Thursday, Jan. 19

The most economical flight I found was a red-eye from Newark, so as I headed off to “Newark Liberty International Airport” via the seldom-used (by me) PATH train, I felt like I was traveling already. And somehow I ended up with my very own private “first-class” cabin on the Newark AirTrain. Woo-hoo!

As usual, I got very little sleep on the plane, despite having my own row to sack out on. Even with the extensive traveling I’ve been doing of late, I still get excited by plane travel (and the allure of free movies on the seat back in front of me).

Friday, Jan. 20

Flying into Dusseldorf very early the next day, I made the connection to the short Paris flight. Arriving at Charles de Gaulle airport, I found my way to the RER B suburban train, which took me to my publisher’s home in the town of Antony, right outside of Paris. In fact, the train took me right through the heart of Paris, all the while being serenaded by live accordion music! I couldn’t help but smile at the cliché come to life

Weighed down by my old traveling backpack and my laptop bag, I made it to my publisher Vincent Henry’s place, meeting him and his two teenage girls before collapsing on the bed for a power nap. That was all I got, as I had an event scheduled for that night. With Vincent as my guide through the maze of the Parisian metro, it was off to the 17th arrondisement for an A.D. “dedication” at Librairie Apo(k)lyps. The store was remarkably similar to your typical American comics stores, with a healthy collection of American mainstream comics and “alternative” graphic novels to go with their selection of French BDs.

One thing I had been fretting about before my trip was knowing that French B.D. fans expect more than just a quick sketch in their books. I had heard stories about artists doing fully realized illustrations in each copy, some taking as long as a half hour to create. In my years of doing signings in the U.S., I’d never faced that sort of pressure! But I discovered that a head-and-shoulder shot of a customer-selected A.D. character did the trick. Add a little spot color with some pens I had brought with me, and voila! a nice memento in under ten minutes.

Fighting through my jetlag, I pulled off the signing pretty well. It wasn’t overly crowded, but there were a couple of people waiting when we got there, and I had a chance to talk with each buyer—in a combination of my bad French and their better English. And I loved chatting with the owner Laurent and the store manager Remi about comics in France & in the U.S. Then it was back to Antony with Vincent before my Saturday day trip to Metz.

I’ll get into that next time.

This is part of a series sponsored by the Rubin, where “speakers from New York and international contemporary art scenes interact with and informally discuss the rich artistic traditions of the Himalayas and surrounding regions in relation to their own practices and processes.” I visited the museum—which is only about seven years old—for the first time last week, and found it a really impressive and beautiful venue.

The Museum is currently exhibiting another show, Hero, Villain, Yeti: Tibet in Comics, and I’ll also be participating in a project centered around that. The subject is especially close to my heart because of my affection for Hergé’s Tintin in Tibet, which I’ve long considered the best of the Tintin adventures. Anyway, along with 7 other graphic artists, I will take part in an “Open Studio” (held at the museum) where we will produce an interpretive graphic version of the Tibetan Wheel of Life (also known as the Wheel of Becoming, a representation of Buddhist beliefs about life, death, and rebirth). This open studio (where I’ll be conceiving and doing preliminary work on my section of the Wheel) will take place March 21; further details to come.

Please come to both events. Here are details on my “Artists on Art” talk:

Friday, February 24, 2012, 6:15pm — FREE!
Rubin Museum of Art
150 W. 17th Street
New York, NY

Meet at the base of the spiral staircase

See you there!

The “Framing Tintin” series is an attempt to reconcile “the world-renowned boy reporter with his murky cinematic past, and [get] at the truth of why Hergé’s beloved hero has never made a perfect journey from page to screen.” The series features five French films made over a 25-year period (most of which have never before been screened in the US), as well as the 2003 documentary Tintin et Moi, “as close a psychiatric evaluation of Hergé as has ever been made public.” As the series notes, the films include “two dazzling live-action comedy adaptations, two earnest attempts at reproducing Hergé’s signature style in an animation studio, and an early stop-motion rarity.”

Guest speakers/presenters include the very brilliant Bill Kartalopolous and the very talented Jason Little; I’ll be doing a short humorous presentation on how I’ve been ripping off Tintin in one way or another my whole career.

