NYC – Stan Lee Universe Panel

Dennis O’Neil, Al Jaffee, Peter Sanderson, and Danny Fingeroth appear at MoCCA on Thursday February 2, 2012 from 7-9pm.

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Press Release:

New York, NY — The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art — MoCCA — is proud to announce a special MoCCA THURSDAYS event: A celebration and signing of THE STAN LEE UNIVERSE, Danny Fingeroth and Roy Thomas’s new book about the co-creator of Spider-Man, The X-Men, Iron Man, and so many other iconic characters. The panel features Lee-colleagues (and contributors to the book) DENNIS O’NEIL, AL JAFFEE, PETER SANDERSON, and co-editor DANNY FINGEROTH. (And don’t be surprised if a guest-star or two shows up as well!)
Copies of The Stan Lee Universe will be available for purchase and signing at the event.

[NOTE: Stan Lee will NOT be present.]

Event details:
Thursday February 2, 2012
7 PM-9 PM
Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art
594 Broadway, suite 401, New York, NY 10012
Admission: $7 / FREE for MoCCA Members

About the book:
THE STAN LEE UNIVERSE is a portrait of Lee’s and Marvel’s development as pop culture forces. It includes much material found in The STAN LEE ARCHIVES at the University of Wyoming, including transcripts of lost radio interviews and debates with Lee and figures such as Hilde Mosse (Fredric Wertham’s partner in comics-hating) and Jack Kirby. Others whose voices are “heard” in this eclectic volume include:  Roger Ebert; Country Joe and the Fish; Will Eisner: Richard Corben; Neal Conan; and James Cameron. And script, pencil art, and detailed notes from both Lee and Kirby for their Silver Surfer Graphic Novel, and pages from a screenplay Lee wrote for director Alain Resnais are just some of the extraordinary items in this one-of-a-kind book.

 

NYC – Comics Out Loud

Walter Simonson, Louise Simonson, Bob Wiacek, Chris Sotomayor, John Workman, and Danny Fingeroth appear at the Society of Illustrators on Saturday, January 28th, 2012.

Press Release:

Comic books (and their cousins, graphic novels) are something we’re all familiar with from childhood on. But if you’re not involved in making them, how they come to be can seem a little mysterious and intimidating. Now, the curtain is pulled back as comics editor and writer DANNY FINGEROTH, in collaboration with THE SOCIETY OF ILLUSTRATORS presents:

COMICS OUT LOUD

In a manner similar to the Society’s acclaimed ART OUT LOUD events, COMICS OUT LOUD will feature top comic book creators—one from each discipline of the medium—demonstrating and discussing their work processes as attendees circulate around the room and watch the process of “sequential art” (as the great Will Eisner dubbed it) being made.

You’ll get to watch writer LOUISE SIMONSON, penciler WALT SIMONSON, inker BOB WIACEK, colorist CHRIS SOTOMAYOR, and letterer JOHN WORKMAN as they ply their crafts. Each creator will be working on a current assignment, so that attendees will get a sense of how team-created comics come to be. Event organizer, and longtime comics editor, DANNY FINGEROTH, will be on hand to discuss and demonstrate the role of the editor in the comic book making process.

COMICS OUT LOUD will be a rare opportunity to see top creators doing—and speaking about—their work. You will have the chance to find out everything you always wanted to know about making comics, but were afraid—or didn’t even know—to ask!

Tickets

$50 non-members, $40 members, $20 students

Food will be available for an additional $5.

Purchase tickets here!
ABOUT THE CREATORS:

LOUISE SIMONSON [writer] has written and edited comic books for many years, including those in the superhero, science fiction, horror, and fantasy genres. Her Marvel work includes the award-winning Power Pack; best selling X-Factor and New Mutants; Wolverine: Meltdown, co-written with her husband, Walter ; and Web of Spider-Man. Her DC Comics work includes Superman: Man of Steel, featuring the Death and Return of Superman storylines; Steel; and World of Warcraft. She has also written 23 books for kids and adults. She is currently writing a Young Adult dark urban fantasy novel and a Rocketeer story for IDW.

