Larry Marder on Facebook!

Yeah, yeah, I know--it took me long enough.

Anyway....I'm on Facebook here (revised).

Happy Birthday to my beautiful, good-natured wife, Cory!

There are many things in this world that make my wife Cory oh so happy.

One is being amongst elephants in the wild.

Above is one of Cory's elephant sketches that often decorate her notes and cards.

Another is her association with A&K.

Below is Cory enjoying a cup of coca tea at the Monasterio Hotel, in Cuzco, Peru.

Happy Birthday Cory.

I love you more than any words can possibly say.

Larry Marder Interview @ Newsarama!

Thanks to Michael C. Lorah there is a great Larry Marder interview on Newsarama today.

Plus there are some preview pages to the upcoming Dark Horse Beanworld Holiday Special.

My thanks to everyone at Newsarama and Dark Horse that made sure that this piece came out as cool as it has!

Neil Gaiman/Larry Marder drawing up for auction at CBLDF!

The press release says:

The CBLDF celebrates the 20th Anniversary of Neil Gaiman's landmark
creation Sandman with an auction of incredible original art!

Up for grabs are exciting pieces of Sandman memorabilia, including
individual works from the 20th Anniversary Poster by Colleen Doran, Mark
Buckingham, Richard Case, Jill Thompson and more! Also included are art jams
featuring Neil Gaiman and special guest artists like Mike Mignola, Paul Pope,
Jeff Smith, Eduardo Risso, Darwyn Cooke, Amanda Conner, and many others! We are
also offering a special convention premium from 2004's Fiddler's Green
convention, and a 1994 copy of The Comics Journal with Neil on the cover!
To bid on these items, go here!

Ah, but for me, it's a lot more than that. First let's go to Neil's words that he recently wrote on Nov 6th on his blog while plugging an interview of mine.

"Larry and I were friends for years, stopped being friends during the McFarlane nonsense, when he was working for Todd and not making art, and then went back to being friends again when he stopped working to Todd and started
doing comics again." \

As I'm sure many of you are well aware, those were some pretty odd, and often stressful, times for me during those years. Private conversations you had with a friend, years later become evidence in a court of law. And all of a sudden you are being cross examined (literally!) by an attorney who's job it is is to try get you tangled up in your memories about things you didn't know you were going to have to remember years later. Probably the most painful thing about my years at McFarlane was the barrier that this put in my friendship with Neil Gaiman.

Well, once I was no longer employed by Todd McFarlane, Neil and I were no longer required to be in an adversarial position grimacing at each other across a bloody playing field.

The first time I actually ran into Neil was at a CBLDF function in New York City. It was so great to be able to shake his hand and hug him hello and not have it be strained. The pic at the left is a documentation of that meeting.

Anyway, for that event Neil did a whole bunch of drawing that took up about half a page on a 5" x 7" stock (really nice paper as I recall). It was first come first served as far as who picked out which drawing. But I definitely remember Jeff Smith, Jim Valentino, Colleen Doran and Paul Pope scribbling like mad that night. (Hmmmm, probably Nikki Cook too).

Well all of those drawings and a whole lot more, are up for auction for at a special CBLDF Sandman Birthday site.

And yes, there are some incredibly good drawings there, but, I'm not sure any of them are quite as unique as being a documentation of the rebirth of Neil Gaiman and Larry Marder friendship.

But that is exactly what this drawing is.

And it can be yours! Yes, I know times are tough, and money is getting ever tighter, but the good work that CBLDF does is just as important as it ever has been--if not more. So, if you like me and Beanworld and if you love Neil and Sandman--this is a hell of an artifact to have in your home!

From the Beanworld Archives!

Lurking Strangers

11" x 17"

Markers, color pencils on bristol board

1987

With the smoke from the wild fires billowing over the horizon in the distance today...this piece seems somehow appropriate. Although I'm quite certain that this drawing was actually some sort of internal dialogue I was having after working on an advertising job that had to do with antibiotics, antibacterial formulas or something germ-phobic.