David Chelsea's Blog, page 23

This Weekend At Wizard World

Starting today at 3 PM, you can come see me at Wizard World Portland Comics Convention. I will be selling copies of all my books, as well as showing my one copy of my latest book, SLEEPLESS:

David Chelsea is watching: Unreal: Season 1

starring Shiri Appleby

I will also be selling various pieces of original art, and prints of some of my fan art, like this Rose Quartz piece:

You can find me in Artist’s Alley at Table B13. Here it is on Wizard World’s ultra-modern interactive map:

As mentioned before, I will be on an indie comics panel hosted by Danny Fingeroth on Sunday afternoon at 2:30.

Oh, and I’ll be giving out a free Voodoo Donut with purchase, while supplies last, just like last year:

Wizard World Portland 2016

Oregon Convention Center

777 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.

Portland , OR 97232

SHOW HOURS

Friday, Feb 19, 2016 – 3pm – 8pm

Saturday, Feb 20, 2016 – 10am – 7pm

Sunday, Feb 21, 2016 – 10am – 4pm

The Secret Stash: More Letters To Mom

It’s the Third Thursday of the month, the day that I post The Secret Stash on my Patreon page– that is, sketches, reference photos, old flyers, and other ephemera from my files.

David Chelsea Is Reading: Barnaby

by Crockett Johnson

My mother, Lolita Marie Celsi, has been doing a lot of house cleaning lately, and keeps finding old letters with decorated envelopes I sent her and other members of my family over the years. Last month I posted a batch from the time she was getting a degree in English As A Second Language in Honolulu a few years ago; now she has brought forth a bundle mostly from the 1980s and 1990s.

This isometric view of my apartment kitchen in New York decorates a letter sent in 1985. I think the post office has tightened up its rules, and that a hexagon-shaped envelope would never make it through the mail today:

This letter to my sister Teresa from 1980 or so depicts a number of old girlfriends, almost-girlfriends, and what I might call aspirational girlfriends– which explains the presence of Farrah Fawcett and Bo Derek:

It’s not just envelopes either; one thing that turned up in this batch is a decorated 45 RPM single sleeve drawn in what looks like 1974 or so, to judge from the presence of Happy Days-era Ronny Howard and Jim Croce:

Mom is an artist herself, and has just launched a website to sell her oil paintings, many of which are quite fine (the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree). I myself am fond of these two landscapes, and this still life of peppers:

Want to see more? Click on this link to the website!

Also on Patreon this week, the latest page of my continuing webcomic ARE YOU BEING WATCHED? In this week’s installment, Mugg stars on a Reality TV show in which he is co–owner of a comic shop. An Eisner-nominated alternative cartoonist, desperate for cash, has brought in a supposedly valuable vintage comic book to sell. Mugg’s partner does not appear to be impressed:

Patreon is a reader-supported site, but all comics content is free. If you like what you see, tell your friends, and $how Your $upport!

Bernie V. Hillary In Willamette Week

Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton caricatures in this week’s issue of Willamette Week- my first work for the paper since 1978! Thanks to WW Art Director Julie Showers for bringing me back.

Here’s the article, in which local candidates are asked which of the two they support.

David Chelsea Is Listening To: Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania

by Erik Larson

Just In Time For Valentines Day, The Modern Love Podcast

The Modern Love Column in The New York Times, which I illustrated from 2004 to 2008, is probably the most visible gig I have ever had. Since 2008, the column has been illustrated by other artists, but all of my old columns can still be found online.

David Chelsea Is Watching: Veep: Season 1

starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus

Recently, the Modern Love column has extended into podcasts, in which the pieces are read aloud by actors. Each podcast page displays the original Times illustration as a graphic under the audio window. So far, all the illustrations have been by my successors, including this week’s. However, The Times recently got in touch to ask me for permission to reuse one illustration, and they said that there may be others. I will blog again when the podcast with that illustration appears.

In the meantime, you can watch this CBS News report about the Modern Love podcast, which features many of my illustrations as scrolling graphic elements. At its point I don’t know if any of those illustrations will appear as part of the podcast, but I promise to keep blog readers informed.

