Portland Zine Symposium the Weekend!

The 11th annual Portland Zine Symposium is taking place this weekend, and Family Style will be there! François will be sitting with Greg Means of Tugboat Press and the wonderful Aron Nels Steinke all weekend, selling comics and gossiping.

Family Style doesn't have any new releases for this weekend (shame on us!), but François will have his new illustrated chap-book of Ambrose Bierce stories, "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge", which is being published by the fantastic team at Scout Books! This is the first in a series that François is editing for Scout Books, go and check 'em out!

Finally, if you are in Portland, head on over to Floating World Comics to check out a show of Wuvable Oaf creator Ed Luce's artwork, including the originals for his upcoming story in ELFWORLD #3!

Stumptown + More This Weekend!

Family Style will be making a splash at our new hometown show this weekend... We've been coming to the Stumptown Comics Fest almost since it began, and we're delighted to be here again, with lots of new work and involvement in some awesome events, too!

On Friday, 4/15, Jonas Madden-Connor, ELFWORLD cover artist Daria Tessler, and many others will be reading from their recent work at the Stumptown Comics Fest Friday Night Party at Guapo Comics & Coffee! We'll be officially debuting ELFWORLD issue #2 that night, featuring Daria's story as well as work from lots of other indy-comics luminaries. What's more, François Vigneault will have some art in the "Haunted Cartoon Vaults" group show opening that night! Whew! And there's much more to draw you out early, including the awarding of the Maisie Kukoc Award for Comics Inspiration.

All that weekend, you can find both Jonas and François at the Family Style table, #D14. We'll be sharing space with the fantastic Julia Gfrörer, who has a brand new mini-comic coming out for the Fest! We'll of course have ELFWORLD, Bird Brain, Ochre Ellipse, and more for your viewing and purchasing pleasure.

On Saturday night, don't miss the Stumptown Afterparty, at the Jupiter Hotel. Be there at 8:00pm for the Stumptown Comics Art Awards, where you'll get to see ELFWORLD #1 get trounced in the Best Anthology category (unless, of course, YOU vote for it!).

Okay! See you there!

Family Style at WonderCon! New Titles!

Family Style will be exhibiting at WonderCon in San Francisco for the first time ever! WonderCon is definitely a more mainstream/superhero/cosplay sort of event than Family Style is used to exhibiting at, but we've been long-time attendees, and we always have a fun time, so we've decided to try it out this year! Jonas will be sharing our table with Kane Lynch, creator of The Relics.

Jonas has a big new story in the latest issue of Papercutter from Tugboat Press, which he'll have for sale at the Family Style table! The story, “The Most Gripping Mind-Exploding Triumphantly Electric of Our Time,” is a fantastic nested tale that intermixes science fiction and mythopoetic elements to remarkable effect.

François can't attend WonderCon, but his long-delayed fifth issue of Bird Brain will be premiereing at the show! This issue of his ongoing nature journal series features illustrations and field notes from his vacation to Louisiana and Arkansas last summer, and includes coverage of the then-ongoing BP oil spill, herons, ibises, lots of songbirds, and even alligators and beavers!

We'll also of course be selling our Stumptown Comics Award-nominated anthology Elfworld Vol. 2 #1, the original Elfworld collection (with a special convention price of just $5!), Ochre Ellipse, Friends, and all the excellent comics and zines that the world has come to expect from Family Style. We're excited to meet new comics fans in this new venue!

WonderCon takes place April 1-3 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. Look for us at table #SP19.

Elfworld #2 Out for Stumptown, Elfworld #1 Nominated for Best Anthology!

Well, when the good news rains, I guess it pours (what did I expect here in Portland?): I just finished up with the layout of Daria Tessler's awesome cover for Elfworld #2, and I wanted to officially announce that Family Style will be premiering the book at the upcoming Stumptown Comics Fest, when I heard that Elfworld #1 was nominated for a Stumptown Comic Art Award! Yay!

