Last weekend Portland Center Stage at The Armory hosted another "Drink and Draw" event with local comics artists -- inviting them to knock back a couple and then sketch a performance of FUN HOME. Here's my contribution.
FUN HOME is a musical adapted from the graphic-novel memoir by Alison Bechdel, and continues at the Armory through Oct. 22, It's a funny, moving, and exceedingly clever study of grief, regret and coming of age. Highly recommended.
Long-overdue commission: a punk Sabertooth Vampire for Gerald, a fine fellow I’d run into around the podcast scene back in the day. (Yes, it’s THAT long overdue.)
Commission for a child's bedroom.
Working on a secret thing, unicorn game on point
Made a bit of promo fanart for my pal Matt Mair Lowery’s debut YA comic LIFEFORMED – written by Matt, beautifully illustrated by Cassie Anderson and published by Dark Horse Comics. It’s out this week, and there’s a signing party Wednesday at Bridge City Comics.
Congrats, Matt – it’s a lovely book and one heck of a debut for you both. See you Wednesday, assuming the whole planet isn’t on fire by then.
A new short story written by Erik Henriksen, penciled and lettered by yrs. truly, and inked and colored by Bill Mudron.
Henriksen's script tells the story of a chaser of patents who brutally simplifies his life with his newest creation. (And maybe also with drinking.)
12 pages, full color. $3 (plus shipping). For sale online here.
Also available in Portland at these fine brick-and-mortar retailers:
• Excalibur Books & Comics
• Floating World Comics
• Reading Frenzy
• Bridge City Comics
• Books with Pictures
• Cosmic Monkey Comics
As posted on the Sequential Art Gallery website:
On Thursday, Oct. 6, Sequential Art Gallery + Studio will feature comics and illustrations by cartoonist Mike Russell — including the debut of a new short story written by Erik Henriksen and illustrated by Russell with frequent collaborator Bill Mudron.
“The Un-Inventor: Comics by Mike Russell + Industrial Blight & Tragic” will feature:
• “The Un-Inventor” — a new short story written by Erik Henriksen, penciled and lettered by Mike Russell and inked and colored by Bill Mudron. Henriksen’s script tells the story of a chaser of patents who brutally simplifies his life with his newest creation. Copies of the full-color, limited-run comic will be available for sale at the show.
• Wall-sized displays will also reveal the work that went into two of Russell’s non-fiction comics collaborations — including an episode of “CulturePulp,” Russell’s 2004-12 comic strip for The Oregonian, as well as a four-page memoir strip written by Sarah Sprague for Birth.Movies.Death magazine that recounts the month Sprague spent in line waiting for “The Phantom Menace” in L.A. in 1999. Each wall-sized display will reveal photo-reference and Russell and Mudron’s not-entirely-serious working method.
• Also on hand: one-off prints, collaborations, posters, covers and illustrations by “Industrial Blight & Tragic” — the joke “studio” name Russell and Mudron have used when working on comics together over the past decade, occasionally bringing in additional collaborators including local comics artist Adrian Wallace.
• The show will also feature original pages from Russell’s webcomic “The Sabertooth Vampire.”
For more information on the show, visit sequentialartgallery.com or facebook.com/sequentialartgallery.
ABOUT MIKE RUSSELL
Mike Russell is a writer and cartoonist living in Portland. His comics projects (many of them collaborations) include “The Sabertooth Vampire,” “The Uninventor” “CulturePulp,” “Mr. Do & Mr. Don’t,” “Opera, Drawn Quickly,” “Jaxxon’s 11,” “Augie, The Littlest Reaver,” “Serenity Tales,” “Santa’s Lil’ Gimp,” “Take My Love,” and several educational comics (most recently “Clusters and Your Economy: An Illustrated Introduction.”) He’s also created beer labels, an album cover and a comics-convention identity system.
His writing, interviews and/or comics have appeared in Dark Horse Presents, The Oregonian, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, Willamette Week, The Portland Mercury, In Focus Magazine, The DVD Journal, Bookslut, and other publications.
You can find his work at CulturePulp.com and SabertoothVampire.com.
[UPDATE 10-6-2016] Thank you to Stuart Tomlinson of KATU News for visiting with artist Mike Russell and curator Kaebel Hashitani at Sequential Art Gallery in the week leading up to the opening reception! You can watch the video and read their summary of the show over here: Cartoonist Mike Russell’s First Thursday gallery show is a collaborative effort.
Opening-night photos and promo stills from the show can be found here.
Originally commissioned for Dark Horse Presents #15. Colors by Bill Mudron.
Also available at SabertoothVampire.com.
Originally commissioned for Dark Horse Presents #14. Colors by Bill Mudron.
Also available at SabertoothVampire.com.
