NEWS

Five New (mostly) Colin Upton Mini-comics! For no good reason other than my need to inflict my opnions on an indifferent world (and lack of other options), I’ve put out five small press comics in the last year or so, two collections and three orginial mini comics! You lucky, lucky bastards…

Colin’s Comics 1992-2002 Volume 1 24 pages 8 ½ X 11 $4.00 CDN $4.50 USA
Colin’s Comics 1992-2002 Volume 2 24 pages 5 ½ X 8 ½ $3.50 CDN $4.00 USA

Collecting strips of strips rarely seen outside Vancouver and Seattle, from ‘zines, a literary freepaper , my wargames club newspaper, cartoon supliments and previously unpublished material! A must for the Upton completeist!

9-11, One year on… Mini-comic 16 pages $.75
A personnal look back at the morning things got worse…

9-11, Two years on… Mini-comic 16 pages $.75
Reflections and questions on what it means to be at war…

Morgana Von Barron, Goth Weathergirl 8 pages $.50
Not everyone loves hot, sunny weather!

These comics are available from me and a few enlightened Vancouver retailors, R/X Comics, The Comicshop and Artopia! Just don’t know when to shut up, do I?

Some of my comic art and paintings will be in a group comic art show in the last two weeks of May in a real commercial type gallery here in Vancouver with a lot of cool locals and some folks from Seatte. See details below:

-Tales from the Cold
The Comic Art of the Northwest

May 15, 2003 – May 31, 2003
Closing Ceremonies: May 31, 2003, 7pm

Gathering artists from Seattle and Vancouver (and Dave Lapp of Toronto), Bfly Atelier presents a group exhibit of one of the most under-recognized art forms of today, the art of Comics.

Displaying a thorough cross section of comic art, this exhibit ranges from work which continues to utilize the tradition of pen and ink to work which has expanded beyond the page, into sculpture and even into multi-media performance. Highlighting some of the ingenious developments in the world of comics, the exhibit looks into the past, the present, and the future, elucidating how not only the drawings but the narrative as well, have come to be refined both in technique and poeticism, communicating an awareness of self and of society.

The Comics community has long argued for the legitimacy of its medium as an art, and Bfly Atelier wishes to recognize that and present the Comic Art of the Northwest, featuring artists:

Donna Barr
Henry Chamberlain
Levi D.
Helen Eady
Ivana Filipovic
Roberta Gregory
Peter Haskell
Alan Kato
Dave Lapp
David Lasky
David Lester
James Lloyd
George Metzger
Davey Oil
Robin Thompson
Colin Upton
Dalton Webb

Meet and talk with the artists over a cup of tea for Tea Vis á Vis, Thursdays 5pm – 7pm, beginning May 15th at Bfly Atelier. $3 for delicious tea and delightful conversation.

The Closing Ceremonies, performances and lectures, for this exhibit will be held on Saturday May 31st at 7pm. Guest speakers include David Lasky and Robin Fisher. Admission is $5.

The Gulf War Diary started almost spontaniuosly. I was sitting watching the news and grabbed paper and pencil and began drawing a cartoon, starting March 28th I think it was. I didn't know what to do with it so I had it put up on my web site. The cartoons are drawn fast, written pencilled and inked in about an hour. The great limitation I found with print comics was by the time I drew them I had worked and reworked them so much the passion, the urgency was gone. And by the time they were printed and available, months after the event, they were now history. This is, I think, the major advantages of on-line comics, topicality and reach, a genre that otherwise holds little interest for me. I will try to post a cartoon strip day for who knows how long. I'm told what I'm doing is a "blog", which sounds to me like Australian slang for vomiting, so I guess it's not all that orginial. I just knew I had to say something about this war. I've written letters to the editor but I am at heart a cartoonist. This is how I howl...

Call for submissions!
The BFly Atelier gallery in Vancouver's Gastown is looking for submissions for a comic art show coming up in May. They are looking for comics art, art by cartoonists and animation but are open to suggestions. Due date for submissions is March 24th. To get a submission form contact Carlos and/or Nicole at 604-647-1019 or E-mail them at bfly@telaus.net. I also have copies and you can also pick up them up from RX Comics on Main Str while they last.

