City Limits Gazette # (June 1991)

Logo by Mark Campos. Bruce Sweeney's Underground Station with logo by Bruce Bolinger, The Bil Keane Watch, me apologizing for being sort of a jerk, bad cover versions of Fool on the Hill, For No One, For You Blue, From Me to You, Get Back.

This particular Bil Keane Watch was one that was read out and performed with great emotion by Bruce Chrislip at SPACE 2011.

Outside In # 3

1st edition, 1983, 150 copies on white cardstock.

2nd edition, December 1983, 20 copies on white cardstock.

3rd edition, 1984. Seattle, Washington : Starhead Comix, regular stock white paper.

J.R. Williams, George Erling, Par Holman, Jim Ryan, John Mobbs II, Bruce Chrislip, Matt Feazell.

A lineup of the classics in their classic poses, almost all of them part of the central core of the Newave comix movement. I got to meet Matt Feazell in person for the first time at SPACE last March, and I can't really explain it, but he actually does look like the self-portrait he contributed here! I'm impressed.

State of the Morty Blog, 5/31/11

Above: Buster makes his shameless bid for playtime. He often jumps on to my lap as I type these posts and edits my work with a very critical eye. This is a fellow with melodramatic acting skills made for the silent film era, such is his repertoire of purely visual emotional expressions.

Two major comix gatherings have taken place since my last State of the Morty Blog report: SPACE in Columbus, Ohio and the Olympia Comics Festival in Olympia, Washington. Attending both of these events was a wonderful experience and helped reconnect this old Morty to the spirit of the creative cartooning community.

I was thinking of collecting old work and reprinting it in squareback books, like those I have seen available at both conventions I attended. I have even talked to a couple printers about it. But after a lot of thought I have backed off. Apparently there is a modern a-go-go requirement for the art to be in digital pdf. But my work was made for straight-ahead photocopy, which carries much more power in the fluid lines that are part of my style. Digitizing my drawings seems to diminish them somehow. Also, a lot of my older work was made for folded legal size, a format now called obsolete by every modern printer I've talked to.

Perhaps I'm a bug trapped in amber, but there it is. So if I ever do publish a squareback, it will be a photocopy, and maybe in legal size folded ("enlarged digest" as we said in Newave days) . Unfortunately, that option appears to be much more expensive.

Call me a dinosaur, but when I see a photocopied comic adrift in a sea of color cover publications, I zero in on the black and white toner produced work. The format just has more of a visceral punch for this ancient Newaver. There is a difference between offset vs. photocopy, between toner vs. digital. The photocopy format itself is a rejection of the slick. And I like the subversive feel of that.

I guess it comes down to being able to master the technology that lands in your lap. There are many great new artists producing wonderful works in the digital and online formats. It is first nature to them. So interesting how technology and the generational landing spot shapes our methods of expression.

But I am working on a way to deliver my stories in a multimedia format. The Fabulous Sarah, the technology brain behind this Morty the Dog outfit, is helping me figure out how to realize an insidious Morty vision that has been forming in my cranium. BwahahahahaHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Hopefully you'll see the results of my evil plan within the year. It will be a new toy that will be too obnoxious for words.

The numbers:

Total number of visitors so far (since Aug. 2010): 20,504
This month (May) we topped over 4000 visitors, so we enjoyed a big spike from the previous average of 2500
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McCleary Time Capsule, 1943-1963

Tsunami Warning System, Ocean Shores, Washington

Olympia Comics Festival 2011 Report, Pt. 1

SPACE 2011 report, Pt. 3

City Limits Gazette: Sample Discussion

SPACE 2011 Report, Pt. 1

About That Donate Button

Brad Foster Has Lit The Fuse

The Bulletin Board

I Am NOT D.B. Cooper

Where the readers are from. The top ten states:

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Top Ten Countries:

USA
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Unlike Russia, the sustained hits from Spain appear to be from real people and not spammers. Why? This interests me. Picasso was always a fraud to me, but I love Dali's work. In the pre-Internet days I had a good audience from Portugal (where my comix were translated) and parts of Spain, and although I was flattered I could never figure out why although I suspect it had something to do with Morty the Dog's universal call for liberty. Anyway, the current interest in this blog from Spain is intriguing.

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To Our Tornado Alley Comrades

A couple months ago I was honored to be invited to SPACE, held in Columbus, Ohio, and met a great group of Midwestern cartoonists.

And now during all the news of these devastating storms clobbering the country's midsection I can't help but wonder how many of you guys have been dramatically impacted by this. Hope you're all surviving the weather safe and sound.

Chad Woody recently posted a pretty sobering bit about finding Joplin, Missouri hospital x-rays at his workplace.

Bruce Chrislip's SPACE Report

My old friend Bruce Chrislip filed his report on the 2011 SPACE experience in today's Midnight Fiction website.

In what must sound like an oxymoron, that was a short long weekend for me. It all went by so fast and furious. At least Bruce's report proves it wasn't a wild dream.