I’m really excited to see these films — some, like The Lake of Sharks and The Blue Oranges, I have comic book adaptations of but have never seen, and many of the others I didn’t even know existed. Hard to beat the price, too: $5 admission for each movie; 2-for-1 admission for the Saturday and Sunday matinees! Here are the details, times, and dates:

FRAMING TINTIN Film Series at the Spectacle Theatre: 124 S. 3rd Street, Brooklyn, NY 11211

Friday 12/16
(with guest presenters Bill Kartalopolous and Josh Neufeld)
7PM: Tintin et Moi (2003)
9PM: The Crab with the Golden Claws (1947)

Saturday 12/17
3PM: Tintin and the Temple of the Sun (1969)
5PM: Tintin and the Mystery of the Golden Fleece (1961)

Sunday 12/18
(with guest presenter Jason Little)
3PM: Tintin and the Lake of Sharks (1972)
5PM: Tintin and the Blue Oranges (1964)

I met Mohammed and Sara at workshops I led while visiting the tiny Persian Gulf country on a U.S. State Department trip. Shortly after I became friends with both of them on Facebook, Bahrain underwent a great deal of turmoil in protests inspired by the Arab Spring — and also by the country’s simmering sectarian tensions.As the New York Times wrote the other day, Bahrain  is “… a country that was once one of the region’s most cosmopolitan is now one of its most divided.”

In the story I document Mohammed and Sara’s impressions of the events, through their words and experiences — as well as their own cartoons, which were published as things unfolded.

As I mentioned, I visited Bahrain last year as part of a trip that also took me to Egypt, Algeria, and Israel/Palestine. I later realized that the way I was “handled” by the State Dept. folks in Bahrain was very different than in the other countries I went to. Essentially, I feel, things were whitewashed a bit, and I was not given a full sense of Bahraini society, particularly the ethnic tensions between Sunnis and Shiites. You can read my original blog posts about the trip, my first reactions to the Pearl Revolution, and my realization that I had been “duped” here. Also, Michael Cavna of the Washington Post‘s “Comic Riffs” blog wrote a very nice profile of me and the piece here.

Since I finished the piece, the Bassiouni committee, which I mention near the end of the story, has published its report. You can read the original report here [a pdf], or two very thorough New York Times articles about its reception here and here.

In the end, I find the whole story quite heartbreaking — particularly because of the way the demonstrators were so brutally suppressed. It’s also really sad to see the lack of perspective on both sides. There’s a quote from one of the Bassiouni committee investigators that I think sums it all up quite tragically: “‘There is no neutral account ‘ said Mohamed Helal, the commission’s legal officer…. ‘The community is almost living in parallel universes.’ In investigating one episode, Mr. Helal said he found on the same day, at the same moment, ‘there was not one moment of overlap. How can you reconstruct the truth when there’s no overlap?’ he asked.”

Once again, here’s a link to the story, “Bahrain: Lines in Ink, Lines in the Sand”: http://www.cartoonmovement.com/comic/24

Our friends Tom Hart and Leela Corman lost their two-year-old daughter, Rosalie, on Friday night. Sari and I can’t even begin to imagine the grief they must be going through. Ironically, tonight we just came back from a weekend trip to Chicago, where we left Phoebe behind with her grandparents. On Friday, right before the flight, Sari and talked a bit about what we hoped would happen to Phoebe — and how she would be cared for — should we both die in a plane crash. Little did we know what was transpiring that very same time, but in reverse, with Tom and Leela.

Their dear friends and fellow cartoonists, Lauren Weinstein and Jon Lewis, have more to say about the situation. I found this line of Jon’s particularly touching: “My friends are in a horror world I don’t even know if I can understand, past some mountains and behind a veil; I want to touch them and protect them but there’s no way to do that.”

Now would be a good time to read Tom’s ongoing strip, “Daddy Lightning,” inspired by his journey as a father. He says he plans on continuing the strip.

Please consider donating to the Rosalie Lightning Memorial fund (administered through PayPal), to help the family with funeral and related expenses.

Now I must go hug my daughter… for a very long time.

It may seem strange to write a tribute to your super, but Victor was an amazing man. He took care of the building for more than 30 years, before ill health forced him into retirement in 2010. He knew all the residents, all 78 units in the building inside and out, and the boiler was like his own child. We moved here 11 years ago, and from the beginning, Victor looked out for us and our apartment. He had a scratchy voice, barely speaking above a whisper, the result of a throat operation, but his condition never deterred him. He was constantly animated, with a wicked sense of humor and a love of gossip — I learned more about the building’s history and the other residents from him than I ever have from personal experience.

