New Generation Rising
and Shameless Hucksterism 101

Having now completed the five-part interview with Gabby Schulz aka 'Ken Dahl' (final installment was posted late yesterday, see below), I'm going to take a wee blog breather -- noting, however, a plethora of interviews coming up this month.

The CCSers are descending on the upcoming New York City comic con MoCCA in three weeks with their new work. I'll be whetting appetites, introducing these artists and their work, and previewing it all here (with online links, too, for those of you who, like me, won't be attending MoCCA).

Ah, the new harvest of comics and mini-comics from
the Center for Cartoon Studies no-longer-freshmen class!
Photo by Joe Lambert.

In the meantime, allow me to note that there's now over 300 collectibles, curios, comics and items of interest displayed and for sale in my booth (Dealer #653) at the

The Vermont Antique Mall at Quechee Gorge Village on Route 4, just a fifteen minute drive (tops) from the Center for Cartoon Studies.

Many of the CCS artists and students have their current work for sale in the booth, too, along with rare issues of my own work (Swamp Thing, Taboo, Tyrant, comics, zines, etc.), mystery novelist and CCS instructor Sarah Stewart Taylor's complete trio of books, and more -- all signed by the creators.

There's also original art for sale, including some stunning paintings by Cayetano Garza aka Cat, creator of the venerable online comic The Magic Inkwell, and clever packaging of work by folks like Colleen Frakes (whose copies of her new comics series Tragic Relief are for sale with an original ink panel from the comic packaged with every signed copy!).

Some of these are selling well, including gems like Alex Kim's unique silkscreen rock posters, which are real beauties!

I've also begun painting one-of-a-kind zombie coffee mugs -- a bit pricey ($35-40), but they are each original Bissette zombies, in color and preserved in ever-lasting ceramic glory, for your morning java fix, each unlike any other, so it's still a bargain.

These are the kind of items and original collectibles folks will be kicking themselves over not having nabbed them -- and at these kinds of prices! -- years from now, when folks like Colleen and Alex and their CCS peers are big-time cartoonists and Cat's paintings are high-ticket items in international galleries.

And your coffee would taste so much better, right here and now, being sipped from a Bissette Coffee Zombee (TM) mug!

Along with these one-of-a-kind items, I've also jam-packed the booth with all manner of knick-knacks, tallywhacks, dogbones and oddball wonders, priced from just 25 cents to -- well, nothing's more than $35-40, which is pretty much a threshold I intend to maintain. I've also racked a ton of great DVDs, most of them brand-new factory-wrapped classics and curios, with the more adult material (Peter Jackson's Meet the Feebles, Jess Franco, Jean Rollin, giallo, spaghetti westerns, Euro-Trash horrors, etc.) locked in the glass cabinet with the signed issues of Taboo, SpiderBaby Comix, and so on.

There's tons of comics from the collections of CCS students, too, and some of Blair Sterrett's amazing LP oddities (including LPs from Mexico, Canada, Germany and elsewhere), and that money goes directly to the students. Again, save for the really precious collectibles, these have all been priced to sell, including huge bricks (and I do mean bricks -- 25 to 60 comics bagged together, in VG+ to mint condition!) of runs, mini-series and title selections from the '80s and '90s, including popular characters & titles from Marvel, DC, Image, Disney, etc.

So, something for everyone, really.

Marge and I will be snapping photos to post here in the coming week -- including shots of those "Zombee Coffee" (TM ) mugs.

So, if you're planning any part of your summer around visiting mid-state Vermont, or the Center for Cartoon Studies, make sure to set aside some time to shop our booth at The Vermont Antique Mall at Quechee Gorge Village -- it's the only ongoing non-internet retail venue for my work and the new community of CCS artists!

Have a great weekend, see you here tomorrow...