The Center for Cartoon Studies (CCS) is America’s premier cartooning school and studio located in the historic village of White River Junction, Vermont.
Here’s a little map I made showing where to find queer cartoonists on TCAF’s second floor! I’m sure there are people I missed, so feel free to add yourself in!
Here’s a preview of a short comic I made for an upcoming collection celebrating the 10th annual Doug Wright Awards. The collection will feature a ton of Canadian Cartoonists paying Homage to the great Doug Wright, including Seth, Chester Brown, Joe Ollman, John Martz, Michael DeForge, Georgia Webber and Kate Leth.
The Doug Wright awards celebrate Canadian cartooning, and I feel incredibly honoured and fortunate to be nominated for a Nipper— the Doug Wright Spotlight Award.
One of the great Kickstarter incentives that Maple Key Comics backers can get their hands on for contributing are pieces of original art from any of several of our stellar creators! Each one of these pages is a one-of-a-kind piece of comics, generously donated by the artist—available to backers and nowhere else! Probably ever!
Let’s have a closer look at some of them!
Above is an image from Jon Chad’s offering, “The Surena Grant.” Jon’s attention to detail in this piece is, as always, INSANE. Check it out in the closeup below:
Rinylo’s inks have such great energy in this piece, which would look great above your mantle.
Rinylo really kills it with this kind of stuff. And this page, along with print and digital editions of the first three issues of Maple Key Comicscan be yours for backing us for $166 or more!
Our head editor, chief designer, and general grand poo-bah Joyana McDiarmid is also offering some of her own beautiful pages! Super nice detail on these ones too.
You can see some of the test strokes from McDiarmid’s pen and brush in the margins above. But the detail in her drawing is so amazing! (It’s PR manager Carl ( thulsadude ) writing, by the way.)
It’s been a wild two years. The next few are assuredly going to be wilder. I have some cool comics work lined up for the next few months, so my work will be seeing these star spangled shores for a while yet.
But if you want to buy an of my mini comics, you need to buy ‘em before Monday because once I’m out of America, I’m not gonna be shipping them here anymore.
I might do a longer farewell America post soon!
Oh, P.S. I will be in Chicago for CAKE on the 31st of May and the 1st of June!
Joyana McDiarmid ( heartsandminis ) is not only the head editor/administrator/designer/creator of Maple Key Comics, but is an extremely talented cartoonist as well! Her new work “Hale” will run for the first six issues of Maple Key Comics.
McDiarmid earned her MFA in Cartooning from the Center for Cartoon Studies in 2013. Her work up to this point has been characterized by her interest not only in telling poignant, often painful stories about self-destruction and redemption, but also by her background in medical and scientific illustration. “Hale” focuses on an estranged family in the not-too-distant future whose individual problems draw them back together to try and work out what it means to be a family.
You can see more of McDiarmid’s stellar work on her website. You can also own the original drawings of either of the two pages above by backing the Maple Key Comics Kickstarter!
Stay tuned, dear readers, for more creator spotlights and more about Maple Key Comics as our Kickstarter Campaign continues!