#8 - 1997 (01-97) 



i went to the trouble and expense of carting a camera to the (now defunct) dirt gallery's 1997 new year's party. many of the people here are friends or acquaintances: you'll note that when provided a model, instead of the interior of my brain, i was able to do a so-so job at imitating their features. i still don't know what was up with christopher's nose, however. the dj is dj superwolf (aka jimmy t. aka james trotter,) a goddamn genius and kcai graduate; the weird art on the walls is his. i was interested in making this look real; i fancied that i would somehow gain a shred of credibility if people saw themselves and realized that the author of sparrow's fall--who had hung in there for two months now!--was at a big bash they had been at; and since i was still quite anonymous, people would wonder who 'he' had been. i'm sure no such thoughts entered anyone's mind, but that's what the writer/artist of an indy comic thinks about. at least i do. comic book fame and fortune are always just out of reach for such a person, and he dreams that people will admire him, women will fall in love with him, and honest to god real comic artists will respect him and admit them to their circle.

of course this never happens, at least not to me. indeed, the entire process has been unpleasant and embarrassing. as sparrow's fall was beginning, the whole 'golden age' of kansas city independent comics was coming to a crashing close. the people who had been producing material were graduating from the institute or otherwise moving on or abandoning their aspirations. i never got the respect i was hoping to receive from them because they largely went away; i was suddenly left high and dry with only a couple other people, whom i barely knew, slogging away also--people who actually had talent.

i kept my head down, and it wasn't until several years later that word began to filter in, second hand mostly, that what i was doing had been noticed, and admired--at least for its persistence. thus, i take all compliments with a grain of salt: the art itself is iffy, and the endurance demonstrated therefore may not be justified. i do think what i am doing is important--but only because it may encourage people with real talent and abilities to take over and create a true comics revolution in this city.

i had--and have--no illusions, as has been said, about what i am doing: but that lack of 'acceptance' during the 1996-1997 period has colored how i view what i do ever since. i feel that i am an imitator, a follower, a pale shadow of what once was and what could have been. it is troubling to me that i have been called the elder statesman of kansas city indy comics, because i know this to be completely not true. as i described it to someone once, i am not in the line of apostolic succession . . . there was no laying on of hands, the keys were passed to me by no one; i am not the rock upon which kansas city comix will be built. i'm just a schlub who wasn't smart enough to give up six years ago.

in this comic i laid more groundwork for the idea that christopher was in fact insane. the idea was abandoned later, of course, but the feeling of painful alienation he experiences is the same feeling i had at every party, function, show, and bar i went to for years, and the cluster of crows--more death, folks--just makes it more fun for everyone.

why is nips dreaming about hot dogs? i'll have to post a few possum & hot-dog comics sometime . . . it's an homage to the ur-sparrow's fall comic of the same name; nips will occasionally think about hot dogs, and that is what i am thinking, when he does.

technical details: the center ring on the front page was made using an inverted coffee cup at the broadway café; the small ring is an inverted water glass; i don't know what the curves on the second page were made with; probably a plate. the wash is handled much better than in the previous comic; i took a great deal of care with this one. i think it took two weeks to do.


 



 

Posted: Sun - April 4, 2004 at 08:24 AM             |

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