Tom Kaczynski's Blog, page 9

Trans Tumblr

Over at the Tumblr parallel universe I’ve started a series of posts that excavates the source material of the architecture found in Beta Testing the Apocalypse. Follow that tumblr if you’re into that sort of thing. The first post was about Jan Maneval:

AV Club Beta Testing

The AV Club has the first review of Beta Testing the Apocalypse and it’s a pretty nice. Here’s a taste:

The story “Cozy Apocalypse,” which gives Kaczynski’s terrific anthology Beta Testing The Apocalypse (Fantagraphics) its name, is a case in point: In it, a married couple buys a house in the suburbs just before a natural disaster and a financial collapse hit back-to-back, and the pair snuggles up in their dream home, awaiting the end of the world that never comes. The piece is clearly commenting on the anxieties of today—global warming, economic strife, a generalized sense of disconnection from what’s reallyhappening—but none of it is literal, any more than the epic traffic jam that ends Kaczynski’s “100,000 Miles,” or the complex of grain silos that safeguards a global conspiracy in “Phase Transition.”

Read the rest here.

Beta Testing Beijing

Photo by Nicolas Grivel

Art from Beta Testing The Apocalypse (Fantagraphics) was recently on exhibit in Beijing. By complete coincidence the cover features the famous Rem Koolhaas CCTV building in the background:

Photo via.

 

New French Trans Review

A short review of the French translation of the Trans books appeared on Mediapart. I asked my now-living-in-France little sister to do a quick translation:

“These two “books” are curious objects, perhaps “booklet” is a more accurate word. Reversible and (double??), four stories that are in dialogue with each other and that complete each other, written by Tom Kaczynski, edited by the independent press Alter Comics. Taking the form of a mini comic, the subject is rooted in reality and draws inspiration from Pat Kane, Momus, Richard Florida, Heraclitus, Breton, and Orwell…to explore philosophical and economic concepts. The “autofiction” form serves as a point of departure for introspection. tom Kaczynski examines the world, and his immigrant identity, his life as an author, graphic artist, and human. He invokes nostalgia and modernity, the inherent change and immutability of things. A reflection on capitalism, wisdom, urbanization, information overload, and creation. A quest that is realized through illustrations. Almost a utopia.

Also, it has come to my attention that North American Francophiles interested in this edition can get it from Amazon.ca: Trans Alaska / Trans Sibérie and Trans Atlantide / Trans Utopie.

SPX 2012

It’s SPX time! I’ll be there with the whole Uncivilized Books spread. Come say hi! Details here.

Beta Testing the Apocalypse

I’ve been quiet about my new book, Beta Testing the Apocalypse (Fantagraphics), mainly because, until very recently, I was still working on finishing all the art & design for it. Fantagraphics has already announced on their site, where it is also available for pre-order (hint, hint). I’m very excited to officially announce it here. What’s in the book you ask?

It collects most of my work from MOME. Finally, a single place to see all those stories.
Most of my work there was black & white, so I took some time and colored all the stories. The book will be printed in two-colors throughout. A different Pantone color for each story.
A brand new story ‘The New’!
A full index. I’ve never seen a proper index in a comic-book (at least I can’t remember seeing one). I’ve always wanted to be able to look up concepts or even just drawings or sequences based on an index. It was really fun to put together. I’m hoping to start a trend here…

Over the last few months, I’ve been wanting to post some art and progress reports on the book. In the end there was little time for that. In a way this felt like I had a chance to one more last MOME story, and it’s also the last time I was MOMEd. Over the next couple of months, in anticipation of the release, I’m going to share a bunch of drawings, ideas and other goodies about the book. Stay tuned!

Trans France

I’ve always admired French comics, now I made one… sort of. This is something I should’ve blogged about months ago, but I got distracted by work on Beta Testing the Apocalypse. Way back in May, my Trans-series (Trans-Alaska, Siberia, Atlantis, Utopia) was published in two tiny hardcover volumes. The books are published by Alter Comics. Each one is a flip-book with two comics back to back. I re-lettered each volume and re-worked a bunch of the graphics & typography to match the translation. I’m really happy how it turned out and extremely excited to have a book in French! As far as I know there’s one French review. Any French readers out there why might have read it, please let me know what you think. I’m really curious how it plays out there.

This is also a kind of homecoming for me. I grew up on European comics (Thorgal, Valerian, Asterix, Lucky Luke, Kajko i Kokosz, Funky Koval, etc.) and I’m honored to have my own comics appear on European soil. Seeing my own work being translated, made me also realize how little European work makes it over the Atlantic to the US. It inspired me to try to bring European work state-side via my Uncivilized Books project. Some announcement about this coming real soon!

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Totalitarian Pop

I pilfered these from Graham Harman‘s blog. Graham is right, this is one of the best songs to emerge from an evil dictatorship.

I love both versions, but this second one opens up a Soviet sized nostalgia zone in my head… even though I’ve never heard this song before. All the notes this songs hits are familiar and mysterious at the same time.

If anyone is interested, I wrote about my my favorite Soviet song here.

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