A couple of developements at the Onomatopoeia Show, the radio show about comics I co-host on Thursays, 2-3 PM at CITR 101.9 FM. First, we are now broadcasting on the web at www.ams.ubc.ca/citr so people around the world may be bemused by our banter! As well, host Robin Fisher and I have been joined by a second co-host, Don (not that one) King from darkest Coquitlem! Don is a small press cartoonist and publisher (he self-published a graphic novel, Wandering Eye) who cares passionatly for his art and for comics, particularly for comics history. You can reach him at: donaldking4@yahoo.com



I've Moved!
Hello. This is Colin Upton. I just moved. Into a condo my mother bought, I'm paying her rent. I'm in a nice place, lots of space, so much room even with all my stuff I can't fill it up. It's positively eerie. Moving wasn't as bad as last time, more time to prepare and I had the help of some good friends, in particular I would like to thank Dan DeVillano for the use of his rental truck, Robin Bougie and Rebecca Dart (in whose building I moved into) and help from Des, Owen and Terry, Judith B, Mr. 12 Midnight, Tom A, Jason A, Brycething, Don King and his brother, Vlad the wargamer, Mark the wargamer, Arron the comic book guy, Adair and anyone else who was there and I shamefully can't think of off the top of my head. I'm still around Mount Pleasant/Main street but further down the slope closer to downtown. I'm on
the second floor, Lomu the wicked is not happy about being an indoor cat but I'm hoping she will adapt in time. I retained my phone number, which remains:
(604) 327-1544
My address is:
Colin Upton
#223 440 5th Ave. East
Vancouver, B.C.
Canada, V5T-1N5
If you want to come by my buzzer is 42 but call first, the streets here are rather strange and you'll need directions. I plan to have a housewarming sometime soon and this time I think there'll be enough room for everybody!

Break-in
My place got broken into in broad daylight, camera's stolen and thousands of dollars of CD's gone, my music. The police and landlord didn't even bother to pretend they would do anything about it. I was pretty devastated, I don't have a hell of a lot, I don't have much money. I am appealing for help replacing my lost music, like I say I don't have much money but I can do sketches, swap comics or something. Here's some of what I'm missing, I'll add to the list as I remember what's gone and when can handle it better.

Luddite gets a website!
Welcome all. After many attempts, I finally have my own website. I only had to search half way across the planet to find our man in Graz, Hanspeter Kriegl, whom I refer to as St.Hanspeter (but Donna Barr maintains that's a demotion). He has in a matter of days done more than others have failed to do in months. If the sight looks at all unprofessional or silly it's my fault, I've insisted on a certain amount of frivolity and the results are as much as I imagined them. So, please, spend some time looking around, there's sure to be lots you've never seen before! Anyone interested in my services should check out the illustration section. My thanks to Donna Barr and in particular Hanspeter for making this possible.

• News Archive
  
  
• Sad News
  I'm saddened to report that Jethro Q.Walrustitty, or Walrus for short, passed away in November from cancer, age 17. Walrus was a good puss to the end and impressed everyone with her gentleness, good nature and friendly demeanor. We went through some rough periods together, poverty and turmoil were she was a great comfort to me. A round, red brown tortoiseshell tabby, Walrus could be seen in many of my comics and at one point received her own fan mail. I miss her a lot (See Upton's All-Stars)
  
  
• Good News
  In January 2002 I adopted a tiny, pure black, two-month-old kitten that I eventuallynamed Lomu Higgins. Lomu, a Moari name, after Johan Lomu, my favourite rugby player for the New Zealand national team, nicknamed the all-blacks. Higgins is for my favourite drawing ink, Higgins Magic Black. She is also known as "Little Lomu" or "Bette Noir". Almost fully grown, Lomu is still as small cat, very sleek and quite manic, racing around the apartment at top speed, leaping in and outside, destroying cat toys, shredding paper bags and contentedly rendering my flesh. Still wary of visitors, her first appearance in my comics is in Drippytown Comics 2002.
  
  
• Drippytown Comics 2002
  Well, it's been a year and the good folks at Drippytown have carefully, lovingly hand crafted from natural materials a second comic's extravaganza! Drippytown Comics 2002 feature some of the best comic's talent Vancouver has to offer as well as out of town talent like a cover by Tony Millionaire! Included are the likes of James Lloyd, Robin Bougie, Robin Konstabaris, Mark Perrault, Owen Plummer and more. I have a four page story, "The people, united…" about political protest and disillusionment. There will be a Drippytown art show at Cosmopolis (1009 Commercial DR, Vancouver, 604-255-8774) from June 1st to 30th. You can get a hold of the Drippy gang at drippytown.com
  
  
• Word Under The Street
  Coming in September is the cross-Canada book festival, Word On The Street! And, again, in Vancouver, the naughty subversive underground cartoonists and zine publishers will be there, underground. The Word Under The Street will be safe in a basement room safe from the prying eyes of the easily influenced children and their uptight parents while the rest of the festival exhibitors are stuck outside exposed to the elements. I'll be there, perhaps even with new material, as well as the sultry Donna Barr (Desert Peach) and Roberta Gregory (Naughty Bits) up for the first time from Seattle. It's an excellent day for book worms and bargain hunters as publishers unload old stock and an chance for cartoonists to reach a wider audience. Library Square, downtown Vancouver Sunday, September the 29th.
  
