Secret Acres is the Best!

THERE’S GOOD NEWS and then there’s good news. First the good news.

We do very much appreciate having our horns blown for us, since it doesn’t really count as bragging if we’re quoting someone else, does it? Someone over at NY Press really likes us. We’re in the boroughs, so being the Best Independent Comics Publisher on the Best of Manhattan 2010 list is a bit more of a hoot to us low-rent guys—and yeah, there’s lots of Brooklyn on there, too (Acres sympathizer and onetime SPX tablemate, Lisa Hanawalt picked up another win for Best Comic About Menstruation. Seriously.). Although, how many independent comics publishers are there in New York, anyway? Is it just us and Picturebox?

Speaking of Manhattan, our man Edie Fake is representing at the New York Art Book Fair (another former NY Press Best of Manhattan selection) this very weekend. He will have all the homemade stuffs, and, if you’re very nice, maybe he’ll even show you his Gaylord Phoenix.

On the left side of the country, another nice guy genius, Theo Ellsworth, of Capacity fame, has a solo show at Giant Robot in Los Angeles. It is entitled Visitors, and if you can be there on the 6th, there’s a 6:30pm reception, but be careful mixing booze and Theo’s art. Just get there by November 8th or you’ll miss out.

And, back in Brooklyn, Secret Acres will be throwing down at King Con, with none other than John Brodowski, the artist formerly known as JB and the man who brought you Curio Cabinet. Additionally, official Acres pal Mike Dawson (the Me in Freddie and Me and superstar creator of Troop 142) will also be hanging around King Con. If you haven’t read either Curio Cabinet or Troop 142, now’s your chance to get both at the same time and maybe some killer sketches to save your street cred.

If you’re wondering what the hell we are doing at King Con if we’re so artsy, well, you’ll find out when we do. New shows are always an adventure. We’re used to being the weird kids in the class, but when a childhood icon like Chris Claremont is the headliner, we really have no idea what to expect. Yes, we’re old enough to remember when Claremont’s Uncanny X-Men were fifty cents an issue. No, we have no thoughts on the $3.99 (momentarily back to $2.99) price tag and its effect on the Direct Market except to say that would have been most of our allowance back when dinosaurs roamed the earth.

Also, as publishers of Ken Dahl‘s Eisner-nominated, multiple Ignatz-winning Monsters, you’d think we’ve have noticed Ken’s online comic about sexism. The comic was largely a reaction to Hark a Vagrant! mastermind Kate Beaton’s message board and tweet hellhole of this past week. In fact, we only noticed it because of Kate’s tweets. Like Kate, we found it was really good, although it generalized about gender too much. Good fodder for discussion, just not online. If you want proof of the putrid horrors of our souls that can only be revealed in cyberspace, you can check out Ken’s message board in the wake of his comic.

For full disclosure, we don’t know Kate. We are fans, like the rest of the world, and she was very polite signing our prints for us at SPX. We think it’s worth noting that on the womanless ride home from said SPX this year, we realized that all of the cartoonists that we were gushing about were of the lady persuasion: Kate Beaton, Lisa Hanawalt, Minty Lewis, Corinne Mucha, Laura Park, Gabrielle Bell, Julia Wertz, Rutu Modan, Melissa Mendes, Lynda Barry, Leslie Anne Mackenzie Stein, Lilli Carre, Sarah Glidden, Joey Sayers, et al. In fact, we tried to name all the great woman cartoonists currently at work and gave up after a while. Depressing as it was to read through some of the intwerwebs’ vitriol and ignorance over the last few days, maybe Heidi MacDonald was right to wonder if we still need a Friends of Lulu?

This whole man/woman thing. Gaylord Phoenix can’t get here soon enough.

Your Pals,

Barry and Leon

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