comics news round-up:
Item! First things first. After a few months of following the reaction to the news about Jack Kirby’s children and their legal battle with Marvel over copyright to the characters co-created by their father, I’ve decided to provide a forum for people to express support for the Kirby cause and ask Marvel to do the right thing and at least give credit and some form of compensation for all the millions of dollars Kirby’s characters (Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, The Avengers, The X-Men) have generated. So I started a petition at change.org last week. I’m pretty gratified that over 150 awesome people have already signed it and am hopeful that hundreds more will do so. You can see the petition and read many great heartwarming comments here. Please read it and sign it if you agree with what we are trying to do.
Item! Ed Brisson has started a fundraising campaign to cover the cost of printing the third volume of his crime anthology comic, Murder Book.
Item! Last week’s big winner was Guy Delisle, who won the Best Book prize at the Angouleme Festival in France. Delisle’s comic strip diary of the festival is now online and is very charming. Day One. Day Two. (via D+Q)
Item! Speaking of the festival, Drawn and Quarterly’s Peggy Burns was also at Angouleme and has her own thorough diary with photos.
The big news from that report is that D+Q will be publishing a new book by Genevieve Castree: “Susceptible” in Fall 2012.
Item! Jesse Jacobs announced on Facebook that he has a new book coming out for TCAF. It’s called By This You Shall Know Him and will be published by Koyama Press. This is the cover. This is all I know.
Item! Seth’s essay about the design of The Collected Doug Wright is partially excerpted at The Comics Journal.
Item! Kevin Boyd covers the last day of the Dragon Lady comic shop in Toronto, and even carries some boxes. Although bittersweet, a new store in a unique location is emerging from the ashes. (The National Post covers the story as well.) I just remembered that I bought the giant Simon and Kirby Superheroes volume from Titan Books at the urging of Joe Kilmartin at FanExpo last year. Thanks Joe!
Item! Another Facebook sneak peak. Nina Bunjevac has announced she will be publishing a collection of her comics called Heartless through Conundrum Press for Fall 2012. The book will be previewed at TCAF. You can see a page of Nina’s art here and read her 2010 interview with Sequential here.
Item! Kenk made the newsletter of the Government of Slovenia.
Item! Roughs from Bryan Lee O’Malley’s next book.
Item! A touring exhibit of freedom-of-expression themed cartoons lands in Nova Scotia.