  
• Canada Customs are at it again!
  We've had enough and it's time to tell Canada Customs we are sick of their puritanical, book burning paternalism, protecting adults from themselves! Once again, Little Sisters, Vancouver's premier Gay/Lesbian bookstore, is under attack and this time its comics. In response, Robin Fisher (host of Onomatopoeia) is editing not one but two comics benefit books featuring local and international talent to be published by Arsenal Pulp Press. The first, out in July, is the "naughty", X-rated collection of sex comics, gay, lesbian and otherwise, calculated to offend the narrow minded. My four-page contribution features Liltih (from Buddha On The Road), as you've never seen her before, a group of nuns and the thin line between religious and sexual ecstasy. The second, G-rated book will be out in September and will deal with the subject of art and censorship. I have an 8 pager in this one that manages to poke fun at both sides of the debate. Perhaps if we tell the thought police at Canada Customs and the lawmakers enough times to get their mites off our reading material someday it'll sink in…
  
  
• National Liberary of Canada acknowledges comics exist!
  I recieved an unexpected e-mail from the National Liberary of Canada asking for my permission to put one of my old mini-comics (Famous Bus Rides #3) on a web site under development called "Beyond the Funnies, The History of Comics in English Canada and Quebec", a companion site to the already existing "Guardians Of the North" web site that profiles Canadian Superhero characters. Based on the research of John Bell and Michel Viau, look for the "History" some time in the forseeable future. And, yes, I did give my permission...
  
  
• Radio, radio
  I’m happy to announce that I am now the sorta permanent kinda co-host of the Onomatopoeia Show with Robin Fisher at the helm, talking about comics on the airwaves of CITR UBC radio! So far we’ve talked about Women in comics, Tintin, Asterix, Harvey Pekar, Derippytown and interviewed local and visiting cartoonists. The show has been disrupted by Vancouver’s endless transit strike, sometimes broadcasting over the phone to the studio from my living room!
  
  
• Colin Upton wins Toonie Award!
  On March 17th the tenth annaul Toonie awards were presented by Cartoonists Northwest (a mainly Seattle based informal association of cartoonists of all kinds). Besides the Cartoonist of the Year award there are several smaller catagories. I won an award for best illustrator for the year 2000, mainlyon the strength of a series of adverts i did for Vancouver's Book Warehouse. The awards were hosted by Jim Woodring and Roberta Gregory accepted the award on my behalf as I couldn't afford to go. It's pretty cool, eh?
  
  
• Upton's want list
  This is stuff I'm looking for, for which I will trade comics or even pay money - but not a lot, peferably used. I'm very cheap. If you have any of these items for sale or trade (or even gifts and tributes) please e-mail me at cupton@planeteer.com first to make sure I have the money at the moment or that I haven't already got the item. Remember, web sites are rarely kept right up to date! And please, send by regular mail, couriers charge me an extra $20 for delivery no matter what the value of the package!
  
  
• Colin Upton in an Osprey book!
  If you know me, you will know that I am obsessed with collecting Osprey Military books, I have almost the entire runs of the Men At Arms, Elite and Warrior series. Literally hundreds of titles. Besides being world reknown for thier scholarship and accuracy, these books feature 8 or 12 colour plates by some of the best illustrators in the world. I've always had a dream of one day being good enough to be an Osprey artist. And I have, sort of, through the backdoor. One of my B+W illustrations from the Flagship Games rules for Samuria warfare, Taiko, has been accepted for inclusion as a spot illustration in an upcoming book, Warrior 29, Ashigaru. Ashigaru (light feet) were the common footsoldiers, an important part of Samuria armies who, with the introduction of firearms, can be argued came to dominate Japanese warfare. The illustration is of a line of teppo (arquebus) musketeers. The request came from the author, Stephen Turnbull, the reknown expert in English on all aspects of Samuria warfae. As you can imagine, I am tickled pink and can't wait to show the lads at The Trumpeter Wargames Club!
  
  
• Comics on Radio!
  When you're in Vancouver be sure to listen to the Onomatopeia Show (apparently the technical term for comic book sound effects, I kid you not) on CITR 101.9 FM, UBC radio, weekly from two to three on Thursdays. The host, Robin Fisher, (a young woman who love of comics is beyond all reason) interviews alternative cartoonists both local and international, travelling to APE and San Diego to get her interviews. She reviews comics and has comics experts join her for look at various aspects of comics art and culture. I myself, have been an occasional co-host, most recently for a full hour discussion on the work of Herge and we're planning another show on Asterix sometime in the hazy future. If you are a cartoonist visiting Vancouver there's a good chance she just might want to talk to you, she's cute and she knows her stuff! You can reach Robin at: betafishblue@usa.net
  
  
• Places to buy Colin Upton Comics in Vancouver:
  The Comicshop, 2089 W4th 738-8122
  Book'n'Comic Emporium, 1247 Granville Str. 682-3019
  Art-opia, 101 440 W.Hastings 685-9100