The world’s leading Tintinologist will reveal the inspiration behind the Adventures of Tintin and the links with the upcoming Spielberg film.

Join Michael Farr, the leading expert on the boy reporter, for a talk about the origins of Tintin, Haddock and key characters from the series.

A book signing for Farr’s Tintin: A Complete Companion will follow the talk.

Sat, Nov. 5th, 2011
3 – 5pm
Books of Wonder
18 West 18th Street
New York, NY 10011
212-989-3270
www.booksofwonder.com

Michael Farr is the world’s leading Tintinologist, an expert on the comic series Tintin and its creator, Herge. He has written several books on the subject as well as translating several others into English. Farr was a reporter and foreign correspondent for Reuters and then the Daily Telegraph. He was soon sent to many of the destinations familiar to Tintin, including Africa, the former Soviet Union, and Central and eastern Europe. When based in Brussels, he became acquainted with the creator of Tintin, Herge, and was later to have access to his extensive archives.

Tintin: The Complete Companion
by Michael Farr

A fully illustrated guide to the world-famous comic character Tintin, and his adventures. This well-researched and gorgeously presented overview follows Tintin through the 23 titles of the complete series. Tintin is the classic example of groundbreaking graphic narrative that all others can be compared to. Written and drawn between 1929 and 1976, the 23 adventures of Tintin, his dog Snowy and an unforgettable cast of characters has become a defining standard of graphic literature.

The Complete Companion contextualizes the work of Tintin’s creator, Herge, and places it in its historical context. Author Michael Farr shows Herge’s drawings side by side with their references, demonstrating how he established believable backgrounds and realistic details. The Companion includes a large number of sketches, which Herge would re-work and polish until he found the clearest, most easily readable line-giving birth to a style that would later be called Clear Line.

The Adventures of Tintin mix universal appeal, adventure and slapstick, drama and humor in a collection of stories that have stood the test of time and whose art style has been adopted by new generations of European cartoonists. This is the ultimate companion to the Adventures of Tintin.

Hardcover, Color and b&w images throughout
206 pages, $35.00, ISBN 978-0-86719-754-9

Published by Last Gasp of San Francisco

by Gary Arlington
$14.95
Softcover
127 Full color images
90 pages
9 x 6 inches
ISBN-13: 9780867197570
Publisher: Last Gasp

FORGOTTEN FANTASY
Sunday Comics 1900–1915 from Sunday Press

Edited by Peter Maresca
Designed by Philippe Ghielmetti

The dawn of the 20th century saw technological advances that were only dreamed of decades before. One such advance was four-color printing, which brought to life stories inspired by both the new technologies of the era and the children’s fiction enjoyed by a growing middle class. This confluence brought about a unique genre within a new art form: the Fantasy Comic Strip.

From 1900 to 1915, American newspapers offered some of the most fascinating comics ever printed. And while Winsor McCay’s Little Nemo in Slumberland is known worldwide, many of the great fantasy comics have virtually vanished – until now.

Presented here in the original size and colors are the
complete comics of Lyonel Feininger—
The Kin-der-Kids and Wee Willie Winkie’s World,
along with the complete adventures of
The Explorigator by Henry Grant Dart
Nibsy the Newsboy by George McManus
Naughty Pete by Charles Forbell
Plus, Dream of the Rarebit Fiend pages by Winsor McCay.

With dozens more fantastical Sundays from John Gruelle, Gustave Verbeek, John R. Neill, Herbert Crowley, W.W. Denslow and others. You’re sure to agree, this is one of the most amazing comic collections ever produced.

FORGOTTEN FANTASY
Sunday Comics 1900–1915 from Sunday Press
156 pages hardbound, 16 x 21 inches, $125

Available from your local bookstore or Last Gasp

BONUS: Each book comes with a full-size replica of the 1906 Chicago Tribune Sunday Supplement announcing the new comics by Lyonel Feininger.