WALT SIMONSON [penciler] is a triple-threat talent, lauded for his work as writer, penciler, and inker. His first professional artwork appeared in 1973 in DC’s Weird War Tales. He gained prominence with his collaboration with Archie Goodwin on the Manhunter feature, and from there went on to many triumphs, including landmark runs on The Mighty Thor, The Fantastic Four (both of which he wrote, penciled and inked), and Michael Moorcock’s Elric.

BOB WIACEK [inker], one of the industry’s top embellishers, has inked over such pencilers as Carmine Infantino on Star Wars, John Romita Jr. on The Uncanny X-Men, June Brigman on Power Pack, John Byrne on Sensational She-Hulk, Walter Simonson on X-Factor, and George Pérez on The Brave and the Bold, volume 2.

CHRIS SOTOMAYOR [colorist] has the reputation of being one of the best—and fastest—color artists in the comics business, and has been a mainstay at Marvel Comics since 1996. He’s proven himself time and again, having worked on their top properties, including Spider-Man, X-Men, Daredevil, Captain America, Hulk, and many others, as well as working on titles for DC, Image and Humanoids.

JOHN WORKMAN [letterer] was born in the mid-twentieth century. He discovered comics at an early age and was struck by the uniqueness of the medium. His plans to be a lawyer flew out the window, and he began to experiment with all the elements that make up the creation of comics stories. His favorite time spent in comics over the last 44 years was the period (1977-1984) during which he was the Art Director for Heavy Metal magazine. He edited, wrote, penciled, inked, colored, lettered, and handled production on thousands of comics pages, all the time attempting to boost sales of the publication and to present comics material to a large worldwide audience. In the years since the HM days, he has become known primarily for his lettering, though he continues to do everything else that it takes to come up with a comics story.

DANNY FINGEROTH [curator] is Sr. VP of Education at SoHo’s Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art (MoCCA), where he co-curated exhibitions of the work of Al Jaffee and Will Eisner. He was Group Editor of Marvel’s Spider-Man line and has written many comics featuring Spider-Man and other icons. He is co-author of How to Create Comics from Script to Print; author of Superman on the Couch: What Superheroes Really Tell Us About Ourselves and Our Society; and co-editor of the recent The Stan Lee Universe, a compendium of rarities from and about the co-creator of Spider-Man, the X-Men, and so many others, published by TwoMorrows.

Society of Illustrators
128 East 63rd Street, New York, NY 10065

WA – Stan Lee Universe Signing

Writer and editor Danny Fingeroth signs copies of his newest book ‘The Stan Lee Universe’ as well as other works at the Comics Dungeon on Thursday, January 5, 2012 from 4:00pm until 6:00pm!

Danny Fingeroth is well known for his extensive editorial runs at Marvel Comics, overseeing titles such as Spider-Man, Marvel Team-Up, and more. His writing credits include Darkhawk, Dazzler, The Deadly Foes of Spider-Man, and numerous issues of the Avengers, Iron Man, Daredevil, and more!

Fingeroth is also the creator of Write Now! Magazine for TwoMorrows Publishing and is also well known for his books ‘Superman On The Couch: What Superheroes Really Tell Us About Ourselves and Society’ as well as ‘Disguised As Clark Kent: Jews, Comics, and the Creation of the Superhero’.

His newest book is an exploration into Stan Lee’s history and features rare interviews, memos, correspondences, and artwork!

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Comics Dungeon
250 NE 45th St, Seattle, WA 98105

NYC – Stan Lee Universe Signing

Danny Fingeroth and Dennis O’Neil sign the new book, The Stan Lee Universe on Thursday, December 22, 2011 from 6-7pm!

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*Stan Lee will not be at this event.

