Category: comics

  • Chicago Alternative Comics (CAKE) Kick-off with Gabrielle Bell, Emil Ferris, Lucy Knisley and C. Spike Trotman on 6/9

    Quimby’s welcomes Gabrielle Bell, Lucy Knisley, Emil Ferris and C. Spike Trotman as read their recent work as a kick-off for the Chicago Alternative Comics Expo (CAKE). This event is at Quimby’s on June 9th at 7pm, but the tabling exhibition happens June 10th & 11th at the Center on Halsted.

    CAKE is a weekend-long celebration of independent comics, inspired by Chicago’s rich legacy as home to many of underground and alter- native comics’ most talented artists– past, present and future. Featuring comics for sale, workshops, exhibitions, panel discussions and more, CAKE is dedicated to fostering community and dialogue amongst independent artists, small presses, publishers and readers.

    Gabrielle Bell was born in London, England and raised in California. She is the author of six books, including The Voyeurs, Truth is Fragmentary and most recently, Everything is Flammable. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.

    Emil Ferris is the author of My Favorite Thing Is Monsters – Part 1 (Fantagraphics). She is also a painter, writer, illustrator and sculptor for the toy industry.

    Lucy Knisley is an award-winning comic artist and author who specializes in personal, confessional comics that deal with memory, travel, family and traditions. Her latest graphic novel, Something New; Tales from a Makeshift Bride, deals with her struggle to modernize and equalize her wedding, and the meaning behind many matrimonial traditions.

    Spike was born in DC, grew up in MD, and lives in IL, with a dog and a man. She’s the founder of Iron Circus Comics, responsible for strange and amazing books such Poorcraft, the Smut Peddler series and more.

    For more info: cakechicago.com

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  • Nurse-cartoonist MK Czerwiec Reads From Taking Turns: Stories from HIV/AIDS Care Unit 371 5/25

    MK Czerwiec’s (pronounced sir-wick) new book Taking Turns (Penn State University Press) shares the story of Unit 371, a shining example of excellence in the treatment and care of patients. Unit 371 was a community for thousands of patients and families affected by HIV and AIDS and the people who cared for them. This graphic novel combines Czerwiec’s memories with the oral histories of patients, family members, and staff. It depicts life and death in the ward, the ways the unit affected and informed those who passed through it, and how many look back on their time there today. 

    Deeply personal yet made up of many voices, this history of daily life in a unique AIDS care unit is an open, honest look at suffering, grief, and hope among a community of medical professionals and patients at the heart of the epidemic

    “MK Czerwiec’s tales of her nursing work on an AIDS unit chart a remarkable episode in the history of medicine. Through the lives and deaths of individual patients, written and drawn in documentary detail, we see the power dynamic between doctor and patient begin to shift. When cure is not an option, care takes on a new meaning.”         –Alison Bechdel

    Czerwiec is a leader in the field of Graphic Medicine, which examines the intersection of comics and health, illness, and care giving.  Czerwiec is a co-author of the Graphic Medicine Manifesto (Penn State University Press, 2015), which was nominated for an Eisner Award. She has also self-published three collections of comics, Comic Nurse, Comic Nurse Delivers Another Dose, and Scars, Stories, and Other Adventures.

    For more info: www.comicnurse.com 

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    Thurs, May 25th, 7pm – Free Event

  • DOUBLE BOOK LAUNCH at Quimby’s! Keiler Roberts Releases SUNBURNING & Jay Ryan Releases NO ONE TOLD ME NOT TO DO THIS, 5/20

    Keiler Roberts writes autobiographical comics. Sunburning, published by Koyama Press, is her fourth book in the Ignatz winning series Powdered Milk. keilerroberts.com

    “Keiler Roberts’ autobiographical graphic memoir captures the feeling of being a parent as well as an artist and writer better than any book I’ve ever read. There are no cliff-hangers or life lessons. It’s more about the texture of being alive: the melancholy, the unexpected small delights, and its unavoidable sense of aloneness. This book is written with insight, intelligence, and a deadpan sense of humor. I loved it.” — Roz Chast

    Jay Ryan has been making screenprints and concert posters in and around Chicago since 1995. No One Told Me Not To Do This (Akashic) is his third book collecting his favorite work, featuring prints made between 2009 and 2015, including posters for bands such as Andrew Bird, Shellac, My Morning Jacket, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr., Hum, St. Vincent, and others, as well as posters featuring Lil BUB, Cards Against Humanity, various bicycle races, film screenings, and pictures of sloths, walruses, and other mammals in states of troubled sleep. With a foreword by master illustrator Aaron Horkey, this volume comprises two hundred screenprints with commentary and original drawings used in the screenprinting process. thebirdmachine.com

    Jay and Keiler are friends who live in Evanston and both have daughters in kindergarten.

