Slabbed: Tales To Demolish #3

The amazing Jim Rugg did this totally amazing rendition of the Tales To Demolish #3 cover for "covered" a great blog project. Thanks Jim, from all of us at the Sparkplug Bullpen.

http://jimrugg.livejournal.com/17881.html?style=mine

reviews

This week seems to be a good one for Sparkplug,
We just got a write up on Thought Balloonists of Inkweed and Reich:
http://www.thoughtballoonists.com/2009/02/more-highlights-of-2008.html
Then, there is a giant review of Edison Steelhead's Lost Portfolio in the Comics Journal #295:
http://www.amazon.com/Comics-Journal-295-Gary-Groth
And then there is a good listing for Sparkplug and a picture of Austin's T-shirt on Gabrielle Bell in the new (and sadly last) issue of Comics Foundry:
http://www.comicfoundry.com/

Olga Volozova interviewed by Emily Nilsson

the cover of the Airy Tales by Olga Volozova

How did you conceive of the stories and art for The Airy Tales and what was the process of creating it like for you?

I've been writing tales all my life- I guess since I was 4 years old- and I have many of those in my notebooks, in the drawers and old bags or elsewhere. For "The Airy Tales" I selected a few tales that I meant to fit into the "airy tales" category: tales that don't give a straight answer...tales where the meaning shows and vanishes in the air...tales with no clear endings...I think that the purpose of any tale is to deal with the unexplainable, and this matches the feeling we get most often from our experience in the world. I believe that "the answer is blowing in the wind" IS the real answer... So, "airy tales" are stories where the elusiveness of meaning (which is an innate quality of a fairy tale) is slightly emphasized.

"Tree of Life" by Olga Volozova (acrylics and ink)

Your book has a lot of fairy tale elements in its stories, yet it seems more geared towards grown-up readers. Did you have an audience in mind when you created it?

Fairy tales weren't a children's genre for a long time through history; they were told by grown-ups to grown-ups, and children sneaked into listening to them, the same way as now grown-ups sneak into reading fairy tales, that are considered to be the children's stuff. Tales tempt our reasoning limits; that's why the age target is sort of indefinite for most tales, both folk and literary ones. I'd like to write tales "for everybody”. Some of them seem more childish, the others, more adult-oriented; I see the age target only after the tale is composed. I didn't separate them in "The Airy Tales”; I really want to see a possibility of a "tale" as a "grown-ups'" reading. The graphic stories of Neil Gaiman and Dame Darcy were very inspirational in this regard. It looks that comic books might resurrect the fairy tales as a reading for adults!



Art by Remedos Varo

Who are your greatest artistic influences? What writers also influenced you?

I am very fond of medieval miniature and illumination art both in Western and Oriental traditions. I am fascinated by the Flemish painters: primitivists, Pieter Breugel the Elder, Hieronymus Bosch...I love mostly all the surrealists; my favorite artist is Remedios Varo, a Spanish-born amazing woman of true integrity and deep mystical mind. My soul is greedy for some grotesque element and expressive lines, always eager to devour works of Francsico de Goya, Jacques Callot, Albrecht Durer, Pablo Picasso, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec... I love Russian art of the "silver age", beginning of the 20th century, especially the theatre art and illustration of that time (Alexandre Benois, Sergey Sudejkin, Nikolai Sapunov, Leon Bakst, etc.) I can't even say all these masters influenced me as an artist- I still have to grow as an artist! I can say they influenced my perception and my mind a lot. Among the writers which resonate with my soul I should name Jonathan Swift, E.T.A. Hoffman, Hans Christian Andersen, Brothers Grimm, Wilhelm Hauff, Maurice Maeterlinck, Attar, Rumi, Hermann Hesse, Jorge Luis Borges, Julio Cortazar, Umberto Eco, Per Lagerquist, Yuri Olesha, Isaac Babel, Alexander Grin, many others...

What comics do you read?