Face front, true believers! The Stan Lee Universe is the ultimate repository of interviews with and mementos about Marvel Comics’ fearless leader! From his Soapbox to the box office, the Smilin’ One literally changed the face of comic books and pop culture, and this tome presents in his own words – and those of the illustrious folks he’s worked with – the co-creation of Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Silver Surfer, and so many other super-characters! Presented are numerous rare and unpublished interviews with Stan, discussing how he made Marvel Comics the household name it is today. Also featured are interviews with top luminaries of the comics industry, including John Romita Sr. & Jr., Tod McFarlane, Dennis O’Neil, Roy Thomas, Gene Colan, Al Jaffee, Larry Lieber, Jerry Robinson, and Michael Uslan discussing his vital importance to the field he helped shape. Plus, this book contains the essential-to-every-writer Stan Lee’s Top Ten Tips for Writers! And as a bonus for this special edition, and direct from Stan’s personal archives (housed at the University of Wyoming), you’ll see rare photos, sample scripts and plots, personal correspondences, and other tidbits from the entire span of his career, some unseen for decades!

Midtown Comics
64 Fulton Street, New York, NY

NYC – Eisner Retrospective Panel

Denny O’Neil, David Hajdu, and N.C. Christopher Couch speak at a discussion moderated by Danny Fingeroth on Thursday, August 4th from 7-9 pm.

Admission: $7/Free for MoCCA members

Why and how did the guy who invented and conquered entertainment comics and then spent 25 successful years creating educational comics reinvent himself, the medium of sequential art, and the comics industry itself through his innovation in the literary and autobiographical graphic novel and his endless advocacy for comics as an art form?

About the panelists:

DENNY O’NEIL, one of comics’ most acclaimed writers, worked briefly in journalism, then moved to New York and comics. Denny brought social consciousness to the medium with the groundbreaking Green Lantern/Green Arrow series. His work on Batman— as writer and editor—returned that character to its dark, gothic roots. Denny knew Will Eisner and considered him both a friend and a major influence.

DAVID HAJDU is a critic for The New Republic and a professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He interviewed Will Eisner extensively and wrote about him at length for The New York Review of Books and other publications. He is the author of four books: Lush Life: A Biography of Billy Strayhorn, Positively 4th Street: The Lives and Times of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Mimi Baez Fariña and Richard Fariña, The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America, and Heroes and Villains: Essays on Music, Movies, Comics, and Culture. His articles and essays have been selected for a number of anthologies, including Best Music Writing, Best American Magazine Writing, The New York Times Arts & Culture Reader, and Best American Comics Writing.

N. C. CHRISTOPHER COUCH holds a Ph.D. in art history from Columbia University. He is the author of numerous books and articles on Latin American art and on graphic novels and comic art, including The Will Eisner Companion: The Pioneering Spirit of the Father of the Graphic Novel (with Stephen Weiner), Will Eisner: A Retrospective (with Peter Myer), Faces of Eternity: Masks of the Pre-Columbian Americas, and The Festival Cycle of the Aztec Codex Borbonicus. He teaches comics as art and literature at University of Massachusetts, Amherst, the School of Visual Arts, New York, and Trinity College, Hartford. He has curated exhibitions at the American Museum of Natural History, the Americas Society, the Oklahoma Air and Space Museum and the Smith College Museum of Art. His most recent book, Jerry Robinson, Ambassador of Comics (Abrams 2010) has been nominated for a Harvey Award.

DANNY FINGEROTH is MoCCA’s Sr VP of Education and co-curator, with Denis Kitchen, of the Will Eisner’s New York andIn The Spirit of Will Eisner exhibitions. With Arie Kaplan, he co-curated the 2010 Is This the Al Jaffee Art Exhibit? at the museum. For Write Now! magazine, Fingeroth interviewed Will Eisner in depth in 2003. The interview is available in The Best of Write Now! Danny Fingeroth was a longtime editor and writer at Marvel Comics, and is the author of Superman on the Couch: What Superheroes Really Tell us About Ourselves and Society; Disguised as Clark Kent: Jews, Comic, and the Creation of the Superhero; and The Rough Guide to Graphic Novels. He has spoken on comics at The Smithsonian Institution, Columbia University (where he lectured about Eisner), and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. With Roy Thomas, Fingeroth is co-editor of The Stan Lee Universe, a compendium of rarities from Lee’s career, including unseen Will Eisner material, which will be released in fall 2011 by TwoMorrows Publishing. You can contact him at: dfingeroth@moccany.org.

