It's the First Saturday of the month, which means:
Please Hold For Dave Sim! For May 2020
Part 1: My kid had to interview a family member for school. Since I'm tired of her incessant questioning, and her mother was at work, and she ALREADY interviewed her four year old sister, I suggested she interview Dave.
So, five questions for Dave Sim from a nine year old:
"Aardvarks have been very good to me." I damn near pissed myself... (On her notes, she wrote down Dave's favorite Cerebus book as: "Vorman Vode" I'm gonna get Dave to work that name into a future Cerebus in Hell? issue.
Speaking of Cerebus in Hell?, gsquared asked (a while ago):
Is there any way to order CIH? one-shots besides dealing with a comic shop? Like, maybe ordering a pile of them direct from AV? I can't be bothered with the hassle of doing a special order, going to the shop, etc.
To reiterate the deal: Send Dave fifty bucks in your currency, either check, cash, or money order (you can get one at Wal-Mart) (I assume Dave assumes American, but he did say your currency) that address is:
AARDVARK-VANAHEIM Inc.
Box 1674 Stn. C
Kitchener ON N2G 4R2 CANADA And he'll sign and send you five bagged and boarded issues of Cerebus in Hell?
Offer expires at the end of the year.
DON'T send money for this through CerebusDownloads.com like you can to get a copy of The Strange Death of Alex Raymond
The short version, if you want a copy, mail a check for fifty dollars American to AARDVARK-VANAHEIM Inc.
Box 1674 Stn. C
Kitchener ON N2G 4R2 CANADA
Or, go to cerebusdownloads.com and click the one time donation button (there are three of them $1 $5 $10, click any of them, and adjust the quantity to $75 (or $80 if you're using the $10 one,) (the price is higher because cerebusdownloads.com uses Canadian monies...) Then send an email to eddiesdoar@gmail.com to let him know how you want your name spelled.
Part 3: Steve Peters asked:
Hey Matt! Hope I got this in on time.Dave answers this one over the next three videos.
BTW, Nate Oberstein just bought a huge set of comics from my back catalog, including one of my few copies of Racecar Comics #4. I think it's the first I ever sold! I included a handwritten copy of your translation of Sparky's monologue on Page 6.
Anyway, here's my question for Dave:
Hi Dave! Hope you are staying safe out there. I was struck by the Synoptic Jesus' assertion that "If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me", variations of which appear in Matthew 10:38, Matthew 16:24, Mark 8:34, Luke 9:23, and Luke 14:27.
The thing that struck me was that no one knew or expected how Jesus would end up (or the two Jesus' in your view). Perhaps "take up your cross" was a common saying at the time, and of course everyone knew what it meant.
Do you have any thoughts on His statement, and why it appears in the Synoptic Gospels and not the Johannine?
---Steve Peters
And Dave sent me a fax of all that:
I know you all needed to see that...
Part 6: Jeff Seiler asks: My question/s for Dave this month: Hi, Dave! I'm wondering, did you know when you finished JAKA'S STORY that you were going to bookend that with RICK'S STORY (much like you bookended WOMEN with GUYS? And, if IIRC, you printed your multi-part essay entitled "Mama's Boy" in the back of the book during the RICK'S STORY run. We never saw Rick interacting with his mum, but Snatcher was sort of a surrogate mother to him (in a very manipulative, bad way), right?
Part 7: Some back and forth between Joe Fiore and myself:
Joe Fiore asked:
Hi,
I wanted to reach out as I've
recently been asked twice by two different people to offer an opinion on what
appear to be two Gene Day recreations. To me, they look like recreations he was
commissioned to do prior to his passing in 1982.
Both recreate Infantino's work on
Star Wars, and both images (while different) seem to have been produced in
roughly the same size/scale to Marvel Pin-ups from Marvel Star Wars UK Weekly.
There's some oddities about the work that jumped out at me right away that
indicate these weren't published, such as differences in line art, and just the
fact that he isn't credited for doing the work, Infantino and Wiacek were. It's
also kind of odd to me that he would be doing recreations of work by other
artists, and while I think some attempt was made to attribute, seem confusing
to the owners, who believe them to be original works by Infantino because his
name is embellished on the work.
Anyhow the reason why I wanted to
contact Dave is because I am aware of a Star Wars portfolio Gene Day worked on,
and intended to release under A&V (of which I understand some made it out,
before Lucas shut it down) - I wondered if Dave knew of any work like what I'm
describing being produced by Gene for the portfolio, and/or if this is just one
of those instances where the portfolio being promoted in Cerebus 1 might have
created some commissioned work for Gene to render these iconic images for fans.
