly below is the original art I created that will be painted on glass blocks and installed in the spring of 2010. The following images show the initial fabrication process, some glass experiments I did while I was there…

Keep up the amazing work, George!

Silent Witnesses: Graphic Novels Without Words exhibition in England

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Silent Witnesses: Graphic Novels Without Words
Curated by Darren Diss

Venue: Danes Terrace
Lincoln
Lincolnshire
LN2 1LP

29 May 2010 to 30 Aug 2010
Admission price: free

Artists include: Lars Arrhenius, Hendrik Dorgathen, Eric Drooker, Max Ernst, Matt Forsythe, Alexandra Higlett, Laurence Hyde, Jason, Andrzej Klimowski, Peter Kuper, Chris Lanier, Frans Masereel, Otto Nuckel, Shaun Tan, Zoe Taylor, Lynd Ward, Sara Varon and Jim Woodring.

This exhibition brings together the work of internationally recognised artists and illustrators from around the world working in Graphic Novel form. Spanning publications from the early twentieth century to the present day, the works contained in the exhibition are distinct in that all use the capacity of images alone to communicate narrative, functioning entirely without the use of text.

The exhibition celebrates the book form and in particular the Graphic Novel as an increasingly popular medium for artists and explores its enduring appeal to readers of all ages. By focussing on works without text it examines the underlying structure and mechanics of developing a Graphic Novel, exposing it as a unique art form. It looks at the Novel in the true sense, as an extended sequence conveying a narrative. The show includes preparation and working drawings, writings, flat plans, sketch books and character studies and associated works alongside complete book-works to reveal the various developmental stages in creating a Graphic Novel.

The exhibition combines works from a wide range of cultural contexts, from modern popular Graphic Novels, with scratchboard images by Eric Drooker produced for his novel ‘Flood’, to woodcuts by Frans Masereel for his his 1925 work ‘Die Stadt’, to original drawings by Sara Varon for her well loved books, ‘Sweater Weather’, ‘Robo and Hund’ and ‘Chicken and Cat’. Also in the show will be a large scale flat-print version of ‘A-Z’ by Lars Arrhenius, a novel produced on the iconic A-Z map of London. Shown in print form it allows the viewer to scan the intersecting narratives sewn through the map in a single image, creating ever new readings.

Works for the exhibition have been loaned to The Collection from the British Museum, Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Klinspor Museum, Offenbach, Scott Eder Gallery, New York, and from the exhibiting artists.

The show’s curator, Darren Diss, is an established illustrator and Senior Lecturer in Illustration at The University of Lincoln. He has a specialist academic research interest in Textless Narratives.

David Sandlin “Sleep O’History” Opens in Berlin

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DAVID SANDLIN “SLEEP O’HISTORY”
Bongout Galerie
Torstrasse 110
10119 Berlin
Opening Friday 28. May at 7 pm
Exhibition 28.5 – 10.7

Bongoût Gallery is proud to present New York artist David Sandlin in his first exhibition in Berlin. He will be showing his books; new paintings; “puritanical novelty items”; and a collection of drawings from his 2006 book, An Alphabetical Ballad of Carnality.  This will be the first major showing of Sandlin’s artist’s-book opus A Sinner’s Progress, an eight-volume series comprised mostly of large-scale hand-printed books, including his most recent work, Slumburbia, a nine-metre silkscreened panorama of sloth and indolence in sumptuous hand-separated color silkscreen.

David Sandlin floats between the worlds of painting, printmaking, comics, and artist’s books. Since he began his career in the 1980s, visual narrative, usually nonlinear, has been a core component of his work. He uses it as a structural device to build content and express ideas while still being able to experiment with form, using symbolism and allegory to amplify his social commentary. Sandlin’s books range in form from complex hand-bound silkscreened editions to offset pulp-style comics—each volume’s form in service to its content to some extent. “The book rather than the single image is the ideal medium for me to explore content and experiment with form,” says Sandlin.

Eccentric modernist painters like Beckmann, Ensor, and Guston have inspired Sandlin’s explorations into the mythic/transformative utility of personal history. His love of words and literature also draw him toward narrative: “I was born in Northern Ireland and moved to the USA, to Alabama, when I was a teenager—both places steeped in the narrative-literary tradition—so I’m not surprised that I need to incorporate words into my images. I love the wordplay used by Irish and southern American artists like James Joyce, Flann O’Brien, Flannery O’Connor, and Hank Williams.”

Other works in the exhibition reflect Sandlin’s love of narrative. “The Sleep of History,” a large work on canvas, is part of his ongoing series of epic paintings. Drawings upon which his abecedarium, An Alphabetical Ballad of Carnality, are also on display as a 22-metre-long panorama. He will also be showing components of “The Pur-Ton-o-Fun Co. Reading Room,” a multimedia installation piece based on A Sinner’s Progress.

David Sandlin’s work has been displayed in galleries and museums worldwide, and his comics have been published by Fantagraphics and Cornelius Editions and have also appeared in many anthologies, including Raw, Strapazin, The Ganzfeld, and The Best American Comics 2009. He is currently preparing to start his next book, a graphic novel, as a Fellow of the Cullman Center for Writers and Scholars, at the New York Public Library, in NYC.

DAVID SANDLIN “SLEEP O’HISTORY”
Bongout Galerie
Torstrasse 110
10119 Berlin
Opening Friday 28. May at 7 pm
Exhibition 28.5 – 10.7

Looking for a place to stay in Paris

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We’re passing along this listing for Coline Irwin, a friend of the Illustration Program.  Seems like an amazing opportunity…

I have a charming, typically parisian, 45 sq meter flat, overlooking
Paris. It has beautiful views of the Eiffel Tower, Sacré Coeur, and
the Paris skies. Top floor (with elevator). One bedroom, one large
living-room with amazing light every second of the day, kitchen,
bathroom. It is located between the Sacré Coeur and Gare du Nord.
Very interesting, lively neighborhood, great apartment.
Don’t hesitate to contact me for more details or photos.

coline.irwin@gmail.com