Also, I want to start a magazine for those us non-Buckeyes who are overly fascinated by a certain Cincinnati sausage and call it Goetta Life.

Above: Bruce and Joan, my wonderful hosts, presiding over the Cincinnati version of the Bottled City of Kandor. Shortly after this photo was taken I was introduced to Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory-- and I had only been in town for an hour or so!

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 17

Before leaving Columbus, Bruce and I paid a visit to the Thurber House, once home to one of America's great cartoonists and humorists, James Thurber.

Naturally on a Sunday it was closed, but I enjoyed the Thurberesque dog art in the yard.

What a nice way to end a day of celebrating comic art.


Back in Cincinnati we viewed old photo albums and laughed at pictures of ourselves from the old Seattle days running around the sunny slopes of yesterday.

Many thanks to Bruce and Joan, and Bob Corby for hosting this visit.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 16

The rest of Sunday was a long goodbye with some winding down.

Above: Hillary with her Dad, Buzz Buzzizyk. This is my favorite photo taken at SPACE. By this time they were both so tired it was hard to tell who was guiding who. We'll meet again, hopefully here in the Pacific Northwest.


Above: Josh Blair was able to give me an almost encyclopedic description of goetta. I was very impressed! Obviously he lives in the Cincinnati area.

Above: I watched Colin Upton's table for awhile, and while he was gone I pretended to be him and told everyone how that as a resident of British Columbia I was delighted to have Randy and Evi Quaid as neighbors! Actually, I think Colin was sort of weirded out about how many times I brought up the Quaids, since I'm very fascinated by their case. OK, I'm lying, I didn't pretend to be Colin, but I did watch his table for a brief time and got to meet the guy at the next table, Andrew Fraser. The production values on Andrew's books really knocked me out. The face of small press has really changed. Still, there is something about black and white photocopy that remains magic for me.

Above: I believe this is the first time in my long comic art life that I have had table space to sell comix.


Above: Colin came back with hot tea (hey, he really is Canadian!), and promptly scalded his hand for life after I bumped into him. Here he is recovering while talking with Michelangelo Cicerone. I had the pleasure of having dinner with Michelangelo and his wife Ryan the previous evening.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 15

Bob Corby (left) and Kel Crum (right) invited me to participate in a reading of our comix. The panels were displayed on a screen as we narrated them. I was a little frightened at the prospect but the experience was more fun than I expected.

Kel told me he sometimes feels like an oddball among oddballs, which brought my reply that means he just doubled his odds. A professional in the radio world, Kel did a great job reading his work. Kel's stories lent themselves well to out loud reading. One tale included his main character, Cornelia. My favorite was the comic about the fellow who kept having his head fall off.

Bob Corby was next. Bob is the organizer of SPACE, which must be a very big job. His humor is gentle and personal. He read from his mini, Why I'm Not Musical, a comic with great graphics that really fit the mood of the narrative.

I read from Ambergris, which meant I had to sing a little. I'm sure my local friends and family will cringe when I say that, since I'm known as the second worst singer in the world, after Jim Jarvis (another McCleary guy). Then I read "Edgar Cayce Talks to the Dead," and finally "How Cats Got That Way."

It wasn't until that morning that I figured out exactly how the tune of the Ambergris song went. And I didn't know how Morty the Dog's voice was going to sound until I actually started reading the cats story.

Thanks to Kel for instigating my participation and to Bob for his great patience in guiding me through the technology of sending my work ahead of time. The resulting fun was worth the anticipatory nervousness.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 14

Sunday began with Bruce braving the 39 degree morning and taking me to Ohio State University's Cartoon Library, which was of course closed. Apparently the Library will be, or is, moving to Sullivant Hall (pictured).

Included in the Library's holdings is the collection of our late comrade, Jay Kennedy. But this isn't the only home for his comix. Back in the 1980s, Jay donated many comix and rare items to the Washington State University Comix Collection when I was there organizing the holdings.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 13

Matt Feazell gave a presentation on his Cynicalman movie. One of the actors was none other than Sean Bieri as Lone Shark! The thing that was most striking to me was how it was obvious the cast was enjoying the task of making a film. You can tell Matt has a large group of devoted friends.


I am looking forward to seeing the final motion picture. In the meantime, Matt gave me a stack of books for the Washington State University Library comix collection.


Above: Carol Tyler's presence at SPACE gave our corner of the room some class at least for Saturday. Here she is contributing to a jam page.

Above: Itamar Reiner lives in Columbus and shared his portfolio. Although it looked like he was engaged in lots of technical drawing, it was his landscapes that really grabbed me.

Above: I got a photo of Colin Upton getting a photo of the one and only Tim Corrigan. In the background you can see Sean Bieri and Max Traffic visiting with John Porcellino.

Tim was every bit as decent and caring as I imagined him to be. His devotion to small press comics impresses me when he relates stories about how our art form helps people find a voice during difficult times in life. He introduced me to Larry Blake and gave me some new Mightyguy comix.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 12

Bruce Chrislip and Matt Feazell inspect the Outside In foamboard display right before the event where I'm interviewed by Bruce.