About the Will Eisner’s New York: From The Spirit to the Modern Graphic Novel exhibition:
From the Golden Age of Comics through the creation of the modern graphic novel (a form he was instrumental in popularizing), you will find New York City at the heart of Will Eisner’s work. Whether thinly disguised as “Central City” in the pages of his legendary creation, The Spirit, or more directly presented in his autobiographical graphic novels, New York was portrayed by Eisner as only a native of the city could know it.

Like the legendary metropolis itself, there are infinite perspectives from which to look at and appreciate Eisner’s work. Will Eisner’s New York: From the Spirit to the Modern Graphic Novel provides surprising insights and moving revelations about the artist, his work, and his city.
 
MoCCA Education
For More information on MoCCA Education please email info@moccany.org

Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art
594 Broadway, Suite 401, (btwn. Houston and Prince), New York, NY 10012

Hawthorne High School Comic Con Returns

Press Release:

New Jersey’s premier comic book convention the Hawthorne High School Comic Convention is back on May 14th for it’s sixth show. Join the students of the Cartooning and the Art Clubs as we present New Jersey’s premier comic book art gathering.

There will be appearances by comic book creators and dealers. Art lessons will be presented all day by the comic professionals and we will have our incredible auction of original comic art, graphic novels, rare comics and other great items. The convention is held to celebrate the great American art form, comics, and to raise funds for our high school’s talented art department.

The art lessons will include many of the skills needed to create comics. The art lessons are for all ages and skill levels

Among the comic creators already booked to appear are:

Walter Simonson
Herb Trimpe
Joe Sinnott (tent)
Bob Wiacek
Joe Staton
Mark Texiera
Rudy Nebres
Paolo Rivera
Joe Giella (tent)
Mark Romanowski
Dick Ayers
Scott Roberts (tent)
James Sherman
Elaine Lee
Danny Fingeroth
Jim Salicrup
Rodney Ramos
Guy Dorian
Ian Dorian
Steve Mannion
Buddy Scalera
Rick Parker
Ken Gale
Mercy Van Vlack
Trevor Von Eedon
Louis Small Jr.
Neil Volkes

…And many more creators to come.

This is an extremely “kids friendly” event. Our art lessons are for all ages and there will be “kid friendly” items in the art auction.

The particulars:
May 14th, 2011 from 10am – 4pm

Dealer tables: $50: Email contact: alllal@aol.com

So whether you are a long time comic book convention veteran or want to experience your very first comic book show, come on out for the finest comic book convention – the 6th Hawthorne High School Comic Book Convention on May 14th.

Hawthorne High School
160 Parmalee Avenue, Hawthorne, NJ 07506

NYC – Al Jaffee Retrospective

Al Jaffee, Peter Kuper, John Bunk and Danny Fingeroth appear at MoCCA on Dec. 9th.

To celebrate the awe-inspiring event that is the “IS THIS THE AL JAFFEE ART EXHIBIT?” exhibit, we’ve assembled an “unusual gang of idiots” including AL JAFFEE himself, plus two of Al’s fellow MAD magazine creators whose work has been greatly influenced by Jaffee—PETER KUPER and TOM BUNK—as well as, playing moderator, the co-curator of the Jaffee exhibit and MoCCA SVP of Education, DANNY FINGEROTH! Would you be mad to miss this amazing panel? At $5 cheap (and FREE for MoCCA members), you sure would be—not to mention crazy, insane, and fershlugginer!

Thursday, December 9, 7 PM
IS THIS AN AL JAFFEE MOCCA THURSDAY PANEL?
Admission: $5|Free for MoCCA Members 

Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art
594 Broadway, Suite 401, New York, NY 10012
(btwn. Houston and Prince)

NYC – The Craft of Comics Writing

PAUL LEVITZ leads a discussion of how to construct plots to suit story structures long and short, building ideas from character, and tools for analyzing the form to develop your goals. Everything you ever wanted to know about plotting comics but were afraid to ask!

Q & A to follow.