INDY COMICS CREATORS TELL ALL AT WIZARD WORLD!

Next week I’ll be making my annual appearance at Wizard World Portland, doing the usual things: selling books, signing comics, and chatting amiably with my many fans. One highlight is sure to be a Sunday appearance on a panel hosted by comics writer and historian Danny Fingeroth. The title is INDY COMICS CREATORS TELL ALL, and my fellow panelists will include three very talented artists: Dean Haspiel, Barry Deutsch, and Lucy Bellwood. You should take that “Tell All” promise with a grain of salt, however– the caliber of mechanical pencil I use is a closely guarded professional secret.

David Chelsea is watching: Unreal: Season 1

starring Shiri Appleby

Here’s the official notice from the program schedule:

SUNDAY, 2/21

2:30-3:15 PM INDY COMICS CREATORS TELL ALL with BILLY DOGMA’S DEAN HASPIEL, HEREVILLE’S BARRY DEUTSCH, DAVID CHELSEA IN LOVE’S DAVID CHELSEA & BAGGYWRINKLES’ LUCY BELLWOOD [A Will Eisner Week Prequel] (ROOM B110)

The model of comics creators tethered to one or two major publishers, working on adventures of corporately-owned characters is no longer the only game in town. Many of the top talents in comics work either exclusively on their own material, while others work both sides of the street, alternating independent work with mainstream assignments done in their own distinctive styles. In this lead-up to the worldwide comics and graphic novel celebration, “Will Eisner Week,” speaking about how they have forged their own paths (and reading from their work), are some of the most distinctive creators in comics today: Dean Haspiel (Spider-Man; Billy Dogma), Barry Deutsch (Hereville: Hereville: How Mirka Met a Meterorite), David Chelsea (David Chelsea in Love; Everybody Gets it Wrong! and Other Stories) and Lucy Bellwood (Baggywrinkles; Down to the Seas Again). The panel is moderated by Danny Fingeroth (The Rough Guide to Graphic Novels; Studs Terkel’s Working).

Danny Fingeroth
Barry Deutsch
Lucy Bellwood
Dean Haspiel
C’est moi!

I hope to see you there!

Wizard World Portland 2016

Oregon Convention Center

777 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.

Portland , OR 97232

SHOW HOURS

Friday, Feb 19, 2016 – 3pm – 8pm

Saturday, Feb 20, 2016 – 10am – 7pm

Sunday, Feb 21, 2016 – 10am – 4pm

Comics From The Archives on Patreon: MAX THE TURTLE IN HOT WATER

It is the Second Thursday of the month, when I post comics from my archives on Patreon. This month’s story comes from 1989, and was originally drawn in my sketchbook. MAX THE TURTLE IN HOT WATER is, as the subtitle promises, “a true story”. Max was a diamondback terrapin that Eve and I kept as a pet when we first moved in together in New York, and this story tells how he met his end.

David Chelsea is reading: Borb

by Jason Little

Diamondback Terrapin

I think I had better explain the story in detail, because the comic itself is something of a failed experiment in wordless narrative– the only time I have ever attempted this particular kind of storytelling, apart from the much later 24 Hour Comic BINGO THE CAT.

At the beginning, Eve and I are about to leave on a trip, and are leaving the key with our friends Lisa and Chris, who have a new baby. Eve shows them around the apartment, demonstrating the various appliances.

Lastly, Eve introduces them to Max, our turtle, who lives in the bathtub. In pantomime, she explains how to feed Max shrimp, and how to change the water in the bathtub, stressing that it must be cold (in reality, we kept Max in a tank, and only put him in the bathtub when we were changing his water. This was my way of streamlining the story.).

Once we have left on our trip, Lisa goes for a walk with the baby, and tells Chris to change the water in the bathtub, as it has become smelly. In the middle of changing the water, Chris goes to answer the phone, not noticing that he has let the water run hot, not cold.

Suddenly noticing the clock, Chris is further distracted as he remembers that he is due at a professional engagement, and begins dressing in his clown suit (This part is real. Chris really was a professional mime– though he preferred the term “silent fool”.). He walks out the door, having completely forgotten about Max in the bathtub.

