SPACE 2011 Report, pt. 2

One of the big factors in my decision to accept the invitation to attend SPACE 2011 was the opportunity to finally meet so many people who had I known for 1, 2, even 3 decades only through correspondence. The recent passing of several of our comix comrades like Jamie Alder, Mike Roden, Steve Fiorilla, Jay Kennedy hit me hard. These were people I was hoping to meet in person some day, and I figured eventually our paths would cross. I waited too long for "eventually" to happen.

But we are not getting any younger. To put it diplomatically, I knew I needed to do this while so many of us are still above ground. And what better place to see so many comix people from our old Newave/Obscuro network at one time than SPACE?

Bruce Chrislip and I loaded up his car and headed north to Columbus on Saturday morning.

Above: on the trip to Columbus.

Upon arrival we were issued and assigned a table which we shared with Mike Hill and Maximum Traffic/Buzz B./Borpo Deets.

One of our neighbors, I'm happy to say, was Colin Upton, who came all the way from Vancouver, B.C.. Together we constituted the only Pacific Northwest presence at the expo. He is a good conversationalist with an understated, wry way of observing life's foibles.

Another person I got to meet right off the bat was Morty the Dog regular reader D. Blake Werts, who helped me make an emergency run to the closest available computer so I could print out a script for the next day's reading. I really appreciated his company and it gave us a chance to visit a little.

If there is any down side to events like this, it is that I don't get to really spend a lot of time with any one person. But names do get associated with a face, a voice, a personality in person. A human connection is made. And that's worth a lot.

Above: Bruce, Colin, Blake.

Colin's new book, The Collected Diabetes Funnies, is a good example of how technology has made it possible for us photocopy comix artists to graduate to a more sophisticated format. I was astounded over and over at what high production values I was seeing in the physical publications. As you can see, Colin has not fallen into the lure of life beyond black and white. "Color," he told me, "Is for the weak"-- a quote I enjoyed so much I asked him to repeat it a couple times.

Musical Chairs

First published in March 1999, 50 copies (8 pink cover, red guts; 3 pink cover, yellow guts; 1 all pink; 6 yellow cover, pink guts; 12 all yellow; 2 green cover, blue guts; 5 green cover, yellow guts; 1 green cover, pink guts; 12 green cover, red guts).

The 1st Danger Room Reprint Ed. (June 2005) had a run of five copies, yellow covers.

This is pretty much a true story. "Big Poppa Ross" was, of course, Ed "Big Daddy" Roth (1932-2001), the brains behind Rat Fink, hot rod comics, and grotesque cartooning for a generation of us Boomers. He influenced many subsequent cartoonists, and helped lay the groundwork for the later underground comix. One of the Newavers who continued Roth's style was a nice guy named Steve Fiorilla (1961-2009), although many others owe Roth as well for bits of their presentation. Including me. Hence the O-The-Irony-Of-It-All!

When I heard Roth had converted to the LDS faith and expressed disapproval of Morty the Dog, the karma of the whole thing made me laugh. Then I drew a comic about it. You can't make this stuff up.

And yes, our teacher really tried to sell us that load of garbage about pale Commies in NYC skyscrapers.

Ouroboros.