October Extra! Cartoonists in the News

Liz Montague!

Elizabeth Montague is a cartoonist and author known online as Liz at Large or simply Liz Montague. She made national news in 2019 for being the first [second*] [third**] Black cartoonist for the New Yorker. Since then she has worked with President Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign, the U.S. Open, and Google, where she illustrated the first Black female cartoonist Jackie Ormes for the Google Doodle. Her debut graphic memoir, Maybe an Artist, depicts Montague’s childhood as a Black suburban kid who had to grow up in a post-9/11 world where casual racism and prejudice from her peers were the new norm.

Publishers Weekly speaks with Liz about her new book and her life.

I took a lot of journalism classes in college, and you have to be willing to go talk to people. I’m not good at talking to strangers all the time. My life right now is kind of the opposite of that. I would have made it work, but I’m glad I don’t have to right now.

* Ink Spill/Comics DC

** E. Simms Campbell: New Yorker work: 1932-1942
Emily Richards (now Emily Sanders Hopkins): New Yorker work:  2004 --
Liz Montague: New Yorker work: 2019- 
source: Michael Maslin

 

Reg Smythe!

With his boozy exploits, cheeky humour and expert job dodging, flat-capped legend Andy Capp has been entertaining millions of readers since the 50s.

Now, Andy is celebrating 65 years since he first dawdled, fag hanging from his lip, into the pages of the Daily Mirror.

At the height of his popularity, the comic strip equalled Charles Schulz’s Peanuts for global fame, was syndicated to 1,700 newspapers worldwide and translated into 14 different languages.

 

The Daily Mirror profiles Andy Capp creator Reg Smyth(e).

Reginald Smyth – he added the ‘e’ for artistic effect – was a cartoonist for the Daily Mirror, where he contributed to the paper’s Laughter Column, when he was asked by editor Hugh Cudlipp to create a northern character for the paper’s Manchester edition.

 

Eric Orner!

Eric Orner has been a professional cartoonist for decades, and worked his way through many types of cartooning.

Mike Rhode talks to Eric Orner about Ethan Green, alternative and editorial cartoons, Disney, and more.

I’m a comic strip artist, who also does graphic novels, animation, and illustration. My artistic roots are really with the alternative weekly newspaper cartooning that existed and really proliferated when I was a kid in seventies and eighties and lasted into the nineties.

All through college, I did political cartoons for the Boston Globe and Boston Phoenix. Even sports cartoons for the Boston Herald.

 

Spain Rodriguez!

[A]n exhibition of Rodriguez’s artwork depicting the Mission District is on display at Cushion Works, an art gallery on 18th Street between Capp Street and South Van Ness Avenue. “Spain Rodriguez: Mission Nites” runs through Oct. 29.

Mission Local outlines Spain’s life and art on the occasion of the exhibition.

Rodriguez, who died in 2012 in San Francisco at 72, blended science fiction, radical politics and countercultural aesthetics into his work and helped bring alternative comics into the mainstream. Originally from Buffalo, Rodriguez spent over four decades living and working in San Francisco, producing a prodigious body of work.

 

National Cartoonists Society!

You’re invited to join us… and invited to spread the word! NCS OPEN HOUSE: Tuesday, October 18th @ 7pm Eastern Open to non-members and current NCS members alike!

Register in advance for the NCS Oct 18 Open House.

Open to both current NCS members and those interested in the NCS, we will share news and have a chance to showcase some of our favourite cartoonists!
Come hang with fellow cartoonists–we look forward to seeing you there.
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