{"id":4087,"date":"2016-11-16T16:50:28","date_gmt":"2016-11-16T16:50:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/?p=4087"},"modified":"2016-11-16T16:50:28","modified_gmt":"2016-11-16T16:50:28","slug":"here-comes-santa-claus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/?p=4087","title":{"rendered":"Here Comes Santa Claus"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n\"blog-header-11_16_16\"A\u00a0DISCLAIMER:\u00a0<\/span>So we had this here Comic Arts Brookyn<\/a> report locked and loaded last Wednesday, the 9th. If you live in America and are aware of your surroundings at all, you know last Wednesday shocked the bejesus out of most of the country. Call us cray, but it seemed in bad taste to hit people up with comics stuff while so many were devastated, furious and scared shitless. If America’s new President Elect gives you a happy because you are a white supremacist, a sexist or you’re lookng for a tax cut, please stop reading right now and don’t ever come back here. If you voted for America’s new President Elect because there was no hope that the Democratic nominee would help those left impoverished and desperate in the rust belt and elsewhere, please drop us a line; we can talk about this all day. Really, anyone reading this who wants to chat, particularly anyone who is afraid and looking for comfort or support, hit us up. Secret Acres isn’t exactly a political concern, but we’re not apolitical, either. We can talk about comics, too.<\/p>\n

SO. After a week catching our breath, we give you our CAB breakdown, featuring guest co-Scuttlebutter, Secret Acres’ own, Sean Ford<\/a>, a lapsed Catholic:<\/p>\n

Comic Arts Brooklyn marks the end of the yearly convention circuit (Sorry, CALA<\/a>). Perhaps because of its one-time December slot on the dance card, it feels like a holiday party. A few people mentioned that the room needed some christmas tree lights strung from the rafters to fit the mood. Holiday parties come with end of the year reckonings, weird hats, too much drinking, and evil spirits from the past. We sprinkled ourselves with holy water, said five Hail Marys, and got to the show early, with high hopes.<\/p>\n

Perhaps due to the late announcement of CAB this year, (and like eighteen competing comic shows happening\u00a0across the globe that\u00a0same day), the show missed a few stalwarts like D+Q<\/a>, Koyama<\/a>, AdHouse<\/a>, Fantagraphics<\/a> and a spiked punch bowl full of eggnog. Who needs the carbs, anyway? Instead, artist tables dominated for once, interspersed with royalty like Charles Burns<\/a>, Richard McGuire<\/a>, and Dame Darcy<\/a>. This\u00a0left more time and space to find less obvious gems than one might otherwise.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"sa1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We\u00a0visited Kevin Hooyman<\/a> just to say, \u201cHey,\u201d only to find that he had TEN (10), as in one per finger, T-E-N (Jesus!), new issues of his excellent comic Conditions on the Ground<\/em><\/a>\u00a0since we’d seen him last. Catch up with Kevin; this comic exists somewhere between our man\u00a0Theo Ellsworth<\/a>‘s Capacity<\/em><\/a>, and the comics of Thomas Herpich<\/a> (Please make more comics, Thomas Herpich!). We spotted Heidi MacDonald<\/a> who gleefully remarked that the Mets can now beat the Cubs next year, guilt-free. Leslie Stein<\/a> sold us some stunning\u00a0watercolors for far too little money.\u00a0Noah Van Sciver<\/a>‘s mustache made its last public appearance.\u00a0Julia Gfr\u00f6rer<\/a>\u00a0Laid Waste<\/em><\/a> at CAB\u00a0(which we forgot to bring to get signed, dammit).\u00a0Darryl Ayo dropped copies of Little Garden<\/a><\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0tabled up with old pals Aaron Cockle<\/a>, Jon Allen<\/a>, and L Nichols<\/a>.\u00a0Josh Bayer<\/a> brought a Ghost Rider watercolor, that\u00a0was the most beautiful thing on the planet, and a collection of Steven<\/em> that he got signed by Doug Allen<\/a>, who was at the show and we missed it somehow. Someone reprint Steven<\/em> already or we’ll do it ourselves! We ran into Greg Benton<\/a>\u00a0and he made fun of us for never having been to Angoul\u00eame<\/a>. Someday, Greg. Meanwhile, Kevin Czap<\/a>\u2019s comics takeover proceeded apace.<\/p>\n

