Mark Connery, Jesse Jacobs Headline Strip Collection
by BK Munn
The popular and artistically innovative 4PANEL comic strip project, launched in 2012 as an online feature and as part of Mark Laliberte’s Carousel magazine, is being turned into a series of books with the aid of a Kickstarter fundraising drive. Editor Laliberte is promising an annual collection of strips with the added bonus of a specially-commissioned set of strips by four unique artists. For the first book, he has recruited Mark Connery, Jesse Jacobs, Mark Laliberte himself, and Anuj Shresthais, and has even had critic Sean Rogers write an Afterword. He’s asking $5000 to get the book off the ground, with many bonus rewards, including original art, for generous backers.
Since its inception, the series has featured a who’s who of alt and avant grade cartoonists and conceptual visual artists. In Laliberte’s own words, the 4PANEL project was launched “to reinvigorate the traditional four-panel strip form,” adding, “Despite its lofty beginnings in the annals of comics history, this once compelling A/B/C/D delivery system has degraded over the years into something that is predictable, humour-tinted and formulaic.” You should check out the Kickstarter page for more details and thoughts from the creator, or watch the video below: