General Category > Comic Related Discussion
Has anyone had any interesting stories of meeting Comic Book artists?
Yoc:
Thanks for sharing the story DM. I think I'd enjoy the two pictures you describe as well.
:)
paw broon:
I don't know about interesting stories but I was in the fortunate position of being there close to the start of comic marts and cons in Glasgow. Then, involved with FOCK - Friends of Clark Kent, a Glasgow comics group who met every Wed evening in a pub, we started organising marts. As time went on and 3 of us ran AKA Books and Comics in the city, we invited guests to the shop and to marts and eventually cons. So, the list of creators who turned up is rather long and, at first was mostly Scottish and British. This was the early days of 2000AD and we formed friendships with Alan Grant, John Wagner, Cam Kennedy, Kev. O' Neil, Mick McMahon. Lots of drink was taken. Then Dave Gibbons turned up followed by the likes of Alan Davis. Had a few great nights out with Mr. Davis in the early part of his career and I remember taking him to a Chinese restaurant and his reaction to his first taste of chili oil - surprised he survived.
Other guests who pitched up for shop signings or con appearances included, David Lloyd, Bryan Talbot, Alan Moore, who we also had coffee with in Angouleme - what a nice man. Some American creators appeared as we grew better known and, just to be clear, not all of them were on our invites, they were sometimes on tours organised down south. But they always seemed to want a night out in Glasgow. So Dave Sim, a couple of times ( don't recall much about those nights), Matt Wagner, Bill Sienkewicz (have I spelled that right?), and we got the great prize of Will Eisner, who was wonderful, full of stories, good company and an excellent dinner guest. And for me, even more importantly, Archie Goodwin. Such a gentleman and such a great loss to comics. I'm sure that Marv Wolfman was at that con in the Central Hotel but I don't remember much about his visit - or am I hallucinating.
At the Angouleme con in France I had dinner with Mike Richardson, whose only ground rule was that we didn't talk about comics. I did an interview for BBC Radio 4 while at Angouleme and Dave Gibbons told me his aunt had heard it.
Back then we often ran into Grant Morrison and, a bit later, had to chivvy Frank Quitely along and encourage him to keep going because he didn't seem to have a lot of confidence at the time. Vincent is a lovely person and so talented.
F.P. in Edinburgh had Chris Claremont up for a signing and we were to meet him the evening before. As we waited we wondered how we would recognise him as none of us had met him previously. Can I just say that from the back, the huge X-MEN logo on the leather jacket was a dead giveaway. That was a good night, wandering down the Royal mile for fish and chips, with a few drinks under our belts.
Yoc:
Very interesting post PB, thanks for sharing.
Please feel free to continue or elaborate if you felt inclined.
:)
paw broon:
Thanks, Yoc. Reading it again it seemed as if I was just name dropping. Not something that comes naturally to many Scots. But, then again, it was a great time. We met so many people, learned so much, saw some great projects come to fruition, had some good meals and the odd wee refreshment. And DC used AKA as a sort of first point of contact for a couple of years when they were coming to Scotland.
Recently, I've had a couple of chats with Ken Barr and bumped onto Colin McNeil at the last mart and F.Q at a previous mart. And, literally, bumped into Dom Regan in the street ( he's colouring Superboy) last week.
DC got me out to L.A. a couple of times as one of their dealer thingies (sorry, I forget the term) and there I was, with Phil Clarke from Birmingham, in Paul Levitz's suite in the Universal Hilton, with messrs. Levitz and Wayne, discussing some problems the shop had had with a DC tpb. Also met a number of DC staff, most of whom were either charming or good company. Hard work this comics stuff, especially when you are plied with good wine and seafood and have the chance to see the Batman cartoon before most of the rest of the world.
One of the highlights of being in L.A. was the opportunity to ride the bus downtown to look for Mexican superhero wrestler comics, for example Sensacional de Luchas and Tinieblas. Success, they were everywhere. I now have a nice wee collection.
Sorry, got a bit off topic there.
darkmark (RIP):
OK, here's my Alan Moore story.
Way back in the late Eighties, I was attending the San Diego Con faithfully, and one of those cons was the one to which DC brought Alan Moore. I once asked Cat Yronwode how to recognize him and she said, "Just look for a big hairy Englishman." Well, I did. Alan was wearing a T-shirt and jeans, iirc, and was accompanied by his then-wife, who wore a short hairdo and a red dress. I caught up to him around an art display and asked if I could take a pic, which he graciously agreed to. Then I took one of Mrs. Moore, who gave me a surprised smile, because I said it wasn't fair to take his picture and not hers, too.
A little later on, after seeing a panel on which Alan (with Gil Kane and others) answered questions, I re-encountered him at the DC table, where he was enduring the ancient ritual of having a big bunch of fans stuff comic books in his face for signing. I asked him if he was any good at discussing politics or philosophy under those circumstances, and he said he'd give it a try. Briefly, I discussed V For Vendetta's raison d'etre with him, and pointed out that Mao Tse-Tung had done a lot of the sort of things he had V fighting against in Fascist Britain. Alan said that he believed really there were only two kinds of politics, the fascist kind that insisted on making all people more or less alike and part of one thing, and the anarchist kind that let everybody supposedly go off and do their own thing. He admitted he wasn't enamored of capitalism, and allowed, "I guess I don't much like anything," facetiously. But, more or less, he agreed with me that in a Communist country, there could very well be a right-wing V For Vendetta, and that Communism was another form of Fascism.
At least, he seemed to.
As I recall, we shook hands and I thanked him for the talk. Alan Moore was a truly nice guy, although I disagree like hell with his politics and his mysticism and a lot of other things. Later on, I read that he was truly disenchanted with the San Diego scene and swore off con appearances forever. I hope I was one of the more positive experiences he had there.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version