John Martz

The TCAF, it is a-comin’

I’ll be at the Toronto Comic Arts Festival this weekend, Saturday May 9th and Sunday May 10th.

I’ll have a new mini-comic in tow, entitled It’s Snowing, We Should Go For a Walk. The short autobiographical story of this year’s first snowstorm will be available in my online shop after the weekend.  As will a collaborative mini with Zach Worton and Aaron Costain. We have compiled a 40+ page collection of jam comics under the name Team Society League. Here’s the cover for It’s Snowing:

I’ll have proper previews of all the new stuff soon, but wanted to draw attention first to the two appearances I’ll be making away from my tablespace at the festival, which is at the Toronto Reference Library.

Sunday, May 10th
1:00pm-2:30pm: Newspapers, Comic Books, and The Internet.
Learning Centre 1

Unless you’ve been living in a cave for the past few years, you know that newspapers—and especially editorial cartoonists and daily comic strips—are undergoing a radical change thanks to the Internet. Comic books are facing this sea-change as well, and everyone wants to know what’s going to happen. What’s next? Luckily, we’ve got the answer. We’ve assembled a crack team of panelists to discuss the future of newspapers, the future of comics, and their possible future on the internet.

On the panel is R. Stevens, the creator of the webcomic Diesel Sweeties. He entered into a deal with United Features Syndicate to distribute his comic in newspapers, and ultimately left that deal to concentrate on his web efforts. Joining him will be: Scott McCloud, author of Understanding Comics and the controversial futurist text Reinventing Comics; Stuart Immonen, an accomplished “mainstream” comics artist on Marvel’s Ultimate Spider-Man, and also a self-publisher who prints his own books and comics, and serializes work online; Brendan Buford, Comics Editor for King Features Syndicate, and a cartoonist, publisher, and someone who works with mainstream book publishers; and John Martz, co-creator of Drawn.ca and Chair of the Canadian Chapter of The National Cartoonist Society. The panel will be moderated by Steven Murray, writer, illustrator, self-publisher, webcomics artist, and cartoonist and journalist for Canada’s National Post newspaper.

And for kids:

Sunday, May 10th
3:30pm-4:30pm: Kids Draw!
Owlkids Day Gallery Space

Do you wanna learn how to draw? Join a fantastic lineup of kids’ cartoonists as they teach kids the basics of cartooning! Cartoonists include Frank Cammuso (Knights of the Lunch Table), Tom Fowler (MAD Magazine), John Martz (Drawn.ca, Kayak magazine) and Kean Soo (Jellaby). Moderated by Naseem Hrab of the Canadian Children’s Book Centre.

Check out torontocomics.com for the full line-up of panels and events.

Finally, the one-page comic Zach and I contributed to Comics Festival can be seen in its entirety here. Whew!