PRAISE FOR Forgotten Fantasy:

Wow! This book is a monumental achievement in both content and visual scale—proof, as we go i-PADdling toward a future where printed books are reduced to Kindling just how beeyootiful a book object can be.
This gem took my breath away (not because I’m a smoker but because it offers so many lost treasures from the first years of comics, when printers were jazzed about their then-new technology of color printing and artists were discovering a new artform.) Forgotten Fantasy is the book that can make you see why its worth taking the measure of what comics could and can be….
And speaking of “worth”: Okay, the price-tag may seem high for one more book, but this volume is more like a full-scale museum you can own.
—art spiegelman

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Wow.
Is all I can say. I know I write this every time, but this has to be the best one yet. To finally see all those Feininger pages full size is just a revelation, to say nothing of the restored colors of Forbells. And all the great articles. Wow. I’m truly blown away.

– Chris Ware

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Peter Maresca has lovingly restored and generously reproduced an amazing selection of rare comic art masterpieces in their original four-color, full-page glory.  Forgotten Fantasy is a dream come true for comics aficionados

– Brian Walker, author of The Comics – The Complete Collection

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The Nemo book was the first of other equally large volumes documenting the Sunday Funnies, including the most recent Forgotten Fantasy: Sunday Comics 1900-1915, a gorgeous collection, including Lyonel Feininger, Winsor McCay, George McManus, Gustave Verbeek, and more, making Maresca and his Sunday Press the veritable reliquary for a slice of America’s most fragile pop cultural artifacts.
– Stephen Heller, The Atalntic
http://www.theatlantic.com/life/archive/2011/06/the-king-of-the-sunday-funnies/240188/

 

Tank Tankuro is one of the first robots ever to appear in Japanese comics and may be the first manga “superhero.”

First published in 1934, Tank Tankuro was one of the most famous manga characters at the time.  The comic by Gajo Sakamoto is famous for its innovative and captivating adventure stories full of surrealism, nonsense, innocence, absurdity, and eccentricity.

Lost in the turmoil of WWII, this hidden gem has been unearthed by Presspop Gallery.  It is soon to be published as a full color, deluxe hard cover with slipcase, beautifully designed by Chris Ware!

 

 

“I considered it a pleasant diversion and a distinct honor working on the cover design of Tank Tankuro,” said Ware. “Sakamoto’s pages seemed wonderfully energetic, almost willfully naive and playful, yet also strangely dire, given their overriding military theme. The immediate Western association I saw was with cartoonist Milt Gross, of the so-called ‘screwball’ school whose work captured the slam-bang of vaudeville, Yiddish humor and never took itself seriously, while at the same time getting at some of the common frustrations and societal anger that ‘higher arts’ don’t necessarily directly address. Gross’s frenetic, loopy pen style is analogous somewhat to Sakamoto’s, and I get the same sort of feeling of hectic happiness when looking at their work.”

 

Under pressure from the militaristic Japanese government of the ’30s, Sakamoto was forced to create what appears to be a pro-war comic.  However, at a time when creative freedom was deeply at risk, Sakamoto used the pages as a silent anti-war protest, expressing his feelings in the playful, free-spirit of Tankuro himself.

 

Tank Tankuro influenced a great many manga artists, such as Shigeru Sugiura, Osamu Tezuka, Fujiko Fujio and more, and is the cornerstone from which many masterpieces of manga art would spring. Tankuro became the archetype for various Japanese manga heroes that were to follow.  In the story, Tankuro fights the villain Kuro Kabuto (lit. “Black Hat”), who attacks Japan. Kuro Kabuto is famous among Japanese sci-fi fans who believe he resembles Darth Vader of Star Wars.

 

GAJO SAKAMOTO

TANK TANKURO: PREWAR WORKS 1934-1935

 

Full Color, Hardcover in Slipcase

Size: 8.85″ x 6.38″

ISBN 978-4-903090-24-5

Price : $29.95

 

256pgs (including 16 pages of interpretive text)

 

ESSAYS

* How I Created Tank Tankuro

* Memories of My Father, Gajo Sakamoto

* Gajo Sakamoto Biography

* The Forgotten History of Japanese Comics Before Osamu Tezuka and Tank Tankuro’s Maverick World

 

