Wednesday, July 22, 2015

(Pierre Feuille Ciseux Is Back) Want An Amazing Artists Book? (Pierre Feuille Ciseux Is Back)

Artists Book "Hercules" from PFC3, Arc et Senans, 2011

I first did the unique artist residency that is Pierre Feuille Ciseaux in 2011, just after the publication of Big Questions. I went to a tiny village in France with 19 other artists from 6 or 8 different countries – almost all complete strangers – and worked on structured collaborative comics experiments for a week. I had no idea what to expect going in, and was probably a little skeptical. But it was amazing. Conceptual comics Summer camp in the best possible way.

In 2013 Zak Sally (another 2011 attendee) and June Misserey had the idea to bring PFC to Minneapolis, and I ended up helping make it happen, along with ChiFouMi, Barb Schulz and the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. And again, it worked out better than any of us could have hoped. Well, now it's back. Artists will begin arriving a week from today. June is already on the ground.
PFC Artists Book "Some Breath King" from PFC4, Minneapolis, 2013


We've got luminaries like Charles Burns and Jillian Tamaki joining us this year along with experimentalists like Aidan Koch and underground heroes like Laura Park. The full list is below, and it again includes a slew of European artists like Dominique Goblet, Elvis Studios' Helge Reumann and one representative of the lively Mexico City comics scene, Ines Estrada.

Artists Book from mini PFC (4.5), Saint Claude, France 2014

Every iteration of PFC produces an editioned, hand-made artist's book with contributions from all of the artists. That's true again this year but for the first time we are making the book (screenprinted cover, risograph interior), along with a narrative comics screenprint available to the public. We should have been doing this all along, of course, but this year there was a slight shortfall in funding to bring some of the European artists over, and so our hand has been forced, for the better. So last week we launched a Kickstarter, which functions basically as a presale of the book and print.

Go here to find out more, to get a copy, and to give us a hand.

Here's a list of whose work will grace both the book and the print:

Josh Bayer (US)
Marc Bell (CAN)
Gabrielle Bell (US)
Charles Burns (US)
Rachel Deville (FR)
Inés Estrada (MEX)
Edie Fake (US)
Pierre Ferrero (FR)
Dominique Goblet (BE)
Sammy Harkham (US)
Aidan Koch (US)
Antoine Marchalot (FR)
Pascal Matthey (SW)
Jean-Christophe Menu (FR)
Anders Nilsen (US)
Jean-Michel / Nylso (FR)
Laura Park (US)
Helge Reumann (SW)
Zak Sally (US)
Jillian Tamaki (CAN)




The LA Times likes it

The LA Times did a really nice, perceptive piece on Poetry is Useless, here.

Tuesday, July 21, 2015

New Show at Lula

While I was on book tour last week Marianne Fairbanks oversaw the installation of the new show at Lula in Chicago. The show includes work by Katara Mallory and his mentor Leslie Baum. Leslie teaches art to students with developmental disabilities at the Nathan and Kiyoko Lerner foundation (Nathan Lerner was Henry Darger's landlord, and discovered that work after Darger's death). Katara is her student. He does drawings based on screen shots of Star Wars. Here are a few images. If you're in Chicago in the next couple of months you should go check them out. A couple of Baum's pieces are below that from a studio visit a few weeks back, including something that looks for all the world like the Deathstar. Influence moves in circles, perhaps.



And Leslie Baum:


Monday, July 6, 2015

Marc Bell just arrived in Minneapolis for our tour kick-off on Wednesday at Magers and Quinn (7pm). He brought a pile of his @#$%ing awesome new risograph book Boutique Mag #1. Apparently there are only 27 copies left and his etsy site is currently getting repo'd, so if you want one you have to come to one of our events and listen to us read poetry.




Wednesday, July 1, 2015

Behind Enemy Lines

Books won't be in stores for another two weeks, but you can get one tonight at the Poetry Foundation in Chicago, the first stop of the tour. 6:30pm, catered by my alma mater, Lula Cafe. Also with Erika L. Sánchez and Amy Newman. Music by KSRA.

Hopefully all parties can maintain civility.