While the Canadian scene might be small by our neighbors example, it is still made up of many hundreds of Creators. It’s growing fast, and these days there’s a strong contingent trying to keep track of the numbers.

The Fabler Blog’s own Kevin de Vlaming has been putting out some great interviews, just was looking at the site and there’s a lot of new stuff up since the last time i had time to browse. Along with this look at the 2010 Joe Shuster Award Nominees, Here’s 4 interviews I’ve not read yet myself.
I met Kelly Tindall myself at the Montreal Comic Con last year, charming guy. Been overworked and forgetting to look him up outside of working context. A little over a month ago Kevin talked to him at length.

He answers his phone and asks me to hold while he turns off his background music – Judas Priest, because he says listening to heavy metal while he illustrates helps keep his mind from wandering. Something about the pacifying voice of Rob Halford. “I’ve always loved comics, ever since I was a little kid. Again, the small town thing; my parents’ friends ran kind of like a supermarket/convenience store, and when they used to return comics they’d rip the covers off and just send those back. So they’d end up with hundreds and hundreds of coverless comics in these big long boxes. They’d give me like four or five hundred a shot – old stuff like the origin of Galactus reprints, Alf comics, Justice Society, that sort of thing.”

Marta Chudolinska is one of this years Doug Wright Award nominees, her book Back + Forth: A Novel in 90 Linocuts is one of the rare examples of a graphic novel that proves the medium is not strictly speaking, a hybrid of words and pictures, but a visual story telling system. They had a nice long talk about it.

“I think the best part about it, Is that people can bring their own interpretations to the story, and see something that maybe I didn’t intend or connect to something that I didn’t think was there. I also like the potential for emotional resonance – it’s sort of like when you’re adding words to something, you’re taking away from the power of the image.”

Colleen MacIsaac is an eclectic and diverse artist doing some lovely work in several mediums including mini comics, and has one of those studios i really want to go have tea in. Her painted illustrations really caught my eye.

“I originally pitched Kate and Bradbury for the Atlantic Filmmaker’s Coop One Minute Film Scholarship , which is a really great program where people who have never made a film before get a chance to learn all the steps involved in making a 16mm black and white film.” – “The idea originally germinated in the new bicycle that I had purchased recently and the people who fly kites on Citadel Hill here in Halifax, which is up the street from our house. It was a definite learning experience, but I had a lot of fun with it and I’m happy how it turned out.”

And Aaron Leighton is an Illustrator with a fun style, not really a comic artist at all, but has a playful post impressionist cartoony way of drawing/painting that’s quite lovely. Kevin talked to him about influences and proses, and what he’s been doing.

“I usually start by putting my head in my hands and thinking “How the hell am I going to solve this one?” That blank sheet can be terrifying. But despite the fact that I often find conceptualizing difficult, it always works out. Sometimes it helps to leave the studio and give your eyes new stuff to look at, thereby cutting through the feedback loop of the mind to allow it to come up with ideas instead.”

Links
The Fabler Blog
Aaron Leighton
Colleen MacIsaac
Marta Chudolinska
Kelly Tindall