MASTER CLASS: THE CRAFT OF COMICS WRITING: THE LONG AND SHORT OF PLOTTING with PAUL LEVITZ
Monday, December 6, 6:30-8:30 pm
Admission $40 | $35 for MoCCA Members

PAUL LEVITZ was born in Brooklyn, NY in 1956, and entered the comics industry in 1971 as editor/publisher of The Comic Reader, the first mass-circulation fanzine devoted to comics news. He continued to publish TCR for three years, winning two consecutive annual Comic Art Fan Awards for Best Fanzine. His other fan activities included editing the program books for several of Phil Seuling’s legendary New York Comic Art Conventions. He received Comic-con International’s Inkpot Award in 2002 and the prestigious Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award in 2008. Levitz also serves on the board of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

Levitz is primarily known for his work for DC Comics, where he has written most of their classic characters including the Justice Society and Superman in both comics and the newspaper strip, and an acclaimed run on The Legion of Super-Heroes, a series he’s recently returned to write. Readers of The Buyers’ Guide voted his Legion: The Great Darkness Saga one of the 20 best comic stories of the last century, and visitors to the site comicbookresources.com selected the same story as #11 of the Top 100 Comic Book Stories of All Time.

Cumulatively, Levitz has written over 300 stories with sales of over 25 million copies, and translations into over 20 languages. As a DC staffer from 1973, Levitz was an assistant editor, the company’s youngest editor ever, and in a series of business capacities, became Executive Vice President & Publisher in 1989 and then served as President & Publisher from 2002-2009. He continues as a Contributing Editor, but is now concentrating on his writing.

Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art
594 Broadway, Suite 401, New York, NY 10012
(btwn. Houston and Prince)

NYC – Backing Into Forward Signing

Jules Feiffer speaks with Danny Fingeroth at the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art on Wednesday, March 24 at 7 PM. Feiffer will be discussing his new autobiography Backing Into Forward: A Memoir.

About Backing Into Forward: A Memoir:
The award-winning cartoonist, playwright, and author delivers a witty, illustrated rendition of his life, from his childhood as a wimpy kid in the Bronx to his legendary career in the arts. A gifted storyteller who has delighted readers and theater audiences for decades, Jules Feiffer now turns his talents to the tale of his own life.

Plagued by learning problems, a controlling mother, and a debilitating sense of fear, Feiffer embarked on his first cartoon apprenticeship at the age of seventeen, emboldened only by a passion for success and an aptitude for failure. He vividly recalls those transformative years working under the legendary Will Eisner, and later, after he was drafted into the army, his evolution from “smart-ass kid into an enraged satirist.” Backing into Forward also traces Feiffer’s love life, from a doomed hitchhiking trip to reclaim his high-school sweetheart to losing his virginity in Greenwich Village, and his road to marriage and fatherhood.

At the center of this journey is Feiffer’s prolific creativity. In dazzling detail, he recounts the birth of his subversive graphic novella Munro, his entrée into New York’s literary salons, collaborations with film greats Mike Nichols, Robert Altman, and Jack Nicholson, and other major turning points. Brimming with wry punch lines, slices of Americana, and pithy social commentary, Backing into Forward charts Feiffer’s rise as an unlikely and incisive provocateur during the conformist fifties and the Vietnam and Civil Rights sixties and seventies.

Danny Fingeroth is MoCCA’s Senior Vice President of Education. He was the longtime group editor of Marvel’s Spider-Man line and the writer of comics including Darkhawk and Deadly Foes of Spider-Man. He has taught comics writing at NYU, The New School, and Media Bistro. Danny created and edited Write Now magazine, the only how-to publication dedicated to comics writing and writers. He is the author of The Rough Guide to Graphic Novels and co-author (with artist Mike Manley) of How to Create Comics from Script to Print.