We're just wrapping up the final work on the upcoming issue... it looks to be a rad one, with comics by cover artist Daria Tessler, Dylan Horrocks, Jeremy Tinder, Matthew Reidsma, Marek Bennett, Eve Englezos and Josh Moutray, and yours truly, François Vigneault! Clocking in at a whopping 40 pages, this issue is full of magic and monsters... a lot of ogres and trolls in this issue, for some reason! Just like the first issue, this will all come wrapped up in a beautiful 2-color letterpress cover with French flaps, printed this time around by the very talented James Tucker (he's got a fantastic solo show of his prints up in Aspen, CO at the moment, you should check 'em out!), and endpapers designed by illustrator Anna Hurley. All in all this is gonna be a great book, and I am so proud to be bringing it out for Stumptown, my new hometown show!

Elfworld #1 was nominated for Best Anthology in the Stumptown Comic Art Awards, where it is in good company (and fierce competition!): Study Group 12 #4, Gazeta, AX: Alternative Manga, and Nix Comics Quarterly. I'm extremely honored that Elfworld is in with this top-notch crowd, and my thanks go out to all the contributors, readers, and store owners who have helped Family Style and Elfworld out over the past few months. If you enjoyed Elfworld, I certainly wouldn't dissuade you from voting for it to win!

I'll have more EW news in the coming month as we countdown to Stumptown, including some sneak previews.

Updated - On The Road Again: Family Style Show Calendar for 2011

This year Family Style is hitting the road again, with appearances at some further-flung shows than we've done in awhile! Here is a preliminary calendar of some of our upcoming shows, I'll of course update and post again as individual events approach and we add others!



Wonder Con (San Francisco) April 1-3
We have attended this miniaturized version of the San Diego Comic Con in Family Style's old home town often, but this will be our first year as exhibitors. Jonas will be representing Family Style at table #SP19, which we'll be sharing with the indomitable Kane Lynch. Family Style will have some very cool new stuff: Jonas' cover story in Papercutter (!!!) and Bird Brain #5!



Stumptown Comics Fest (Portland) April 16-17
This is Family Style's new official hometown show, so we'll be there in force. We'll be sharing our space with the fantastic Julia Gfrörer. Premiering at this show: Elfworld Vol. 2, #2, including comics from Dylan Horrocks, Daria Tessler, Jeremey Tinder, and more! Stay tuned for more info.

TCAF (Toronto, CANADA) May 7-8
Yay! We are so proud to have been selected for the Toronto Comics Art Festival! We've heard so much good stuff about TCAF, we're delighted to be attending for the first time. We have some secret projects that might be ready for this show... again, I'll keep you posted!

*We are super sorry to have to back out of TCAF this year due to financial constraints. We're hoping to go next year.

Chicago Comic Con August 11-14
I've been asked to be a Guest at this con! What!?! Should be really fun, I (Francois) lived in Chicago for a few years, and this will be a great chance to re-connect with old pals and all those genius Chicago cartoonists (including a bevy of Elfworld contributors, old and new: Jeffrey Brown, Grant Reynolds, and Jeremy Tinder).

San Francisco Zine Fest September 3-4
These dates haven't been officially announced yet, but the SF Zine Fest is likely returning to its Labor Day Weekend slot again this year. This is the 10th anniversary of the Fest, and we at Family Style have been heavily involved in running the show for more than half of that time, so we will be there with bells on!



APE (San Francisco) October 22-23
We'll be back in SF one more time this year for APE, where we always have a great time. I don't know if I mentioned it in this blog before, but the 2010 APE was a vast improvement on the previous year, so we have high hopes for this year! Premiering at the show: Elfworld #3! We'll also be hosting another "Tales" indy-fantasy reading to celebrate, this time at Mission: Comics and Art! This should be a really, really fun weekend!

OryCon (Portland Fantasy/Sci-Fi Convention!) November 11-13
Finally, we'll be wrapping the year up with an appearance at OryCon, a long-running Portland sci-fi/fatasy con. We're hoping that we can reach a new audience for Elfworld, and I think the show will be a lot of fun, too! I am a long-time fantasy fan and I've never been to a dedicated fantasy con, looking forward to it.