I usually seek for the comics produced by Fantagraphics of Seattle, WA, and Slave Labor Graphics of San Jose, CA; now of course the Sparkplug books have been added to my list. In general, my preference is alternative comics, books of a very individual approach, unique style; I see a new hilarious genre of literature growing out of this branch of comics.

Lake Zyb Illustration to the stories "Zybari Zelenyje" by Olga Volozova (Acrylics)

Please talk about your childhood a little and how you developed as an artist. Is your storytelling method similar to stories you heard while growing up?

I lived in Moscow since I was 16 years old, all the time before I moved to L.A.; I was born in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, then part of the former USSR. The Baku of my childhood, even under the Soviet power, somehow preserved a character of an independent city, with a free spirit, eastern hospitality, and “the law of the land” - an ancient, pristine moral code that shone through many historical layers. In my mind my hometown takes the place of a paradise, with its ships that are reflected in the sea and almonds that fall off the trees in the parks. Our home was filled with books; as a kid I had been reading lots of tales of different cultures; I felt at home with all of them. Later I became passionate about any studies in mythology and subconscious. I always wanted to be a tale-teller who doesn't construct tales as stories but knocks and waits until a tale would fall down, as a poem. The most captivating for me in literary tales is the quality of “lightness” and “magical” ease that makes them seem as if, before having been written, they pre-existed somewhere in the world ‘s universal memory… such as books of Tove Jansson (Norway), Donald Bisset (England), Gianni Rodari (Italy), Daniil Kharms (Russia of the 1920s-30s) who influenced my heart’s desire to be a tale-teller...

"Glowing Husk 2" by Olga Volozova (Acrylics and ink)

When did you move to L.A., and what brought you there? How has moving to the U.S. affected your aesthetic?

Here in US, I discovered the alternative comics' world! In 1992 I was on a visit to L.A.; I met someone whom I married; the most unusual human being I ever met, a child and a wizard together; that's how I stayed. We went together to Moscow and brought my little son here. My husband David passed away last year of a heart attack. I miss him terribly. We used to quarrel and come back together all the time. We scheduled a trip to Spain, to get some visuals for a story/legend that he so much wanted me to make into a book or film or something. Now I am working on that story... My aesthetic hasn't changed much after coming to the U.S.; I believe that "a person is a style", or vice versa; but on the other side, who knows! After having read “Ghost World”, by Daniel Clowes, I had this overwhelming feeling of a new door that had been opened for me.

How did you meet Dylan Williams of Sparkplug Comic Books, and what was it like to work together to publish your book?

I met Dylan at the International Comic-Con in San Diego two years ago; walking by his booth, I was surprised to see books exactly of the kind I am drawn to, and I asked him if he could publish some of my stories, too. Dylan Williams is magic. He says "yes" when other people say "no"; and this is perhaps a definition of magic. He seemed to like the story I showed to him (“The Moonbirds"), and then, after we corresponded for some time, he told me that he wanted to publish a book of my tales, which would be in the visual style of “The Moonbirds". I was very excited by this idea. It was like a dream; I was feeling free to do what I wanted within the space, but I always had clever advice and consult when I needed it. Everything was done by e-mail; at the end I sent the DVDs to Oregon and I was on time for the Alternative Press Expo in San Francisco! I considered all this process a gift of fortune and a work of good sprites or spirits (who obeyed the will of Dylan Williams).

from the story "Tales of Giants" by Olga Volozova (pen and ink)

What experiences besides publishing The Airy Tales have you had with exhibiting your artwork and/or publishing your writing?

I had published some tales in Russia, in different magazines, newspapers, collections of stories...When living in Russia I also wrote plays for puppet theatres; I did it for a living for a while. I started showing some artwork recently with a group of L.A. artists called Carpe Arte; I also showed an "alternative” animated film at one of their events; and some other animation at student festivals. Before that, a few years ago, I showed some of my paper dioramas at the Brewery Art Walk in L.A.

What plans do you have for future work and exhibiting or publishing it?