ABOUT GAJO SAKAMOTO

Gajo Sakamoto was born Masaki Sakamoto on December 1, 1895, in Itsukaichi-shi, Nishitama-gun (present-day Akiruno-shi), Tokyo. After studying painting for 5 years at a private art institute, the Kawabata Painting School, he followed the advice of famed cartoonist Ippei Okamoto and pursued a career as a professional manga artist. While working at several newspapers, he ran comic strips and contributed cartoons for newspapers, magazines, and comic anthologies. With Shigewo Miyawo and others, Sakamoto helped form the Doshin Manga-kai manga artists’ group. In January 1934, he started the serialization of Tank Tankuro in Yonen Club (from the Dainippon Yubenkai Kodansha publishing company), which made him a popular artist. The manga was published as a book in October 1935, and the Yonen Club serial lasted until December 1936. Other works from this period included Hora-gai Hora-taro and Janken Pon-chan. In 1939, Sakamoto served as a part-time employee for the government’s public relations department in Manchuria (Northeastern part of China) but returned home a year after Japan’s defeat. After his return, he continued his active career as a manga artist, working on titles such as Gara-gara Sensei, Bari-bari Hakase, and Genkotsu Osho as well as new stories for Tank Tankuro. Around this time, Sakamoto also became interested in the art of suiboku-ga or nan-ga (ink-and-wash painting) and studied Zen Buddhism. In 1956, the same year as the marriage of his first daughter, Sakamoto ended his career as a manga artist to devote himself entirely to Buddhism and suiboku-ga. In 1969, he received an award for his distinguished service to children’s culture from the Japan Children’s Writers’ Association. He died on August 8, 1973, at 77 years of age.

 

 

 

Add Toner contains more than sixty stories and interviews, interspersed with bold graphics and illustrations, including never-before-published bonus material.

Cometbus began in July 1981 as a small, stapled fanzine focusing on the Bay Area punk scene. The editor, Aaron Cometbus, had just turned 13. As the magazine grew, it became about much more than music. Bands talked about their lives and travels in interviews, essays and fiction that band members contributed. People got involved.

As soon as Aaron was old enough to hitch a ride out of town, he began to write about his life and travels, too. Cometbus continued to grow and change over the years, but retained its handwritten, homespun charm and continued to chronicle punk and other underground cultures, focusing on the values and stories behind the scenes. Each issue had a different theme, and some consisted entirely of other people’s work. Still, Aaron’s own writing became synonymous with the magazine, and increased its cult-like following.

Add Toner features “Back to the Land,” a Studs Terkel-like investigation of the 1970s homesteading movement through the eyes of its offspring, and “Lanky,” a coming-of-age story set in Berkeley in the (anti-) Reagan ’80s.

In 2002, Last Gasp published Despite Everything: A Cometbus Omnibus, a “greatest hits” collection from the first twenty years of Cometbus. The collection featured over 100 contributors and to date has 15,000 copies in print. Two novels followed: Double Duce and I Wish There Was Something That I Could Quit.

“Cometbus is considered a classic in the subterranean world” –Time

“Simple, precise, and absolutely compelling. …Aaron Cometbus is this generation’s literary voice” — the Rocket

“Cometbus is bigger than the scene that spawned it,” –SF Weekly

Add Toner

Aaron Cometbus

Paperback | $12.00 | 352 pages | 8″ x 5.25″

ISBN: 978-0-86719-753-2

Published by Last Gasp

Called “the godfather of Japanese erotica,” Toshio Saeki has cultivated a unique and shocking style – blending traditional Japanese technique with his own twisted imagination.

Saeki’s artwork is a synthesis of depraved vision and incredible artistic ability.

“A famous writer once described my works as ‘obviously peculiar’ and I cannot completely deny that,” he said.

“I want to surprise people, make them happy, and if possible, even completely enchant the minds of those who see my work. To realize that, I will choose whatever method it takes, and will not limit myself.”

Saeki embraces the controversial nature of his work. He seeks to challenge social norms by placing the unconscious in plain view.

“In the modern world, where one rarely stops to think about the truth behind the moment, you might enjoy it if you take a peep at my mysterious and strange illusions,” he said.

“To those who frown at them, I want to place the drawings right in front of your face and ask if you really disapprove. I’m always thinking, how wonderful it would be to give shape to psychological pictures which everyone hides and holds deep within them.”

