Morty Comix # 2550 * Another Update

Last April I posted an update on the beautiful job our comix comrade John Eades of Florida performed when he converted Morty Comix # 2550 to oil paint. But apparently he wasn't finished. Take a look at this, a mixed media of oil and acrylics if I'm reading John's emails correctly.

I'm stunned and impressed. Thank you, John.

Morty Comix # 2550 *UPDATE!*

As you might recall, Morty Comix # 2550 was sent to Florida under mysterious circumstances. As it turned out, Mr. John Eades produced some beautiful oil painting versions of my scribbles! I am really impressed.

John also had a tale to tell and photos to send regarding this project. He graciously allowed me to post his work here. I recently cracked a rib so John's story made me wince as I laughed, but that's OK:

"I hit a bit of a snag with the paintings. After three days they were still wet. The medium says it is quick dry, but after sitting around for ten years I suspect the quick drying additive has dried up. Ran out to the art supply store, and they had nothing I wanted, so I ordered some new material online. I put the paintings out in the harsh raking sun to speed up the drying process. My bare feet were getting toasted on the patio, so the temp. is right to help dry these things."

"While I was out there with the camera, a bird came by and sat right on the edge of the plywood with his poop-shoot hovering right over the paintings-- an art critic bird? The bird was just out looking to purloin some cat cookies from our cat's breakfast. Funny how ambivalent they seem when the birds swoop in. It has been a while since I found a little pile of feathers and carcass remnants in the yard, however the ninja cats are fond of massacring the little anoles."

 

... "I wish I had been more thoughtful and caught the bird right there, poised buttward towards the pictures, but I freaked and shooed him off before he could make his mark. My car gets pummeled by Ibis bird poop once a week as the flock descends in my driveway for their weekly crapfest." 

Deep Thinks Animation

A bite-sized animation by John Eades. This one is an adaptation of a one-pager I drew in the mid-1980s. If I'm not mistaken I think this first appeared in a comic published by Steve Lafler, and has been reprinted a few times in different places. Jay Kennedy even made a little sculpture of Morty based on this drawing.

Morty the Dog Animation

Our long-time colleague from the Newave era, John Eades, is the first person I am aware of to completely animate a Morty the Dog story.

Check out his take on the 1984 minicomic, Lordy, Lordy, Where's Mr. Morty?

Retreads 4

1st edition, 1985, Pullman, Washington, 70 copies, cherry cover, enlarged digest size.

1st Danger Room Reprint edition, July 2005, 5 copies, blue cover, enlarged digest size.

In the 2nd half of 1985 I published several comix but didn't release them until the start of 1986. This was one of them.

Trivia:

Pages 10-11: "The Leash" was always one of my favorite short pieces. It originally appeared, I think, in Equinox, a comic with more of a fan audience than a Newave readership.

Page 16: As I recall, the title for this was created by first drawing the background texture and then taping a cut out stencil of the title over it.

The device of using third parties to describe a basically unseen character in an almost documentary way is a convention that has long interested me. Come to think of it, applying nonfiction narrative techniques to comix is something I learned from the undergrounds. If a documentary is well produced, no matter what the topic, I'm much more engaged than watching, say, football or baseball.

Pages 29-31: George Erling, Bruce Chrislip, Jim Ryan, and J.R. Williams are four very silly people.

Fundamentalcase Follies

John Eades was a reviewer of obscuro comix the mid-1980s. He was also a student at Florida Atlantic University, where he edited the campus newspaper, Atlantic Sun.

He reprinted my comix in the paper, and although he chose some of my more mild pieces to get past the conservative administrators, they apparently still kicked up a fuss. Apparently knowing he was going to get canned anyway, John asked me to pick a hot button issue and draw a comic that would be the equivalent of poking a stick in an antpile.

Hence, the birth of Fundamentalcase Follies, and consequently, the end of John's career as a newspaper editor at FAU.

The strip ran in the Feb. 5, 1986 issue. It was made into a print-on-demand comic in 1994.