Matt Adrian (the Mincing Mockingbird) and Kim Bagwell (the Frantic Meerkat) were sharing a table, I think they’re married, but I never assume anything. Kim got into making comics because Matt needed a comic for one of his books and she came up with her first clip-art comic, the outlaw one. That one went over so well, she continued to make clip-art comics of serious looking animals with soap-opera relationship issues where the text is so outrageous with the art, and vice versa, the finish comic transcends it’s elements and to become a satire on romance, relationships, honor, etc. David Rees’ Get your War on did that with more serious material, but it works here as well. At least I liked it, but I like things that take a moment to sink in. Her background is in fine arts, but her bread and butter has been in graphic design. She’s been using clip-art up to now because she didn’t have time to paint. But more recently, she’s been painting.
Matt started painting “troubled” birds about three years ago and he’s done three books with unusual titles. He’s a fine artist educated in art at Columbia College in Chicago. He didn’t paint for a long time after he graduated, but didn’t start painting again until five years ago and then exclusively birds about three years ago. His paintings are done in acrylics. His troubled birds are lovely paintings with punch-line titles that make you look at the painting until you get the joke and smile (or don’t).
This is their first Comic Con. They know Karen Knighton of BirdEnvy.com and she inspired them to get a table in Small Press. That doesn’t surprise me; I find K Knighton very inspirational and I just met her.
See Comic Con 2011 for links to all these artists:
Anson Jew (agoynamedjew.blogspot.com)
Ron Brown (freefallart.com)
Sabrina (sabrinabellydancer.com)
Ben Henderson (goldencrusader.com)
Steam Crow (steamcrow.com)
Kirstie Shepherd (curioandco.com)
Paul Roman Martinez (19xxad.com)
Ryan Claytor (elephanteater.com)
The Frantic Meerkat (franticmeerkat.com) and The Mincing Mockingbird (mincingmockingbird.com)
Karen Knighton (birdenvy.com)
Mary Bellamy (marybellamy.com)
John L. Brooks II (11thhourbooks.net)
Mike Bocianowski (artistmb.com)
Anthony Hon (motenaicomics.blogspot.com)
Shannon Wheeler (www.tmcm.com/tmcm)
Brett Bean (2dbean.com)
Celine Chapus (purpletophat.com)
Amy Mebberson (mimisgrotto.com)
Sho Murase (shomurase.com)
Katie Cook (katiecandraw.com)
Cat Staggs (www.catstaggs.com)
Bryan “Kaiser” Tillman (dark-legacy.net)
Sze Jones (szejones.com)
Maddox (maddox.xmission.com)
Thien Pham (thienisawesome.blogspot.com)
Ben Costa (shilongpang.com)
Jeannie L.S. Galster (jeaniels.com)
Debbie Huey (bumperboy.net)