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Nick Gazin's Comic Book Love-In #41

I went to the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Fest hosted by Gabe Fowler, owner of Desert Island Comics. It was one of the best comic get-togethers I've ever been to.

Dear Everyone,

I'm in California right now. I've been working on the comic I'm doing with Nathan Williams from Wavves and Matt Barajas from Heavy Hawaii called Negative Dad. If you search for it, you can see the early sketches around the net. It's getting closer and closer to completion. It should be good when it's finished.

The day before I came to California to work on the comic I went to the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Fest hosted by Gabe Fowler, owner of Desert Island Comics. It was one of the best comic get-togethers I've ever been to.

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It was in this church, same as the last two years I think. This is the third and definitely the best time it has happened.

This is Gary Panter, my former teacher and permanent idol. I'd show up with main goal of meeting Jack Davis. He let me know Jack was outside. Jack is an artist who drew the original EC comics and worked at Mad Magazine for a long time. He's done a ton of highly recognizable and beautiful illustration work.

This is Dash Shaw. He is so beautiful. He is a big success in comics. One time I woke up and he was on the end of my bed in my dorm room and he was telling me he wanted to hurt me and smash my things. I think we got past that though.

That's Jack Davis in the middle there. There goes my hero, watch him as he goes. He left an hour before he was scheduled to sign books so he could go watch college football. I was pretty torn up by that.  I moved a flight so I could meet him. He was my main reason for being at this thing.

This is my friend Gilbert from DC. He's friends with a lot of cartoonists and he is homeless. Be nice to this man, Gilbo.

Pretty much every girl at or around the event was at least "strikingly adorable." At most, they were mind boggling babes that made you want to bite your fist.

This is Dan Nadel who publishes Picture Box Books. He is a great writer and kind of an uptight guy. Young Lust is a major concern of his clearly.

How good are these Mickey Zachilli posters? So good.

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How good is this one?

Mickey's so rad and she reminds me of her drawings.

It's Brian Ralph. He just did a good comic about a zombie apocalypse. I shoulda reviewed it already but I do not care about my job.

This is Johnny Negron. His name is racist. Only kidding, that's his real name. He does a lot of rad shit for VICE and I think he's so great. He was selling the horniest original art ever and it was all on the crappiest, cheap paper. Tunde Adebimpe bought this piece later. Good purchase, Tunde.

This guy James Moore made this. I feel like he and I have some similar sensibilities.

This is Domitille Collardey. She made hand-painted wooden brooches for cheap. I bought a bunch. She referred to this design she's displaying as "Vagina Bone."

Look how pretty Domitille's jewelry is. I bought a bunch but I wish I'd just bought them all.

This is a great example of Jack Davis's art. So fucking good. Why'd you have to break my heart, Jack Davis?! GODFUCKING DAMNIT! I JUST WANTED TO KNOW YOU A LITTLE!

This is fan favorite, Lisa Hanawalt. She was looking pretty hot. She's holding up a little painting she did called "Monster Crotch" based on a photo I took and she gave it to me! Don't expect to get free art for yourself though, we have an understanding.

This is Ben Marra trying to imitate the exact pose he did last year when I photographed him at this event. He used to look like a metal thrasher but now he usually looks like Michael J. Fox on Family Ties.

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The Scott Eder Gallery, which is a DUMBO-based comics art gallery, was there showing off some mind bogglin' originals. Here's a beautiful Crumb drawing on a placemat.

This little sketch is on the back of a beautiful early Gary Panter drawing. It's unclear if this is an actual Matt Groening drawing or if it was just Panter imitating his not-then-famous pal.

Here are some of my pals who also do art for Mishka.

Sammy Harkham shows off his new zine, Terror House.

Here's Gary Panter with a beautiful French fan. This guy has so many beautiful girl fans it's ridiculous. He's like a magnet for beauty.

Hey, it's Owen Kline. Will you ever stop looking nine years old to me?

This is Kris Mukai, one of the two Mukai sisters. They both are great artists and are on the come up. I've known their older brother since he was like 17.

This is Tunde, from TVOTR, wearing one of Domitille's wooden buttons. All the guys in that band are huge into the visual arts and really rad.

This is Koren Shadmi. He's shaking his fist because I've been pretty raw to him. One time I tossed a book he'd made into the toilet and pissed all over it. Then I did some other bad stuff. Don't you shake your fist at me you son of a bitch.

This is Lizz Hickey. She does a lot of comics for us. Here she is showing us a print that she made in college and is ashamed of.

Here's another thing that she made. She's a fucking genius of stuff. The cover is slathered in glitter or something shiny.

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This is Jon Vermillyea. We haven't spoken in about four years because that's when I went kinda nuts and had some bad shit happen to me that led to me doing bad things I regret. Anyway we opened our hearts and I apologized and then we shook hands. When we finally shook hands two people were there to take photos. It was like a disarmament pact.

Lala Albert hates having her photo taken.

This is Roxie Vizcarra. She works for Rockstar Games and drew the cover for L.A. Noire as well as most of the rest of the art used to advertise the game. She is also a foxy lady and she draws a lotta porno situations, like this one of a cowboy graphically boning a squaw lady and you can see all the penetration details like they were in a room with a million light sources.

I bought this wooden pin from Ginette LaPalme. She's rad.

Talent sandwich. On the left is David Mazzuchelli who most recently made Asterios Polyp but also is known for drawing the two best Frank Miller comics, Batman Year One and Daredevil Reborn. I asked him about Miller's recent crazy comments about the Occupy movement and he said that he knew Miller in his "pre-hat" days. That's Sakura Maku in the middle and Nick Bertozzi on the right. If you are an SVA student make sure to take his Comic Book Storytelling class. The things he taught are still with me.

This is the only costume I saw. I asked her if she was a duck and she told me she was the Holy Ghost. Then she gave me a mini-comic she'd made.

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This is Michael Deforge, his crafting of a single issue of a comic that evokes memories of Dan Clowes when he still made single issues of Eightball that were beautiful from the cover, to the letters. Michael can change tone like crazy. Dude's amazing.

This is Peggy Burns from Canada. She runs Drawn & Quarterly, the Canadian comics publisher. I asked her to hold up her best thing and she grabbed the new printing of Clowes' The Death Ray.

The day ended with Jonny Negron drawing me a big bobbed lady with a skinny neck. I was hooting and hollering like I was at a strip club. When he finished I requested that he throw some bumps on the aureolas and he complied. Love that dude. There should be clubs where you go in and it's just Jonny Negron drawing naked ladies while you throw singles on the stage.

So that was my time at the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Fest. Thanks to Gabe Fowler for hosting it. Go to Desert Island if you want just a taste of the flavor. I'll be back next week with reviews of the things I got there.

Sincerely,
Nick Gazin

Previously – Comic Book Love-In #40