Many plans for picture books and graphic novels; I have to organize myself to finish at least some of them! It’s the most important direction. I want to do more painting as well and also to follow through with my paper theatre projects.

Do you have another job right now?

I do web design freelance.

How would you describe your work ethic? Do you have a daily routine for working on your art?

I like to write plans of what I have to do, again on the scratches of paper, though I often lose them; but I am becoming less of a procrastinator now. From time to time I go on a quick walk and draw in my notebook the shapes I see when gazing into the bark of the trees, puddles or ground, it's always been the best creative stimulant.



Olga is currently the guest artist at the amazing Partyka website.

Olga's website

Drop In by Dave Lapp

I read this comic collection, Drop In, by Dave Lapp on my lunchbreak today. I can't say I love the art and the writing is oddly clunky at times---and yet Drop In is one of the better comics I've read in a while.

It's a very simple concept---Lapp has worked in "drop in" centers for years---places in Toronto where low income children literally drop in to make art. Lapp draws strips about stories the children tell him, stories he tells them, and little events that happen.

What's good about this book is how odd the stories come across, which means Lapp is working really hard here: instead of lazily retelling these stories and letting them fit into a normal mode (child says this, beat, response, coherent finale), Lapp does the work to make the interactions feel as disjointed and open ended as they probably were inr eal life. i feel a certain amount of kinship with this. The more I read comics (or books) with very clean writing, the more I feel that disjointed "experimental" writing is closer to "realism" then naturalistic fiction will ever be. Reading the weird exchanges in Drop In makes labored over "realistic" writing seem stilted.

I also love Drop In for its moral attitude. This is a book about poor children and Lapps interaction with them. Somehow---and this is a commendable accomplishment---Lapp shows care and feeling for this children and makes us angry for their plight without an ounce of heavy handedness. How does he do it?

Through his cartooning. He depicts the events so well and with such artistry that our sympathies can't help but be with these kids. Lapp depicts the action so well that he doesn't need to tell us to care---his drawing makes us care.

So this comic has a leg up on most anything else out there right now. even though the art is a bit dull (although it has a foundation of greatness and an interesting design sense...which will inevitably get better as Lapp keeps cartooning. This is his debut so serviceable artwork is quite an accomplishment actually---and there are touches of greatness in hi pattern making and some of his less tight drawing) I admire the ambition of Drop In so much. Not many comics are so fresh and so right in their approach to storytelling---and even fewer are as important to read for their subject matter.

You can get it here:

http://www.conundrumpress.com/nt_lapp.html

the Horse.

My inspiration (thanks to Jason for the image).

Benjamin Marra's new Night Business

You have to check his stuff out. From Ben:

"Night Business, Issue 2, is debuting at NY Comic Con this weekend, Feb. 6 to 8, at the Javits Center!! But it's available in advance here, on my website's shop!! Also! I'm now taking orders for hand-painted, airbrush Night Business T-Shirts depicting Johnny Timothy (see attached)! The shirts are 80s-neon green, from American Apparel, and each one painted by expert fashion airbrush artist Jennifer Ginchereau! They are ... esspensive ($60 + shipping) and may take a few weeks to get to you (because Jen will be painting them as orders come in), but you'll no doubt be the coolest kid on the block. Order yours today! NY Comic Con this weekend!! Be sure to swing by our booth (1056), wave hello to the Nerdcore dudes, and punch my Mammal pals in the arm, to test their machoness. You'll find Nerdcore calendars (va-voom) n'other Nerdcore stuff for sale. Issues of Mammal, Mammal t-shirts and issues of Night Business will be for sale as well. Hope to see you there!! I'll sign copies of Night Biz for you."

The Bad Apple

Well, besides now having a Sparkplug Office, Tim Goodyear and I have opened a store in the front of the office (6340 SE Foster Rd.) called the Bad Apple. No website but we do have a blog:
http://thebadapplestore.blogspot.com/
We sell books, dvds, art and t-shirts. And we're located right next to Guapo Comics and Coffee. I expect you in the store soon. I'll be repainting the sign every 15 minutes.