I'd appreciate if you could pass
this info along to Mr Sim directly, and as these are not in my custody, I am
not in a position to share the images with anyone. I have only been given
permission by the owners to speak directly with Mr. Sim at this point should he
need any additional information about them.
Any help on the above-mentioned
would be greatly appreciated.
Joe
I replied:
Hello Mr. Fiore,
I'll ask Dave, but I have a feeling
that he is going to want to see the images. If you could send them, I'd pass
them on to Dave with the understanding that they are not for distribution, or
publication, just for review.
And:
Hi again,
Rereading your email, I'm wondering
if these are images produced for the Marvel Star Wars series. Gene worked on
the book with Infantino.
But again, I'd have to see them to
have any idea.
Joe:
Hi Matt,
What I can share at the moment is
what the original source works were for both images.
The first was published originally
in the oversized Marvel Special Edition Star Wars #2, as rear cover art. That
was as far as I know attributed to Infantino and Wiacek circa 1977. It was then
used (the source for the recreation) in Marvel Star Wars Weekly #104 as "A
Marvel Mighty Marvel Pin-Up." What I can say is the recreated art is
roughly the same size (slightly taller) than the page I attached, but has
noticeably different shading/hatching/line art on the shaded area of the
glove/thumb, has two additional TIE Fighters (which I've circled in green in
the location), and does not have the Might Marvel Title, nor does it have the
MTFBWY callout box.
The other page is also a Pin-up
used for Star Wars UK Weekly 113, which I've attached also as a reference. Of
note, it too is a recycled image which originally appeared on Marvel Star Wars
#11 of the original US series. On this, you can notice some differences in the
line-art, but it also includes the titling, and for whatever reason, Gene used
a colourized gradient on the cover, which more clearly appeared to me something
rendered for a fan creation, as the published rendered was in black & white
and would have been greyed out if using Gene's image as the source. That one
used what appears to be done in brush work, and again nowhere are either of
these reprinted images ever attributed to Gene Day, they are attributed to
Infantino and Wiacek.
I'm not sure to what extent Mr Sim
was involved with publishing Gene's portfolio, but he should recognize if these
images were intended for it as they are pretty iconic. Also, if we are using
the UK Weekly series as a timeline point, then it would appear these images
were rendered sometime between 1980-1982. As far as I know, and from the scans
shared online, these two images were not part of the portfolio. Both these
works are in collectors hands located in the UK, so I'm not sure at this point
that there are any ties to published works at all, but found that odd given
Gene lived in Canada, and I'm just wanting to understand their context, as they
look like commissioned recreations to me.
Joe
Part 8: Continuing the discussion of Gene Day and Star Wars.
Part 9: And since Dave doesn't make a dime off of the previous topic, we turn to the Kickstarter for the remastered Cerebus #1, which had gone live ten minutes before Dave called.
Part 10: Dave continues discussing the Kickstarter, and then answers Keith Callbeck question: While you are asking, I'm curious if Dave is still using the heavy art board. It was interesting to see how different it was from the more light cardboard type that is the usual.
Part 11: Dave answers Dave Kopperman's question:
pulling from the FA interview, Dave says this about inking: "An inker, to me, is a very functional, mechanical kind of thing. [...] Gerhard's not an inker, Gerhard's an artist." Which sounds to me like at the time, Dave made a pretty clear distinction between inking and art (ala the 'Chasing Amy' running joke of everyone calling the inker a 'tracer'). I wonder if Dave still agrees with the underlying principle of this, given his own focus for the last fifteen years, with his visual efforts going to an exploration of the great photorealist inking techniques - with much of his own work literally tracing images and then deploying his technique on it. I personally have a very broad definition of art, and I do think that his documented journey of the medium (which I recall first seeing hints of in a piece he did for the Comics Journals "Cartoonists on Comics" special) ABSOLUTELY falls under the umbrella of art, but...
In other words, is inking art? Is only SOME inking art? And if there is a distinction, Is intent a big part of that distinction?
Part 12: The big finish. I ask Dave a question that's been on my personal list of questions to ask since the first one of these: Dave's not here, man! And then I preview the Remastered Cerebus #1.
Alright, thanks for watching!
Next Time: Oliver and the reason you're NOT gonna mow the lawn or clean the gutters tomorrow...
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