Monday, August 23, 2010

Will there be...???


Secret Sketches?



Ohhhhhhh yeahhhhhh!



TUESDAY
August 24th

CARTOON ART MUSEUM
7:00-9:00pm

655 Mission Street
San Francisco CA
(between New Montgomery and Third Streets)
(415) CAR-TOON
With Lark Pien!



WEDNESDAY
August 25th

Floating World Comics
6-8pm

20 NW 5th Ave #101
Portland OR

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Hoo-Hoo-HAs & a Hoka-Hoka-HEY!


It's been a long, long time since I answered my mail here.
So let's get to it!



Dear Larry,

I took this picture for you today while walking in Boston's historic North End neighborhood. This mosaic greets visitors to the local branch of the public library. It looks like Proffy's dream from Beanworld.

I am eagerly awaiting the next book!

Best,
Brad Friedman

I love knowing that this mosaic exists.
Brad, you're so right to think about Proffy' dream when looking at this.

Whoever made it was thinking along very similar, but ultimately a bit different, lines as the creation of the 23 Realities in Proffy's dream: A Gift Comes!-page 317).

Thanks so much for taking the time to snap the pic and send it along.


Larry,

I wanted to upgrade my TALES OF THE BEANWORLD books from paperback to hardcover until I saw that they were reduced in page size. What was the reasoning on doing this?

Todd Tamanend Clark


Excellent question, Todd...

Quite a few of the photographic film negatives from the old comics were lost. This was not a huge deal because I never sold my original pages and was in possession of every page of the Tales of the Beanworld.

The original negs were often kind of shoddy anyway. Many were shot as favors or at discounted prices and didn't always accurately reflect the drawings on the pages. Fine lines often closed up or got fuzzy or disappeared altogether.

So we went back to the source material and scanned it all digitally. The production department at Dark Horse A really talented digital artist at Dark Horse, Matt Dryer did an astounding job capturing the fidelity and crispness of the original artwork . Thanks to the iron will of Diana Schutz and the DH production department the hardcover books totally look exactly like the scans--and the scans look like the drawings.

We also knew, as long as we were starting from scratch anyway, that a size change was something to seriously contemplate. I admit, I was cautious about reducing the page size but I also knew that a slightly smaller 6" x 9" final product was a format that had wider commercial acceptance and once I saw just how inconsequential the reductions actually were--I never looked back. You can see for yourself in the picture (below) I just snapped of a random page in both formats.

I don't think anything is lost in the transition--but I'll leave it up to other Beanworld fans to give their opinions.



Ever see these, Larry?

http://www.mightybeanz.com/

$1 each, over 100 to collect, nice carrying case too. I thought they'd be nice to scrape the picture off if possible and paint your beans on them.

yuppicide138



No, Yup, I've never seen them before.
Pretty nifty toys.

The site itself....map, the music, the bad puns, the ridiculous attitude is the sort of thing that can keep me awake at night whenever some one asks about turning Beanworld into something-other-than-what- it-already-is.

It's this anxiety that somehow no matter what I am promised (or even guaranteed) that somehow Hollywood will transform Beanworld into something like this.

No can do, folks, no can do.



Hi Larry,

I was going through a box in storage when my eye caught a glimpse of an envelope bearing a familiar green “bean.” Inside, was a letter and a stash of chip drawings purchased from you at San Diego Comic Con in the time leading up to the full blown “commission piece” you did for me. Hope all is well!

Kind regards,
Kevin Noonchester

As I told you at Comic-Con, Kevin, it's hard to believe its been 25 years since the first time you came up to my table in 1985. You were one of the very first Beanworld readers I ever met that was an actual kid! Up until that point, I really didn't know that a middle schooler was capable of following the intricacies of Beanworld.

Now, everyone knows differently, of course.

That's quite a stash over Beanworld "chip drawings" you accumulated one-by-one over the years.

And the letter?
An personalized, original drawing of Beanish before TOTB #4?
Hey, that's a pretty cool thing to own if I do say so myself!



Hi Larry,

This is a long shot, writing to you, since you probably get thousands of fan emails and I'll probably not get a reply, but:
Isn't Beanworld about our circulatory system?

I don't want to bother you with details of why I think so (including the shapes chosen for the 4 realities and the bacterial/viral infection of the poppers etc), I'm just surprised that no one seems to have mentioned this anywhere on the Web.

Thank you for Beanworld and for your time.

Dominic Wan
Singapore

To the best of my sometimes leaky memory, Dominic, no one has quite made this observation before. It's a fascinating new interpretation of Beanworld.

As I always say, whatever resonance a Beanworld reader feels emanating while reading the book is true. If you think it, if you feel it: it's there.

It's a pact, a covenant between you and the Beanworld.
I'm just the guy who delivered the pages.

If you are local to San Francisco or Portland OR next week....I'll be appearing at:


TUESDAY
August 24th
CARTOON ART MUSEUM
7:00-9:00pm
655 Mission Street
San Francisco CA
(between New Montgomery and Third Streets)
(415) CAR-TOON


WEDNESDAY
August 25th
6-8pm
20 NW 5th Ave #101
Portland OR


Saturday, August 14, 2010

Marder to sign at Floating World Comics August 25th!