Judging by the expression on Bruce's face, I'd say he was using the method actor technique of preparing for his role as interviewer. For you see, about 35 minutes after this was taken, I saw Bruce give the greatest performance of anyone ever on any panel discussion of any type.

In the course of the hour, Bruce read a couple selections from "The Bil Keane Watch." The first one was from City Limits Gazette # meat of the tree (June 1991):

But it was Bruce's rendition of the next one that brought down the house. This was from City Limits Gazzzzzzzette # Pongo (Aug. 1991):

Being every bit as dramatic and somber in his narration as James Earl Jones or John Houseman, Bruce slowly built up his voice until by the time he was yelling out at the top of lungs "DEAD! DEAD!" he was on his feet with his clenched fists in the air. The audience applauded in ope mouthed awe. I was laughing so hard I was crying.

This 50 minute Chrislip-interviews-Willis portion has been captured on audio by both D. Blake Werts and Bruce Rosenberger. I have a copy of the Werts version and The Fabulous Sarah is working on a way for us to post it here.

Update, 3/25/2011: Audio by Bruce Rosenberger is available at the SPACE website:
http://www.backporchcomics.com/SPACE2011CrislipandWillis.mp3

Bruce Chrislip's amazing performance is about 30-35 minutes into the program.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 11

The much anticipated arrival of Buzz Buzzizyk/Maximum Traffic/Borpo Deets finally came to pass and all was well with the world. Max's arrival made an already extraordinary event become something historic for me. A lot of us sit around thinking creative thoughts, but Max actually has the energy and discipline to give expression to his visions. He is one of my artistic heroes.

Although we didn't really get a chance to talk a great deal, I was thrilled to finally meet him and look forward to giving Max a tour of my corner of the world someday in the near future.

Max brought a stack of the recent White Buffalo Gazette as well as his compilation, Truth Be Known.

In the above photo Max is talking with Colin Upton. In the background Bruce is showing Mike Hill and Hillary Buzzizyk the Outside In portraits on foamboard.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 10

Colin Upton wins my award for having the best sign.

In the background is Mike Hill and Hillary Buzzizyk.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 9

A sideways halfmoon shot capturing only part of the scene. There were well over 100 tables.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 8

John Porcellino was our other table neighbor. I managed to get a couple photos of him during the rare times he wasn't surrounded by fans. It was gratifying to see that his work attracted a lot of well-deserved attention. And unlike my old guy corner, John's table was a magnet for a good mix of generations and gender.

A mob of cartoonists invaded an unsuspecting Vietnamese restaurant that evening. I sat at the end of the table across from John and Buzz Buzzizyk. I enjoyed talking with him and realized later that we hardly mentioned comix at all. We were also in awe of Sean Bieri, who was sitting next to me, creating brilliant off the cuff drawings in spontaneous jams. Matt Feazell sat on my other side but had to move since the chair and floor were conspiring to eat him alive.

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 7

Dan W. Taylor was another person from the Newave days I was hoping to meet. As it turns out, Dan and his wife Carrie are cranking out little minicomix at such a prolific rate that Dan can be called a minicomic king at this point. Seeing a guy with his long history in self-publishing still being this active really puts me to shame.

Dan is also nudging several old Newavers to return to the drawing board. He seems to have become a professional instigator.

For any student of the Newave, his Time Warp Comix is a must read. Dan gave me some art for my next collage piece, and I promised him some work for his fun series. See how he does this? The guy is insidious. Like I said, a professional instigator.

The Taylors also donated a pile of minis for me to send to the Washington State University Library comix collection.

Above: Colin Upton, Mike Hill, Dan W. Taylor

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 6

I had Mike Hill here as a guest long ago when he dropped by McCleary. By coincidence, collector/reviewer Lynn Hansen was visiting as well, so we held a mini-convention.

Mike is an important figure in the Newave story, his Worker Poet publication pushing the movement to a more literary edge. His art is distinctive and wonderful. It was a true joy to jam with Mike and Maximum Traffic at the of 1999 for Modernman # 3 ; Maximum Traffic # 210.

On Saturday night Mike put together a quick mini (with Blake's help, I understand), Modernman # 4. I like to call it the quint-Hill-sential Mike comic.

Above: Bruce Chrislip, Colin Upton, Mike Hill

SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 5

Bruce Chrislip is totally at home in this convention environment. I can't think of anyone in our Newaver generation of comix artists who has remained so consistently as enthusiastic about comic art over the span of time as Bruce.

He created several prints to sell at our table, including some old jam material of ours. Bruce also published an 8-page minicomic called Free Space just for SPACE 2011.

There were also a couple formboard displays with selected self-portraits from the Outside In series he originally put together back when he lived in Seattle. That's when I remember seeing them initially.

If you hang around Bruce and Joan for long be prepared to laugh a lot.

In this photo Bruce is gearing up for what will be one of the crowning performances in his comic career later the same day. And I was there to see it, and you will read about it when I reach that point in my report.