From my prior bouts in New York City apartments, superintendent were usually gruff, unmotivated, and difficult to get ahold of. Victor was the opposite in every way. He was literally always around, available at a moment’s notice from his basement apartment. In all the years we lived here, I don’t remember Victor ever taking a vacation. He took it as a point of pride that he was a constant presence. We always used to say that the building was his life. We used to joke that he would die in the building.

And in the end it proved to be true. In his last years, diabetes had made him practically immobile, and he was sub-contracting his superintendent work to underlings. He basically couldn’t do his job anymore, and the co-op board was put in the unfortunate position of forcing him to retire and hiring a new super. They allowed Victor to stay in his basement apartment ’til the end of the year, and even arranged for a large, low-rent apartment for him and his family to move into in another neighborhood. But it became increasingly clear that Victor would never leave; the building and its residents were too important to him.

* * *

Sari and I went to his viewing on Monday night, at a local funeral home. It was the first time I’d seen an open casket (if you don’t count the Balinese cremation ceremony I witnessed back in 1992), and the first time I saw someone I had known after they were dead. It was quite weird, though not quite as unsettling as I anticipated. And in fact, I would have barely recognized Victor if I hadn’t known it was him. In his heyday, Victor’s hair was tousled, he was wearing grease-stained overalls, and there would have been oil or grease on his face and hands. Now his hair was combed and he was wearing a suit. A slight smile was on his face. His skin was powdered — he looked a little out of focus, or like a wax effigy of himself. His family had put a set of rosary beads in his hands, and his casket was decorated with a giant New York Yankees logo. The logo was actually larger than his name.

Many other building residents came to the viewing as well, to greet the family and extend their condolences. Also there was Van, the building porter and Victor’s long-time right-hand man. He sat uncharacteristically somber, contemplating Victor’s body. But then he nudged Juan, Victor’s replacement, and said, “You better watch out — this building kills supers.”

St. Edward’s University

I flew down to Austin, TX, last week, where I was met by my excellent host, Assistant Dean Jennifer Phlieger. She then set me up for my lunch with St. Edward’s students, a subsequent hour-long Q&A, dinner with some  faculty members, and finally an hour-long presentation for about 300–400 kids.

I didn’t know much about St. Ed’s before I got there, other than that it was a private, Catholic institution that had been founded by the same guy who founded Notre Dame in Indiana. I have to admit about being a little curious about the Catholic aspect, and there’s still a nun in charge of major decisions, but it was explained to me that the school’s religious underpinning is pretty downplayed nowadays. Some of the elements that still remain, admirably, include a requirement that students spend at least one spring break doing some kind of community service, whether it be working for a homeless shelter or helping to build houses in communities like the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans. The school also does major outreach to the Latino community, offering all sorts of scholarships and the like, to the point that 25% of the student body is currently Hispanic. In most other respects, however, the school is a “typical” private liberal arts school located in the heart of Austin (which, as you may know, is not your typical Texas town).

The first official event was for me the highlight of the visit. About eight students joined me for lunch in the school cafeteria. They were mostly freshmen, and ranged from natives of New Orleans to students in a graphic novel class. We started off with questions about A.D. but soon branched off into the current state of New Orleans, race relations, and politics. I found the students incredibly engaged, not only with the book but with the world at large. They were opinionated, lively, and willing to challenge me about elements of the book. I really enjoyed our conversation.

From there I did a free-wheeling Q&A with about 150 students who had read A.D. I didn’t have a presentation prepared, but there was a video projector in the lecture hall, so I used the web version of A.D. to illustrate various points. In both this class and the lunch, the very question I was asked was about A.D.‘s unique color schemes, so I must make a note to myself to discuss that question in future presentations.

After a nice dinner with about six faculty members I headed back over to the university for my official presentation. As a result of my re-reading of the book, I also made a major revision of my usual presentation, and this was the first chance I’ve had to share it. (Because of a paper written by a U. of Chicago grad student, and my being asked to talk about the “Art of Catastrophe” as part of another event earlier this year, I’ve come to see that a major part of why I was so moved by Hurricane Katrina — from volunteering with the Red Cross to then doing A.D. — was because of emotional trauma I suffered from 9/11. Makes sense, but I never realized that until recently. Duh.) Anyway, the talk went well, though it was such a big venue (they repurposed the university gym) that I felt a bit disconnected from the audience. Still, there were a lot of great questions, and I must have signed about 100 copies of the book for eager (and patient) students afterward.