Floating World Comics
20 NW 5th Ave #101
Portland OR

Wednesday, August 25th,
6-8pm
Details here!


Thursday, August 12, 2010

Pssssst! Oregonians....

WHO: Larry Marder
WHAT: Book signing
WHEN: Wednesday, August 25th, 6-8pm
WHERE: Floating World Comics, 20 NW 5th Ave #101, Portland, OR 97209
(503) 241-0227

Save the date and time.
More details as the develop!


Thursday, August 5, 2010

My Leguminous Comic-Con Wrap Up 2010!



This was my first time as a Guest of Honor at Comic-Con and I have to say--everything I ever heard about the GoH experience is true. They take superb care of you every step of the way. Cory and I send along our great thanks to all the members of the Con Committee and the army of volunteers who make Comic-Con work with amazing efficiency on the ground. Particular thanks to my GRT: Tiff Hudson who made sure I showed up at all my obligations in plenty of time.


A few observations regarding the con itself.
Yes, it's gotten so big you can't begin to take it all in.

The sensory overload of crowds and displays and attendees in costumes and giant bags and swag and thundering noise put Comic-Con in a class of events up there with Mardi Gras and Super Bowl. Doesn't bother me a bit. The idea that there are one-way halls and entrances/exits is something that I've become accustomed to now--a few years ago it drove me nuts. Now it's just part of the way things are.

I have to admit, I've never set foot in Hall H in my entire life and I reckons there is a good chance I never will. That part of the convention is off my radar completely except for hearing anecdotes from friends and fans.

I really liked the placement of Artist's Alley all the way at the end in Hall G this year. Clydene placed me in a great spot. The aisles were wider and the noise level wasn't anything that bothered me where I was. Some folks thought the Alley was too far away from the larger artists tables and although that was probably true--I don't think it had a lot of impact on my fans. I think because Hall G is next to the fabled Hall H...it's possible we had foot traffic because it was the closest set of doors downstairs. Don't know but it felt like it.

As far as a metric for measuring foot traffic, I do know this--I broke a personal record in the amount of FREE Beanworld Action Figures I gave away. 3 1/2 pounds. I don't think I ever gave away more than 2 1/2 before. Zombie, Crazy, Battle Damaged, and Dead remain the most sought after of the lot. But Tee-Hee is definitely making a surge.






I received an Ink Pot from the Convention for Achievements in Comic Arts. This means a lot to me. People assume I've won all sorts of awards. But I haven't. I've only been nominated for one (a Kirby) once and that was in 1987. As I said in my dazed acceptance bit of babble "I've spent a lot of my career working for and with folks who have enough awards to crack the foundation of their homes. But this is one of the only times where my work has been recognized."




Scott McCloud immediately turned it into a FLEECE Beanworld Action figure merchandise display and I had the little fella working for on the table the rest of the show.



I'm a New York Times certified geezer!

I got a terrific write-up in by Peter Larson in The Orange County Register: Now our neighbors can see what Cory's husband actually does all day.

Some really nice words about the indescribable Beanworld experience from kli.
"It is the kind of book where you generally recommend it to someone by shoving it into their hands so it can be experienced directly."

I had a good time on all of my panels--as far as I know the only one that has turned up as a public documentation is Graphic Novels: The Personal Touch” that featured Gabrielle Bell, Howard Cruse, Vanessa Davis, Jillian Tamaki, Carol Tyler and me--moderated by Shaenon Garrity. I'm rather quiet in that one--I was far more interested in what my fellow panelists had to say that hearing myself speak but I did mange to get in some pithy observations here and there particularly about the quality of printing reproduction these days.

The "Indy Writers Unite" panel was an odd collection of mostly writer/artists and it's reported on here.

In a lot of ways, the most remarkable panel I did was "The Funny Stuff: Humor in Comics and Graphic Novels." I more or less dropped out of it in the middle as I had front row seats to one of the most bizarre and surreal panels I've ever had the honor of sitting on in my quarter century of panel participation. As far as I know, it wasn't written up anywhere in depth. All I can say is: it was a classic example of funny-weird not funny-ha ha. However, I did get a chance to make one of my favorite points that I consider Duchamp's L.H.O.O.Q to be the greatest satirical gesture of the entire 20th century.

Image comics/Shadowline Fractured Fables hardcover was launched at Comic-Con. My contribution isn't Beanworld but it's very Larry Marder just the same.




I did two Sketch-a-Thon stints at the Cartoon Art Museum table. One was with Scott Shaw! I think I laughed more in that hour than any other hour the entire run of the show. Lot's of cartooning fun

Well, that's as much time as I can steal for a blog post today.
More stuff as I remember it.

And my next post will be about this.


Sunday, August 1, 2010

Babbling at Comic-Con!

An impromptu interview with Rich Johnston of Bleeding Cool at Comic-Con.