    Sat May 20th, 7pm – Free Event

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  • PHD Comics’ Jorge Cham & Particle Physicist Daniel Whiteson talk what we don’t know about the universe at Quimby’s 5/18


    PHD Comics’ Jorge Cham and particle physicist Daniel Whiteson are experts at explaining things. Together they bring that expertise to a book about all the things we don’t know about the universe: WE HAVE NO IDEA: A GUIDE TO THE UNKNOWN UNIVERSE (Riverhead Books). You can think of WE HAVE NO IDEA as a handy guide the universe’s biggest unknowns. Cham and Whiteson have teamed up to spelunk through the enormous gaps in our cosmic knowledge armed with their popular infographics, cartoons, and highly entertaining and lucid explanations of science to explore some of the biggest unknowns in the universe. Why does the universe have a speed limit? What (or who) is attacking earth with tiny, super-fast particles? What exactly is Dark Matter? And for that matter…what is matter?

    A delightful combination of comedy and cosmology that is as charming as it is informative.
    —Zach Weinersmith, creator of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

    “Accessible and hilarious (the two best things it is possible for a book to be), We Have No Idea not only explores WHAT we don’t know, but WHY we don’t know it.  You’d think that’d be plenty, but Cham and Whiteson also provide the most credible and up-to-date scientific explanations as to what some of the answers to these huge (and hugely important) questions might possibly be, PLUS puns.”
    —Ryan North, author of Romeo and/or Juliet and To Be or Not To Be

    In WE HAVE NO IDEA, Cham & Whiteson explore why a vast portion of our universe is still a mystery, and what a lot of smart people are doing to understand it. Along the way, and with over 400 incredible, original illustrations, they illuminate everything from quarks and neutrinos to gravitational waves and exploding black holes.

    You may recognize Cham and Whiteson from their video about gravitational waves that went viral earlier this year, or from their individual careers. Jorge Cham is the creator of the popular online comic Piled Higher and Deeper, popularly known as PHD Comics and earned his PhD in robotics at Stanford. Daniel Whiteson is a professor of experimental particle physics at the University of California, Irvine, and a fellow of the American Physical Society. He conducts research using the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

    Thurs, May 18th, 7pm – Free Event

    For more info:
    phdcomics.com
    To interview Jorge & Daniel, contact: Al Guillen at aguillen(at)penguinrandomhouse(dot)com
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  • RIP Underground Comics Legend Jay Lynch

    Quimby’s gives best wishes to the survivors, fans, friends and family of underground comics legend Jay Lynch, who passed away at age 72. His legacy includes such titles as Bijou Funnies, Nard ‘n’ Pat, Phoebe & the Pigeon People, Arcade, as well as illustration for Wacky Packages and Garbage Pail Kids, but he also did illustrations for The Realist, as he reminisced about in the zine we published about Quimby’s (Ever Evolving Bastion of Freakdom: A Quimby’s Bookstore History In Words and Pictures):

    “Paul Krassner, who founded The Realist in 1958, was doing a book signing in the store. I stopped by to say hello, since I did many a cartoon for The Realist in the early 60s. I saw Paul staring in awe at the shelves stacked with every “alternative” publication that exists. All of these zines in one place isn’t something that you see every day-and Krassner was nonplussed at the sight. “What have we begat?” he said to me in a concerned tone.”

    Jay’s presence at signings at Quimby’s, as well as his contribution to the world of underground comics and his legacy as contributor to the origins of the store will be missed.

  • Jillian Tamaki Launches Boundless at Quimby’s, In Conversation With Jessica Campbell 6/23

    In Jillian Tamaki’s new book Boundless (Drawn & Quarterly), Jenny becomes obsessed with a strange “mirror Facebook,” which presents an alternate, possibly better, version of herself. Helen finds her clothes growing baggy, her shoes looser, and as she drinks away to nothingness, the world around her recedes as well. The animals of the city briefly open their minds to us, and we see the world as they do. A mysterious music file surfaces on the internet and forms the basis of a utopian society—or is it a cult? Boundless is at once fantastical and realist, playfully hinting at possible transcendence: from one’s culture, one’s relationship, oneself. This collection of short stories is a showcase for the masterful blend of emotion and humor of award-winning cartoonist Jillian Tamaki.

