Tag: james sturm

Yep, it's our annual survey of the comics landscape, from the mainstream to the indies and everything in between. Each year we send out surveys to as wide a swath of comics pros around the world as we can muster...among the answers you'll find lots of news of 2015 projects, predictions of the year ahead...and right off the bat some startling news from Jeff Trexler about a possible legal bombshell in 2015...and the return of Casey from James Sturm's epochal comic strip "The Sponsor." Hold on to your hats and let's get going.

On Monday, James Sturm, cartoonist and director of the Center for Cartoon Studies, posted a cartoon at The Nib called "The Sponsor". I'm sure if you are a cartoonist you've already read it, since it was the talk of the town for a few days. Basically it concerns cartoonists, jealousy, the low bar for success, anxiety over one's abilities, tumblr hits, Kickstarter and more. All in 24 panels. I'd call that a good job. The basic conceit is that as in various 12-step programs, cartoonists have sponsors they can call in moments of stress. A young cartoonist named Casey calls his sponsor, Alan, in the middle of the night to fret about another cartoonist named Tessa who has a six figure Kickstarter, a line out the door at a Rocketship signing, and a book deal with D&Q. Tessa's success sends Casey into such a tizzy that he has to work things out and consider grad school, despite Alan's insistence that Crumb never thought about hits. And despite his "stay strong" rhetoric to Casey, Alan soon picks up the phone to call his OWN sponsor.

I just arrived at SPX and the thrill of excitement over comics is a palpable thing, as the young and the young at heart (Saw Jules Feiffer walking around) gather to talk about what they love....

COMICS! remember that? First Second has announced its Winter '15 slate, which includes not only the LONG AWAITED new book by Scott McCloud, but new books by Jay Hosler, James Sturm, Andi Watson and the...

  What a great idea for a comic programming focus: this year's Small PressE Expo, to be held September 13-14 in Bethesda, MD, will spotlight the history of alt-weekly comics, a powerful if now vanished,...