I was pretty excited to get to the Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery this past Sunday and see the exhibit is now up for Drawing Power: An Exhibition of Cartoon Advertising!

Where the heck did editor Warren Bernard get all this cool stuff?! Well, we can ask him in person when he makes a special Seattle appearance on Saturday, September 24th at the Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery!

Make plans now to join us from 6:00 to 8:00 pm. Warren will be giving a slideshow presentation and talk. 

And as an extra bonus, we'll be joined by artist Tom Neely, currently on tour for his incredible "painted novel," The Wolf.  I'll be dishing more about that on the Flog later...!

The Bumbershoot Music & Arts Festival in Seattle has come and gone, and I'm still recovering from the three-day whirlwind of bands, comedians, and shishkaberries, but for those of you who weren't able to attend, I thought I'd share some snaps from the "Bumber By Number" exhibit, which ran during Bumbershoot weekend!

Curators Marlow Harris and Jo David gave vintage paint-by-number kits to local artists, who were encouraged to customize the works and "paint-outside-the-box," as it were. Here's Jim Blanchard's vibrant piece, which looks like it should be hung in a wood-paneled basement, or perhaps screened on the side of a van...

And here's Jim Woodring's morbid take on a winter scene... Damn, I love it.

You can see larger versions of these photos on the Fantagraphics Flickr page, and be sure to check out all our awesome photos and videos while you're there!

There's a fantastic exhibit opening this weekend in Chicago featuring several Fantagraphics artists, including Chris Ware, Lilli Carré, Anders Nilsen, and Jeffrey Brown! 

CartoonInk!: Emerging Comics in Context spotlights the work of students and alumni of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, all curated by SAIC faculty Christa Donner, Surabhi Ghosh, and Mome contributor Jeremy Tinder!

Bump!!!

After a few delays (hence the past date on the poster above, which was gorgeously designed by Marc Bell), CartoonInk! runs this Saturday, September 10th through October 15th at the Betty Rymer Gallery at SAIC. And on Friday, September 9th, there will be an opening reception from 4:30 – 7:00 PM!

Anders reports he'll have a full wall painting there (see pics up on his blog), and Lilli says she'll have some original pages and animation frames on display!

The Betty Rymer Gallery is located at 280 South Columbus Drive, between Jackson Dr & Monroe St. in Chicago.

The Joost Swarte exhibit Trafic at Galerie Champaka in Brussels which Kim posted about a couple of weeks ago is set to open tomorrow (which is today if you're in Brussels), and the gallery has posted some mighty handsome preview images of the artwork on their public Facebook page.

The Bumbershoot Music & Arts festival is upon us again, and if you can navigate through the drum circles and shishkaberry lines, here's where you can find some Fantagraphics:

Bumber By Number: local culture vultures Marlow Harris and Jo David are featuring a fully-immersive and interactive paint-by-numbers art exhibit, which will also feature vintage paint-by-numbers kits altered by our own Jim Blanchard and Jim Woodring.

[ That's a shot of Blanchard's piece above, which will be for sale! ]

If you wanna check out Bumber By Number and the rest of this year's visual art offerings, head to Seattle Center on Thursday, September 1st for a FREE open-to-the-public preview from 3:00 to 9:00 pm!

And, just an aside, but this year's Bumbershoot graphics were designed by noneother than Fanta-friend Jesse LeDoux. 

Eric Verhoest et Thomas Spitaels
ont le plaisir de vous inviter
à l’inauguration de
Trafic par

Joost Swarte

Vernissage en présence de l’artiste,
le jeudi 8 septembre 2011
de 18h00 à 20h30
_

Eric Verhoest en Thomas Spitaels
hebben het genoegen u uit te nodigen
op de opening van
Trafic door

Joost Swarte

Vernissage in het bijzijn van de kunstenaar
op donderdag 8 september 2011
van 18u00 tot 20u30

Rue Ernest Allardstraat, 27
Bruxelles 1000 Brussel
Belgium
Tel : +32 2 514 91 52 
Fax : +32 2 346 16 09
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
www.galeriechampaka.com

(Apologies to Tom Spurgeon for swiping his title.) That is one classy invitation, too.

I doubt the fact that the show's title is the same as the title of Jacques Tati's final movie is a coincidence; as I recall Tati's Playtime is Joost's favorite movie.

And yes, we're barreling down the final few laps of the Swarte Book Marathon! It's still on for early 2012.

Aieee! Last minute Beto alert! He's got some artwork on display at a comic shop in his hometown of Las Vegas, with what sounds like a hoot of an opening reception tonight. From the Facebook invitation:

Alternate Reality Comics proudly invites you to our FIRST ever Artist Spotlight Reception!! Please join us for this great event as we try to bridge the gap between the comic world and various other art forms!!

This months featured local artists will be the very talented Keri Schroeder and comic book legend Gilbert Hernandez (creator of Love and Rockets).

We will also have live performances from local folk talent Rushmore Beekeepers and local poet/spoken word artist Harry Fagel.

The reception will run from 6:00pm-9:00pm
Performances start at 7:30pm

Ellen Forney & Jim Woodring at the Frye Art Museum in Seattle, 03/08

This weekend, the Boise Art Museum unveils a new exhibit that is right down our alley: Comics at the Crossroads: Art of the Graphic Novel.

The exhibition spotlights 40 different comic book artists from the Pacific Northwest, including our own Jim Woodring, Ellen Forney, Shannon Wheeler, and Colleen Coover. We're also excited to see Fanta-friends David Lasky and Matthew Southworth included in the line-up!

Included in the exhibit will be original artwork, unpublished drawings, book covers, and more!

A preview party for Comics at the Crossroads is happening this Friday, August 19th at 5:30 PM, and the exhibit runs from August 20th to November 27th at the Boise Art Museum [670 Julia Davis Drive, Boise, Idaho].

Make a habit of visiting Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery this fall as we approach five years of presenting comix culture to the masses. It just keeps getting better:

On Saturday, September 3 between noon and 3:00 PM, we host a sneak preview of "Hooked on Comix 3." Fimmakers David P. Moore and Audry Mandelbaum will be present for a continuous screening of the latest installment of their insightful documentary series on alternative comix. This one features the lovely Dame Darcy and always entertaining Tony Millionaire. Can't wait.

On Saturday, September 10 we open Drawing Power, an amazing exhibition of cartoon advertising curated by Warren Bernard. On Saturday, September 24 Bernard will present a slide talk followed by a book signing from 6:00 to 8:00 PM. He'll be joined by visual artist and cartoonist Tom Neely presenting his latest "painted novel" The Wolf.

On Saturday, October 1 we'll host a special preview of the topical graphic novel Oil and Water with journalist writer Steve Duin from 6:00 to 8:00 PM.

Don't miss a minute of the action. Visit Fantagraphics Bookstore daily. If you don't live here, with local housing prices remaining soft and the Seattle job market improving, now's a good time to move. See ya'll soon.

This Friday, August 12th, the fabulous Roq la Rue gallery debuts The Blab! Show, curated by noneother than Monte Beauchamp!  

Beauchamp returns to the theme of "Krampus," which you may remember from back issues of Blab! and the collection of vintage Krampus postcards The Devil in Design, and the show features interpretations by artists like Shag, Andy Kehoe, and Ryan Heshka. If you don't recall, Krampus is a sinister holiday devil, so appropriately enough, Roq la Rue promise they'll be "throwing one hell of an opening party!"

The Blab! Show runs until September 3rd. For anyone outside the Seattle area, an online gallery will be posted here this Friday. Roq la Rue is located at 2312 2nd Ave. in the bustling Belltown neighborhood.