      “Jillian Tamaki seems capable of drawing anything, in any style, and making it appear effortless. Her writing could be described in the same way, and it’s thrilling to see those twin skills of hers united in service of these daring, unpredictable, and quietly strange stories.”—Adrian Tomine, cartoonist of Killing and Dying

    Jillian Tamaki is an illustrator and cartoonist based in Toronto. She is the co-creator along with her cousin Mariko Tamaki of the graphic novel Skim, a New York Times Best Illustrated Book and a finalist for the Governor General’s Award. Their second graphic novel This One Summer earned a Governor General’s Award and a Caldecott Honor. Tamaki’s first collection of her own comics was the critically acclaimed New York Times bestseller and Eisner Award-winning, SuperMutant Magic Academy.

    This event will feature Jillian Tamaki in conversation with Jessica Campbell, the artist of Hot or Not: 20th-Century Male Artists!

    Jessica Campbell is from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada and is an enthusiast of jokes, painting and comics. She completed her MFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she was the recipient of the Edward L. Ryerson Fellowship, and also a comics instructor. She has exhibited work in Canada, the United States, Australia, and Greece, and was selected as one of NewCity’s 2015 breakout artists. She is a member of the Chicago-based comics collective Trubble Club and has published comics with micro press Oily Comics, and contributed to Drawn & Quarterly: Twenty-Five Years of Contemporary Cartooning, Comics, and Graphic Novels.

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    For more info:
    jilliantamaki.com/illustration
    Contact JULIA POHL-MIRANDA and SRUTI ISLAM
    publicity(at)drawnandquarterly(dot)com / 514.279.2221 ext 225

    Friday, June 23rd, 7pm. Free event!

     

  • “Too Much Fun Too” Comic Release with Logan Kruidenier and Live Musical Performance 3/10

    Logan Kruidenier’s experimental comic “Too Much Fun Too,” continues the mythological story of a tree-thing’s attempts to befriend and spend meaningful time with a turnip that it dug up. This work considers the nature of masochistic, repetitive routines, envious desperation and a scattered mentality.  Kruidenier loves creating work that deals with the universal, yet extremely personal theme of relationships between living beings, objects and media. TMFT also features a great poem by New York based writer and performer Connor Bush.  Logan Kruidenier has drawn major influence from artists such as Michael DeForge, Taiyo Matsumoto, Olivier Schrauwen, and video games such as Bioshock and the Super Smash Bros series.

    “Niiiiiccccceeeee.” – Connor Bush, writer and performer.

    The work of Logan Kruidenier has been featured in such places as: The Chicago Publisher’s Resource Center, Meathaus, Quimby’s Bookstore, the Mott St. Restaurant, the Beguiling, The Toronto Alternative Comics Festival, Ada Books and Desert Island Comics. 

    For more info visit: logankruidenier.com

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    Friday, March 10th  7pm      Free Event

  • Emil Ferris Debuts Her Graphic Novel My Favorite Thing is Monsters

    My Favorite Thing is Monsters by Emil Ferris (Fantagraphics Books) is a murder mystery, a family drama, a sweeping historical epic, and a psychological thriller about monsters, real and imagined, within and without. Set against the tumultuous political backdrop of late ’60s Chicago, the precocious Karen Reyes tries to solve the murder of her beautiful and enigmatic upstairs neighbor, Anka Silverberg, a holocaust survivor, while we get to watch the interconnected and fascinating stories of those around her unfold. My Favorite Thing Is Monsters is a revelatory work of striking originality and will undoubtedly be greeted as the debut graphic novel of the year.

    “Absolutely astonishing” – Chris Ware, Building Stories

    “No one has ever made a comic like Emil Ferris …it threatens not merely to exceed established standards of excellence, but to set new ones.” — Sam Thielman, The Guardian

    Emil Ferris grew up Chicago during the turbulent 1960s, where she still lives, and is consequently a devotee of all things monstrous and horrific. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from The School of the Art Institute. This is her first graphic novel

    Invite your friends with the Facebook invite!

    For more info: Pederson(at)fantagraphics(dot)com

     

  • Black Eye Number 3 Release & Signing 2/18

    This event is occasioned by the publication of BLACK EYE No. 3, the final and timely volume of the Ignatz-nominated Black Eye, the anthology of humor and despair published by Rotland Press. This all-comics issue compiles 136 pages with a jaundiced eye on the zeitgeist. Subtitled “A Shameful Enlightenment,” it is a riff on the absurdity of our times, as charted by a coterie of 36 international cartoonists. Black Eye No. 3 will thrill, sicken, amuse, titillate, horrify, and fortify. This event is an opportunity to bring together five of the contributing artists who are based in Chicago: Andy Burkholder, Corinne Halbert, Paul Nudd, Onsmith and Johnny Sampson. Copies of BLACK EYE No. 3 will be available for purchase, as well as a limited edition letterpress print by Paul Nudd, and a limited edition risograph print by UK artist Ben Jones. The Sightseer’s Complement, a limited run, 40-page supplemental book to Black Eye No. 3 will also be available for purchase and signing.