As always, I was struck and humbled by how A.D. has connected with so many people from so many different ways and stages of life. I really know what it means now when people say that as an artist all you can do is put the work out there. What the world does with it is, poignantly, beautifully, beyond your control.

My mom came up with the concept and text, and I did the illustration. The project was commissioned by DAAD (in English, the German Academic Exchange Service). My mother is in Berlin for a year on a residency sponsored by DAAD. This is the second large public art collaboration I’ve done with her, the first being part of the MAK Center’s “How Many Billboards?” project from last year.

The piece is quite massive, approximately 35′ x 42.’ Here’s a photo:

Pull Up Those PIIGS!

This is how the building normally looks (without the palm trees), sorry about the weird cropping:

And here’s a link to a larger version of the original illo, complete with the groovy yellow-green background which they had to cut out for print-compatibility reasons…

Though I was able to reconnect with Sari a short time later, I spent much of the morning freaking out, watching the second tower fall from the roof of my building, and meeting up in Park Slope with my good buddy Dean Haspiel (aka ). It was all too stunning, surreal, and horrific to truly understand.

Sari left work shortly after the second tower fell and watched TV, and the smoking craters, from the balcony of her sister-in-law's house. She finally decided to walk home over the Manhattan Bridge, where I met her later in the afternoon.

I tell the rest of the story in my three-page comic "Song for September 11," which you can read on ACT-I-VATE. Shortly after 9/11, Alternative Comics publisher Jeff Mason suggested doing a benefit anthology for the Red Cross, and I was invited to contribute. I wrote and drew the piece in November 2001 and it was published in the anthology 9/11: Emergency Relief in January 2002. You can read a little background about the piece on Comic Book Resources. The Library of Congress asked me for the original art for "Song for September 11;" the pages are now in their archives in Washington, D.C.

In 2006, on the 5th anniversary of 9/11, I did another 9/11-related piece, the one-page "Post-Traumatic Skyscraper Anxiety," which you can also read on ACT-I-VATE. The piece was recently published in print in Cousin Corrinne's Reminder #3. There's a video of me reading the piece here.

In many ways the experience of 9/11 led me to volunteering for the Red Cross after Hurricane Katrina. Both catastrophes led me to make art. I muse on the connection in the paper, "Filtering Catastrophe Through Comics," which I wrote for a panel I was on earlier this year.

As I listen to the roll-call of names of those lost on September 11 at the World Trade Center, I devoutly hope to never witness such tragedy again.

Last Sunday, Sari, Phoebe, and I came up to Sari's parents' place in Austerlitz, NY, or a two-week working vacation. Summer camp is out, Phoebe starts pre-K after Labor Day, and we've been enjoying the end of summer here in the "country." And now, with a new hurricane forming — ironically heading to my neck of the woods — it all comes around again.

The house still has no TV, but they've upgraded to DSL, which helps us stay abreast of things. Like the residents of the Gulf Coast back in '05, we're tuning into the latest developments, doing our own storm-tracking, and preparing for things like power outtages, flooding, and the like. But here in the Berkshires, Irene shouldn't be too bad, nothing how it could impact coastal areas from the Carolinas all the way to New York City. Our whole lives — our home, our friends, most of our family — are back there, and once again I'm absent — not there to experience the event for myself, to prepare, to help do what I can. And if the storm is bad enough here to knock out our electricity, I'll be just as in the dark (literally) as I was six years ago. Actually, more so!

As you know, the events of Katrina prompted me to volunteer with the Red Cross; which led me to getting trained in disaster relief; which led to me being deployed to Biloxi, MS; which led to Katrina Came Calling; which led (iindirectly) to A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge. I'm glad New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, as they continue to rebuild from Katrina (and Hurricane Rita), have mostly escaped nature's fury since 2005; the fact is we on the East Coast are far less prepared than they were. And all we can do here is watch, wait, and hope for the best.

By the way, the upcoming anniversary has instigated a few journals to cite A.D. Here are a few recent mentions:

• The Atlantic: "Comic Books as Journalism: 10 Masterpieces of Graphic Nonfiction"
• The Onion A.V. Club: "After the deluge: 29 remarkable works inspired by Hurricane Katrina"