Giant Robot Store and GR2 News
Junko Mizuno is a manga artist from Japan now living in San Francisco. We interviewed her for Giant Robot magazine years ago at a time when she hardly spoke English. Now, she speaks English without issues and is busy exploring her comics and artwork. For GR2′s Robots exhibition, we have original pages of a special Japanese edition of Pure Trance. They’re all drawn by hand with some Zipatone added for shading. We have some of these pages available here.
Photos by Joshin Yamada. Chris Cilla, Reklaw, Dylan Williams, Tim Goodyear, and Andrice Arp at the Stumptown Comics Festival in 2007. That’s Andrice Arp at bottom right with our friend and late Dylan Williams at her left. Arp is an indie comics publisher and illustrator. She’s quietly appeared in numerous Giant Robot exhibitions and demands little, but always produces something fun and interesting. She paints meticulously and has a character style that’s all her own. Some of you will recognize her work from the bookmooch.com website. That illustration is below. Recognize her work now? Her piece in GR2′s Robots exhibition, Robot Kitten sold, however we do stock issues of Mome at the low price of $8 where she contributes her comic work. Arp sells a variety of her work both handcrafted, printed, and painted on etsy as well. This is her page.
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It was great to see Hellen Jo and Calvin Wong. We talked about the passing of Sparkplug’s Dylan Williams. Evidently, it was his wake in Portland literally at the same time last night. It took place at a comics shop which was fitting for a guy who spent a lot of time in the indie industry. Hellen and Calvin mentioned that they wanted to be there, but couldn’t so it was fitting that we were able to reminisce about the goodness Dylan brought. Dylan published Hellen’s first comic, Jin and Jam and was generous the entire way. While at a convention in Portland, Calvin said he sold a few of his comics throughout the day, but Dylan picked up 30 copies for distro at the end. We talked about Dylan’s generosity, his great eye, some publishing milestones and great attitude. A conversation is just one thing, and really, the least we could do to commemorate the guy. We had our own wake. At the end of the night, Hellen said, “Thanks for talking about Dylan.”
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Zak Sally remembers Dylan Williams of Sparkplug. It’s here.
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GR friend, Gene Luen Yang, a Bay Area native has been tapped to draw Avatar: The Last Airbender Comic. You might know him for his efforts with Eternal Smile, Level Up, and American Born Chinese. Check out Gene at Humblecomics.com and here’s an Airbender comic he drew in the past that crits it’s use of non-Asians in the film. Not a central point for confrontation or arguments, Gene Luen Yang has been doing comics for over a decade. It’s great to see him being tapped for indie projects and non indie projects alike.
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