At the Laughs At Lakeside gallery show, I met quite a few Ohio artists & cartoonists and was lucky enough to have some of them join the cartoonist group, Sunday Comix. One of them was the “newly minted” cartoonist Sue Olcott (that’s her on the left talking with another long-time local artist, Susan Sturgill).

Sue recently began writing & drawing this wonderful, quirky comic Onion City; in the vein of some of the great underground comix artists of the 60s & 70s:

At present, I don’t know how else to get a copy of her book besides you emailing here at optikstix_at_yahoo.com.

Anyway, when I saw her watercolor-styled art, I knew I found someone who could translate my (occasionally overwrought) B&W line work into and elevate it to another realm. So I asked her to color my version of Calvin & Hobbes Lazy Sunday Book; a tribute to Bill Watterson’s phenomenal comic. I think she did a stupendous job:

Just a quick post…

Whew!  Both gallery shows that I was involved with over this past weekend went great.  (They really wore me out, too!)  Kafe Kerouac’s “Komics @ Kerouac” party was a fun time (casual, intimate, busy, laid-back, and so-much-more!)  and the Laughs At Lakeside exhibit opening at the High Road Gallery was a total blast in a different sort of way.  Because the K@K exhibit was hung in a coffee house (a stone-throw away from OSU campus), the clientèle was far more… mixed and some people just happened into the shindig, not knowing what the heck was going on.  “What’s this?”  “Why are you drawing comics?”  Is this yours?”  “That’s pretty good.” (etc.)  The L@L was more of a “typical” gallery event, albeit with cartoonists and the like… so the typical “snobbery” that I tend to encounter on those rare occasions I attend gallery shows rarely (if at all) surfaced.

Now that I’m “done” with the gallery stuff (until I need to go back & take the stuff down, that is), I’ve got to get ready for S.P.A.C.E.!  I’m working on an advert for the expo’s program book; two actually.  One for Blink and one for Sunday Comix.

The other reason I wanted to post something here was just an excuse to slap these sweet drawings of Blink on the site.  Every time I look at one of my drawing of her (and Sam), I just think how absolutely grateful I am to have managed to create these two wonderful, beautiful people… the fact that I get to create and write and draw their lives and share them with the world… it makes me so very, very happy.

That’s why the girls tend to smile a lot.

Waiting for my ride so that I can hang these photos on the walls at Kafe Kerouac for the Sunday Comix gallery show. I’m so excited!

I invite you to the opening reception on Sunday, February 3rd, for “Laughs at Lakeside” : Cartoon and Graphic Arts by Ohio artists.  I am one of over a dozen artists on display through February at The High Road Gallery at 12 E. Stafford Ave in Worthington, Ohio.  With the cooperation of the National Cartoonists Society Great Lakes Chapter and Steve Boreman, who is chair of the show, cartoonists will exhibit framed or matted originals and prints.  Artists whose work will be on exhibit include Russell Merritt, Ron Hill, Susan Sturgell, Paul Palnik, Judith Vierow, and Sunday Comixers Matt Wyatt & your very own Max Ink. (I’ll be exhibiting three pages from “Space To Breathe.”) The show dates are January 30 through February 23.

The free Artists’ reception on Sunday, February 3rd, will take place from 2-4 PM. The cartoonist group I run, “Sunday Comix”, will head a “cartoonists’ jam session” during the opening in which all artists are invited to a progressive cartoon, adding their skills to the panels as they are drawn. Mike Patrick will select prizes for entries in the show and awards will be given at the reception.

Three dimensional additions to the show are enamel pins by Susan Hunt and felted vessels by Suzanne Pusecker.

The High Road Gallery is located in Worthington at 12 East Stafford Ave, one block north of 161 off High Street. Gallery hours are 12-4 Wednesday through Friday and 11:30 to 4 on Saturday. Gallery phone is 614-781-6454. Visit www.highroadgallery.org for more information.