      “Ryan Standfest brings together an exquisitely curated collection of funny, dark, and beguiling comic art for Black Eye No. 3. I’m going to read my copy by a roaring arson blaze.”  —Kaz, Creator of the comic strip Underworld

    The contributors to Black Eye No. 3 include: Alexis Beauclair, Tom Bunk, Andy Burkholder, Max Clotfelter, Mark Dancey, Kayla E., Vincenzo Fagnani, Penelope Gazin, Julia Gfrörer, Anna Haifisch, Corinne Halbert, Eric Haven, Ian Huebert, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Clara Bessijelle Johansson, Francis Kulikowski, Meghan Lamb, David Lynch, John Maggie, Nicolas Mahler, Jérôme Mulot, Erik Nebel, Paul Nudd, Onsmith, Pierre La Police, Helge Reumann, Josephin Ritschel, Martin Rowson, Florent Ruppert, Johnny Sampson, David Sandlin, S. William Schudlich, Santiago Sequeiros, Sammy Stein, Brecht Vandenbroucke, Chris Wright The cover is by Joan Cornellà. The book is edited by Ryan Standfest.

    Founded in 2010, ROTLAND PRESS is a small publishing house located in Detroit, Michigan, USA. It is a publisher of printed projects that promote subversive humor— be it black, dark, gallows, satirical or absurd. ROTLAND PRESS aims to occupy a place between the mainstream and the avant-garde, the philistine and the genteel, industriously manufacturing the finest in despairing entertainment. Ryan Standfest in the Publisher and Editor-In-Chief. More info: rotlandpress.com

    Sat, Feb 18th, 7pm – Free Event

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  • Quimby's Welcomes Michael DeForge with Sadie Dupuis 3/25

    Join Michael DeForge for a live reading and book signing as he introduces the world to Sticks Angelica, Folk Hero. Sticks has escaped her heritage for the refuge of the woods and through her story, DeForge delivers another deeply humane work, one that subtly questions the integrity of the political state and contemporary journalism, all while investigating our relationship to the natural world.

    Michael will be joined by musician Sadie Dupuis (Sad13, Speedy Ortiz) who will play a solo set following the reading. Come out for a celebratory lo-fi comics night!

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    More info about the book:

    A Johnson has his Boswell and every Sticks Angelica has her Michael DeForge

    Sticks Angelica is, in her own words, “49 years old. Former: Olympian, poet, scholar, sculptor, minister, activist, Governor General, entrepreneur, line cook, headmistress, Mountie, columnist, libertarian, cellist.” After a high-profile family scandal, Sticks escapes to the woods to live in what would be relative isolation were it not for the many animals that surround and inevitably annoy her. Sticks is an arrogant self-obsessed force who wills herself on the flora and fauna. There is a rabbit named Oatmeal who harbors an unrequited love for her, a pair of kissing geese, a cross-dressing moose absurdly named Lisa Hanawalt. When a reporter named, ahem, Michael DeForge shows up to interview Sticks for his biography on her, she quickly slugs him and buries him up to his neck, immobilizing him. Instead, Sticks narrates her way through the forest, recalling formative incidents from her storied past in what becomes a strange sort of autobiography.

    Deforge’s witty dialogue and deadpan narration create a bizarre, yet eerily familiar world. Sticks Angelica, Folk Hero plays with autobiography, biography, and hagiography to look at how we build our own sense of self and how others carry on the roles we create for them in our own personal dramas.

     

    Author Bio:

    Michael DeForge was born in 1987 and grew up in Ottawa, Ontario. His one-person anthology series Lose has been nominated for, or won, every major comics award including the Ignatz and Eisner awards. His previous graphic novels with Drawn & Quarterly are Ant Colony, Big Kids, and First Year Healthy. This March he releases Sticks Angelica, Folk Hero.

    Sadie Dupuis is a musician, writer and artist who most frequently performs as the frontdemon of the rock group Speedy Ortiz, which has released two critically acclaimed albums for Carpark Records. She also writes politically-geared pop songs under the moniker Sad13. Based in Philadelphia, her writing on music has been published in Spin, New York Magazine, and Nylon, and she earned an MFA in poetry from UMass Amherst.

    Sat, March 25th, 7pm  FREE EVENT