Off to ArtFest

The whole family is hitting the road tomorrow. We're heading to the final ArtFest up in Port Townsend, Washington. I'm teaching one all day workshop and setting up a table of my work at the vender's night. Then I'll get to spend the rest of the weekend exploring the hills and beaches, giving Griffin piggy back rides, and hanging out with everyone. There's so many people I can't wait to see up there. Teesha and Tracy Moore know how to put on amazing events, and their attitude and views on creativity are the most refreshing around. I'm sad that it'll be the final ArtFest, but I'm excited to see what they're going to do next. They're always up to something. The picture above has to do with the class I'm teaching, and it also has everything to do with my book. I'll write more about that sometime.

Sparkplug Forever!

Sparkplug Books is doing a fundraiser over at indiegogo.com to help them publish their next three books: www.indiegogo.com/sparkplugbooks I highly recommend going to the site and checking out the excellent short video they made about Dylan Williams and his vision for Sparkplug. Dylan died last September of Leukemia and his wife and friends are hoping to publish the three books that he was working on releasing as well as hopefully continuing on to publish more books in the future. Sparkplug is a publisher that's really important to me. It's done a lot to redefine what comics can be, and helped give voice to unique and unusual artists. Dylan's absence has left a huge hole in the world of art comics, but I love the idea that Sparkplug could keep publishing new books for years to come.

Reading for Sparkplug

I'm going to be reading from one of my comics at the Waypost tonight at 3120 N. Williams in Portland, Oregon as part of a fundraiser event for Sparkplug Comics, to help them to continue publishing awesome comics after the passing of our good friend and Sparkplug founder, Dylan Williams. They're raising money to print the next few books that Dylan had already planned to put out, and they're all books I've been excited about ever since Dylan first told me he wanted to publish them. Sean Christensen, Julia Gfrorer, and Aron Nels Steinke are also reading. All of them are great cartoonists and I'm looking forwards to seeing what they're going to read tonight. The event goes from 7-10pm.

facing facebook with my face

My Wife finally convinced me to get a facebook account. The above werewolf child combed his hair to celebrate. Do you want to "like" me? http://www.facebook.com/TheoEllsworth

giant comics and secret books

The Understanding Monster is the comics series I've been quietly working on for quite awhile now. If all goes well, the first installment will come out in October. Finishing it on time is my ultimate art goal this year. This book begins a story I'm hoping to tell for a long time to come. Making this comic has been the weirdest and most exciting artistic process I've experienced by far. I've been pretty secretive about it so far, but as I get closer to finishing it, I'll probably start talking about it more.

This is one small panel from a page in the book depicting some room mutation. There's a lot of room mutation going on.
This is a book of stream-of-conscious drawings and writings I made leading up to Griffin's birth. He was actually born the day after I finished the last page. Filling this book was a valuable process for me, and I feel like it mentally prepared me to become a dad. I haven't really shown it to anyone. I should probably make it into a little publication at some point, when I have time.
This is the back cover. The mummy and the library will also be seen in The Understanding Monster.

one page spread from My Thesis on Multi-Dimensional Brain Travel.

Logic Storm is another stream-of-conscious drawing book I made while trying to get my head around some of the concepts I've been working with in The Understanding Monster. It's a "Thinking" book, and making it helped me figure out a lot of things that I couldn't have figured out just by thinking. It's weird, my first instinct when I finish something like this is to put it away and not show it to anyone, but I'm also trying to make a living with my art so I can keep making art all the time. My desire to share my art with the world and my weirdo reclusive side are constantly at odds. Secret Acres offered to put this out as a pamphlet comic, and I'd like to take them up on it. I'll probably make a new cover if I do.
This is a 12 page comic I made for an upcoming End Of The World themed anthology that's going to be published in English and Spanish. I decided to fold and staple my drawing paper and work on both sides of each page so that the original became an actual book. I made a color cover, mostly just for myself, but if I can get around to it, I'd like to make it in to a little handmade mini comic as well.

Thanks for looking.

doorstep arrivals

It's been feeling like progress is slow on all the projects I've been juggling, so it's nice to suddenly get a bunch of things in the mail to remind me that I've actually been up to a lot. I just recieved the awesome publication that went with the group show I was in at 12Mail Gallery in Paris, France and it includes a big fold-out print of oe of my pieces from the show.

I also just got a nice stack of Space Cadets stickers in the mail. I'm planning on including them with orders from my Etsy shop until they're gone.
The newest release from Space Cadets just arrived as well. ASC TMA-1!