111 Minna Gallery and Last Gasp Present
Toshio Saeki
Opens Thursday, Sept. 4th at 5pm
Show runs November 4th – 27th
21+

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SAEKI’S TECHNIQUE

In a modern version of traditional Japanese woodcut printing, Saeki creates finished work in conjunction with a printing professional. The artist typically prepares only black and white originals. He does not apply color directly to these pieces, but instead uses overlays to enumerate the precise values of the colors he wants.

Saeki works with the terminology of the four-color printing process: cyan, magenta, yellow and black (CMYK). For example, he indicates a woman’s skin tone should be reproduced with 10% magenta, while her nipples should be 60% magenta. Most of the men in Saeki’s artwork have a skin tone that is 30% magenta, 20% cyan, and 50% yellow.

He calls this method chinto printing – the picture is complete only after it has been printed. It is a modern version of the ukiyo-e, a genre of Japanese woodcut prints or paintings produced between the 17th and 20th centuries. Ukiyo-e were works of collaboration between the eshi (artist) and the surishi (printer). Saeki is paying homage to this style, and considers himself an eshi.

ONIKAGE

A new book by the artist, which was just released by Last Gasp features a selection of Saeki’s previously unpublished works. The art is shown in a gorgeously large format. Throughout the book, paper vellum overlays re-create Saeki’s unique method for adding color to his black and white artwork. Both original black and white renderings and finished color artwork is shown. However, the reader is not allowed to see every image in all stages. Like the artist, the viewer must use his or her imagination to complete these peculiar pictures.

Preview Onikage by Toshio Saeki
56 pages, Hardcover, 11 ¾” x 14 ½”, Color and b&w images, paper vellum inserts
ISBN 978-0-86719-719-7, $39.95
Publication date: August 2010
Published by Last Gasp

BLABWORLD Book Signing
Sponsored by The Intuit Show of Folk and Outsider Art (with SOFA Chicago)
Navy Pier Festival Hall

Friday, November 5th, 2011, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM

Contributing artists, CJ Pyle, Fred Stonehouse, Michael Noland, Travis Lampe, Kari Laine McCluskey, Larry Day, and BLABWORLD founder, editor, and designer, Monte Beauchamp will be available to sign copies of the premiere volume of BLABWORLD, a 10 x 10 inch, full-color, 128-page, periodic hardcover book of works by leading contemporary painters, print makers, illustrators, and sequential artists worldwide.

Attend the book signing and purchase books at the Intuit Store, Booth 1524i.

Get a FREE 3-Day pass to both fairs!

Signings with Junko Mizuno, Joe Ledbetter, Buff Monster, Ron English, Camilla d’Errico (See schedule below)

Play Last Gasp Comic-Con BINGO with prizes!

Plus all the newest books, imports, rare stuff… Our booth is #1616.

SDCC exclusive junko mizuno print

2-print set. Edition of 60. Debossed digital offset.

Signing Schedule

Thursday

Camilla d’Errico – 2pm-3pm
Junko Mizuno 4:30pm-6pm

Friday

Junko Mizuno noon-2pm
Ron English – 2pm
Joe Ledbetter – 3pm
Buff Monster – 4pm
Junko Mizuno 5pm

Saturday
Junko Mizuno 11am

Copies of our HUGE, amazing 11″ x 14″ catalog will be available!

Todd Schorr: Designed for Extinction
Opening reception: June 26, 4-7pm
Book-signing for Schorr’s latest monograph American Surreal hosted by Last Gasp.

Designed for Extinction is a solo exhibition featuring the paintings of Los Angeles-based artist Todd Schorr, a leading figure in the world of “pop surrealism” and “lowbrow.” Schorr is undeniably inspired by Renaissance masters such as Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel, and Salvador Dali, as well as the early animated cartoons of Walt Disney and Max Fleischer, underground comics best exemplified by Zap, and classic films from the 1930s such as King Kong and Frankenstein. His highly polished, fantastic paintings are intricate narratives about evolution and the plight of man

Music by GLUE ONE, food by Rasta Tacos, and limited edition Todd Schorr designed T-shirt provided by Hurley.

Otis College of Art and Design
9045 Lincoln Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90045

Show runs June 26 – September 11, 2010

More Info
Full Press Release