Downstairs, we found Chuck Forsman<\/a>, Michel Fiffe<\/a>, and Melissa Mendes<\/a> slinging their excellent comics to a very constant and pleased crowd. Peow Studio<\/a> took all our remaining money and gave us a bunch of gorgeously printed, seemingly manga-influenced books. But our biggest spend went to Breakdown Press<\/a>, where we bought everything we couldn’t afford, notably Anna Haifisch<\/a>\u2019s gorgeous new edition of the\u00a0Artist<\/em><\/a>. Find that book and smell it a few times.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"cotg\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

At the Acres table proper, Brendan Leach<\/a> appeared early, sold some copies of his slick, new hardcover edition of Pterodactyl Hunters<\/em><\/a>, and split\u00a0to go teach America\u2019s youth about comics. Rob Sergel<\/a> did a brisk business and sold out of his fine Eschew<\/em> collection,\u00a0SPACE<\/em><\/a>, his mini,\u00a0Bald Knobber<\/a><\/em>,\u00a0and damn near everything else. Sean Ford obsessed about the eyes of Tucker Stone<\/a>\u00a0and came up just shy of a\u00a0Shadow Hills<\/em><\/a> sellout himself. If you allow us one lament: we were too dumb to find Dame Darcy during the day, and too tired for the\u00a0A+ after party, featuring a triple banjo performance from Dame, Matt Thurber<\/a> and Jesse Gelber<\/a>. After the show, we tuckered Acres went out to a quiet dinner, then home early to read Hooymans, giggling ourselves to sleep and feeling okay about our spot in the universe…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"chuck\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Thank you, Comic Arts Brooklyn, all the people there and special guest co-blogger, Sean Ford. You might just get to keep this gig, Sean, now that we’re bi-coastal. As for Los Angeles, we might just take a peak at CALA and report back here for fun. We shall see.<\/p>\n

We also promised a sneak peek at 2017. Just remember we told you first, very first of all, that our first book of 2017 will be the\u00a0Academic Hour<\/em>. Feast your eyes on the debut graphic novel from Keren Katz:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"the-academic-hour\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We met Keren several lifetimes ago, but really got to know her at MoCCA<\/a> 2015, where she won the Festival Award of Excellence (and, no, steering committee or not, there was no conflict of interest there since we didn’t even get a vote). Newbie or not, you likely peeped Keren’s work in the\u00a0New York Times<\/a><\/i>, or the\u00a0Brooklyn Rail<\/a><\/i>, maybe, or in a couple of anthologies from\u00a0Locust Moon Comics<\/a> or Seven Stories Press<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Academic Hour<\/i> charts the budding love affair\u00a0between Poethel, a disgraced architecture professor, and his student, Liana, through their notes and letters. It’s all set in a fantastic, logic-defying art college of shifting rooms and secret performance spaces; perfect for\u00a0an intense, fledgling, morally complicated relationship. Prepare for Keren to romance your pants off.<\/p>\n

See you in a few, all you beautiful people…<\/p>\n

Your Pals,<\/p>\n

Sean and Barry and Leon<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A\u00a0DISCLAIMER:\u00a0So we had this here Comic Arts Brookyn report locked and loaded last Wednesday, the 9th. If you live in America and are aware of your surroundings at all, you know last Wednesday shocked the bejesus out of most of the country. Call us cray, but it seemed in bad taste to hit people up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4087"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4087"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4087\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4113,"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4087\/revisions\/4113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4087"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4087"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/secretacres.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4087"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}