MoCCA came and went. Kinda glad its over in a way, although I still haven’t caught up on sleep. If I didn’t have school, I would have gladly stayed home. The MoCCA Art Fest itself didn’t tire me out. Actually, it was staying up all night working on the latest Psycho Bunny mini issue that did it. By the time I had arrived at the fest itself, I was pretty much zombified. At my table I practiced the art of sleeping with my eyes open.
It was around this point that I swore never, ever again will I attempt to pump out a self published issue within a 24 hour period. These might be empty words though. Somehow I can see myself doing another 24 hour art marathon.
If that wasn’t enough, I found myself sketching this despite only getting three hours of shut eye:
At this point I had become a mean, not so lean drawing machine. Still amazed that I was able to sketch while suffering from sleep deprivation. The piece itself, done on illustration board with Dewitt brand pencils was for a collaboration between me and artist/writer/inker/podcaster Peter Palmiotti. He’s done stuff for Marvel, DC, Image, Valiant and numerous independent titles. When he asked me to collaborate on this, I considered it an honor.
My own influences have always been more of the Fantagraphics Books style. What really got me into comics was the likes of Los Hernandez Brothers (Xamie and Gilbert) and Peter Bagge. I’ve been reading titles from these two parties since the early ’90s. Got dog-earred copies of their comics to prove this.
Yeah, I’m getting all sentimental here. Meeting both Hernandez Brothers last year, and Peter Bagge this year reminded me of why I dug comics in the first place. Also reminded me of why I put up with various nonsense over the past few years. Its due to my love of this medium. Honestly, if it wasn’t for these two, I would have never been a comicbook fan in the first place. When I was a child I read comics, mostly Harvey titles, Rupert The Bear, Archie, Peanuts, along with various newspaper strips. Yet it wasn’t until the late ’80s/early ’90s that I fell in love with what comics truly had to offer. After discovering those two, I explored different titles, like Sandman, Joe Matt’s Peepshow, Omaha The Cat Dancer, some Robert Crumb stuff, etc. In the end, I always went back to L&R and Hate. So if anything, you can always blame Hernandez Brothers and Peter Bagge.
Back to MoCCA. It was a bit slower for me than it was last year, but still managed to sell some stuff.
Here’s some more photos from this past weekend:
Still like MoCCA Art Fest better than some of the more mainstream comic cons. Probably because with the Alternative cons, its more mellow, and focuses more on the artists than numerous collector items.
Anyway…MoCCA was fun as always. Before I left, I swiped a poster from the wall, an advert for some Peter Bagge exhibit over at the Scott Eder gallery. Still got ethics, so I waited until the weekend was over until I took it. And with that, until next time…
*Photos by Ben Herman & Myself
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