Admission: $5
Free for MoCCA Members

NYC – MoCCA Comics Writing Series

CLAREMONT, O’NEIL AND DeFALCO MASTER WRITING CLASSES

 The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art – MoCCA is proud to announce the spring offerings from its Education Department. Organized and headed by Senior Vice-President of Education, DANNY FINGEROTH, the season’s initial offering will be: 

MASTER CLASS SERIES IN COMICS WRITING 

3 sessions, TUESDAYS, March 16 & 23; April 13, 6:30-8:30 pm 

March 16: CHRIS CLAREMONT 

March 23: TOM DeFALCO 

April 13: DENNIS O’NEIL 

Series Cost: $100 | $90 for MoCCA members

Individual sessions: $40 | $35 for MoCCA members 

CHRIS CLAREMONT, TOM DeFALCO, and DENNIS O’NEIL will each hold a master class session in comics writing. These three extraordinarily accomplished writers have written some of the highest profile and most acclaimed comics of all time, with bodies of work that have played significant parts in defining the modern versions of The X-Men (Claremont), Spider-Man (DeFalco), and Batman (O’Neil). Each of them will condense the most important things they know about writing into highly-concentrated (and entertaining!) lecture form. This is a rare opportunity to hear these top names in the field speak about what makes for great comics writing. 

CHRIS CLAREMONT has encountered more success than most writers ever dream of. Best known for his work on Marvel Comics’ X-Men, he has written other seminal characters such as Batman and Superman, originated several creator-owned series, is published throughout the world in many languages, and has authored nine novels. His unbroken 17-year run on Uncanny X-Men is the stuff of industry legend. The story arc “Dark Phoenix,” with its radical treatment of its central character, paved the way for the reinterpretation of superhero mythos. Current projects include the ongoing Marvel series X-Men Forever, X-Women, drawn by renowned Italian artist Milo Manara, the young adult novel Wild Blood, a contemporary urban dark fantasy, and the screen play Hunter’s Moon. 

TOM DeFALCO, a former editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics with over thirty books currently in print, has written comic books, graphic novels, short stories, prose novels and books like Spider-Man: The Ultimate Guide and Comic Creators on Fantastic Four. He was also a major contributor to The Marvel Encyclopedia and The Marvel Chronology. DeFalco has recently worked on Star Wars: The Clone Wars for Titan Comics, The Man From RIVERDALE for Archie Comics, Flash Gordon for Ardden Entertainment, The Flying Fool for Moonstone Books, The Super Seven for Stan Lee Comics and, of course, Amazing Spider-Girl for Marvel Comics. 

DENNIS O’NEIL is an award-winning comics writer and editor (best known for his landmark work on characters such as Batman and Green Lantern), and an educator at institutions including New York University and The School of Visual Arts. He has also been a journalist, critic, television writer, best-selling novelist (novelizations of The Dark Knight film and the epic Batman: Knightfall comics storyline, and the original novel Green Lantern: Hero’s Quest), and has published dozens of short stories. He lives in Nyack, N.Y. with his wife, Marifran.

And starting in April, MoCCA Education will present two more incredible courses: 

ANATOMY FOR ILLUSTRATORS WORKSHOP 

Instructors: R. SIKORYAK AND KRIOTA WILLBERG 

4 sessions, Mondays April 19 & 26, May 3 & 10.

HOW TO WRITE COMICS & GRAPHIC NOVELS 

Instructor: DANNY FINGEROTH 

4 sessions, Tuesdays April 20 & 27, May 4 & 11 

Details on these two courses will be announced soon. 

For more information and to register, call 212-254-3511 or go to www.moccany.org.

Press Contact: Ellen Abramowitz | eabramowitz@moccany.org 

The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art – MoCCA is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit arts education organization dedicated to the preservation, study and display of all forms of comic and cartoon art. The museum promotes greater understanding and appreciation of the artistic, cultural and historical significance of comic and cartoon art through a variety of events, exhibitions, and educational programs. The museum is located at 594 Broadway (between Houston and Prince Streets) in New York City. MoCCA is open to the public Tuesdays through Sundays from 12:00-5:00 pm. Suggested donation to the museum is $5 but free for MoCCA Members as well as for children 12 and under (when accompanied by a paying adult). For more information about the museum and MoCCA events, exhibitions and programs, visit the museum’s Website (www.moccany.org).

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