Max is overcome by the hot water and dies, and the water in the bathtub overflows (our bathtub had been installed by the previous tenant, and lacked an overflow drain). Water eventually drains into the downstairs neighbor’s apartment, and he goes to find the super.

Both of them break into our apartment by pushing the air conditioner out of a window,

and go to shut off the water in the overflowing tub, where they are puzzled to find a cooked turtle at the bottom.

There is a bit more to the story than that. Max came with the apartment when we moved in, and had originally belonged to the previous tenants, Sunday and Sam, who let us take over their lease when they moved to Los Angeles. Max was something of a rescue pet– Sam had bought him out of the tank at a Chinatown market, where he and his fellow terrapins were being sold as the ingredients for soup. One of the conditions of our taking over the lease (the apartment itself was a converted loft several times the size of the apartments Eve and I were moving out of, and at a reasonable rent- quite a prize in the crowded New York real estate market) was that we promised to take good care of Max. I believe we even signed a contract, with mock solemnity. His soupy death at the bottom of a hot bathtub had the ring of cosmic irony.

(By the way, Lisa and Chris were completely distraught and apologetic about the incident. Chris was STILL apologizing when he came to visit Eve and I in Portland last year. However, truth be told, the death of Max The Turtle came as a bit of relief to us. Taking care of him had been a real chore.)

Little of that comes through in my comic. In fact, most of the few people who have read this story find it impossible to follow (hence the lengthy synopsis). I MIGHT be able to pull off such a narrative challenge now, but at the time I simply lacked the comics chops to tell a story clearly without words. The story went to the bottom of a drawer, and has never appeared anywhere– until now.

This project did give me a chance to experiment with borderless panels. I had some fun also using a variety of different zipatone textures to create backgrounds. If memory serves, I first made several photocopies of my sketchbook drawings, and then copied zipatone texture onto one set of copies, then cut out the portions I wanted to be toned, and pasted those areas over the untoned copies, then copied THAT. Such were the stratagems cartoonists employed in the days before Photoshop made it all much easier.

Also on Patreon this week, the latest page of my all-digital continuing webcomic ARE YOU BEING WATCHED? This week, Mugg finds himself on a new Reality TV show, Cellar Dwellers, which covers the same territory as the Kevin Smith-produced program Comic Book Men. It opens with Mugg getting a visit from a certain Eisner-nominated alternative cartoonist:

Patreon is a reader-supported site, but all comics content is free. If you like what you see, tell your friends, and $how Your $upport!

RIP, Bob Elliott

Decorated envelope from a letter to Geoff Seaman, 1975

First Thursday: More Fan Art

It’s the First Thursday of the month, when I post Fan Art on my Patreon page.

This month, it’s two more action figure portraits, done using the Camera Lucida, this figure of Mrs. Potato Head cosplaying as Wonder Woman, and a bubblehead of Rey, a character from the recent film Star Wars: The Force Awakens:

David Chelsea is listening to:

America

by America

There has been something of controversy among Star Wars fans over the character Rey. Feminist critics have alleged that Rey is underrepresented as an action figure relative to the male characters in the film, and some believe that there is an active conspiracy to suppress her image on the grounds that “boys won’t buy girl toys”. Maybe there is something to this, as this bobble head was the ONLY figure of her I was able to find in stores.

Also this week on Patreon, a new page of my continuing webcomic ARE YOU BEING WATCHED? This week has Mugg between adventures, finding the devil at work on routine mischief:

I devilishly repurposed this week’s routine mischief from this popular looping gif:

Patreon is a reader-supported site, but all comics content is free. If you like what you see, tell your friends, and $how Your $upport!

3-point Perspective in PhotoShop: The Video!

Thursday’s hangout is now archived on YouTube! 25 scintillating minutes of 3-point perspective! Watch it here!

Belated RIP, David Bowie

I somehow had the idea that I had never drawn him, but then I found these two drawings in a box of coquille board originals. Almost undoubtedly, these were drawn for The New York Observer.