East Bay Alternative Press Book Fair + Tales: An Indy-Fantasy Comics Reading | Sat., Dec 11

We are super excited to be participating in two great events on Saturday, Dec. 11 over in Berkeley!

First off, Family Style will be exhibiting at the first-ever East Bay Alternative Press Book Fair, at Berkeley City College. This one-day show should be lots of fun, in addition to our fellow comics creators and small-press publishers like Susie Cagle, Sparkplug Comics, Sophie Yanow, Kane Lynch, and Jen Oaks, this shows also has tons of great zines, crafts, art, and more! We'll be debuting the long-awaited fifth issue of Bird Brain, as well as bringing some sold-out titles back into print for the show. Get your holiday shopping done and support local artists!

After EBAP, come by Comics Relief in downtown Berkeley for Tales: An Indy-Fantasy Comics Reading! This will be a super fun night of sword & sorcery comics from the pages of Elfworld and beyond, from some of the best indy creators around: Trevor Alixopulos, Ben Costa + J.R. Parks, David Enos, Ben Catmull, and yours truly, Francois Vigneault. It should be a great evening filled with great tales, from the hillarious to the mysterious and everything in between!

East Bay Alternative Press Book Fair | Saturday, Dec. 11 10am - 4pm | Berkeley City College, 2050 Center Street, Berkeley | FREE!

Tales: An Indy-Fantasy Comics Reading | Saturday, Dec. 11 6pm - 9pm | Comics Relief, 2026 Shattuck Ave, Berkeley | FREE!

APE Was Great + New Drawings

The Family Style crew of Jonas and François had a very lovely time at APE this year... our very unscientific estimation was that it seemed quite a bit busier than in years past! We merrily sold the new Elfworld Vol.2 no. 1 all weekend and got great feedback... don't forget that the new issue is available online, too (retailers, we'd be delighted to get it into your shops, you can order direct from us or (by next week) from Last Gasp, too).

We both picked up lots of books... I (François) haven't gotten the chance to read most of my new purchases, but what I have read has been top-notch: Expansion, the new collaborative effort by Matt Sheean and Malachi Ward, the hillarious (I was literally lol-ing) I Want You #2 by Lisa Hanawalt, and the long-awaited Trackrabbit #4 from Geoff Vasille were all excellent.

Secondly, Jonas and I always sit around drawing random stuff at these shows, usually goofy genre stuff, like our Marvel mash-up battles last year. This year we drew a couple of matched pairs, which came out well enough that we're gonna experiment with doing drawings like this once a week and posting here on the Family Style blog! Your first pair is Red Sonja by François and Conan by Jonas... check back in next week for another pair, this time of the super-heroic variety!

Family Style @ Stumptown

Next week Family Style will be making our annual appearance at the Stumptown Comics Fest in lovely Portland, OR... But you WON'T find us on the official exhibitor list, sadly! (Yay! The kind folks at Stumptown just added us to the list! You guys rule). Just like last year, we missed the boat on registration (not our fault, we swear), and the wonderful Eli Bishop of Global Hobo has once again generously offered to host us at his table! So, look for us at the Global Hobo table, where François will be offering a carefully curated selection of Family Style's best work, including (hopefully) a brand new issue of his bird-watching zine Bird Brain!

Family Style will be rocking it at the first-ever Indy Euphoria show in Sacramento, an interesting mash-up of the indy comix and vinyl toy worlds... We've staked out a space along with some of our favorite creators: PS Comics, Damien Jay, Susie Cagle, Jason Martin, Josh Frankel, Andrice Arp, and Jesse Reklaw, and we'll be neighboring the great Portland publishing house Sparkplug Comics! Whew! They've also got some great special guests from these different facets of the indy/DIY art scene, including Jim Woodring, Jeffery Brown, Tom Neely... should definitely be a fun show!

Oh! And of course we are premiereing a couple of wee books for the show, too! François will have the newest instalment of Bird Brain, and Nick St. John just completed a fantastic new comic called "How I Came to Work at Wendy's", and we'll have both on sale this weekend! See you in Sacramento!