They sure grow up so fast!

 Drawn on the bus.

Shooting the Breeze

Bye Bye, Blues

Cellphone faces

It's the same old story. I'm sorry.

 

Click on the image for a bigger glimpse.

Warming up

Fun with dip pens

Angry Bird. Yahtzee. Bejeweled. I dunno.

 

Happy Spring to everyone! This just in! An interview with me is up on the Robot 6 - Comic Book Resources website. I talk about Yam Books,  Ticket Stub and juggling between being a publisher and a cartoonist. Thanks to Chris Mautner for inviting me to chat!

Rina Ayuyang moves from cartoonist to publisher with Yam Books
http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2013/03/rina-ayuyang-moves-from-cartoonist-to-publisher-with-yam-books/

Start all over again

Seems so dumb

New Review

Here's a nice review of my recent mini-comic "Outta This Comes the Crazy" at Rob Clough's High Low website. It's nice to be reviewed alongside two of my favorite artists, Lauren Weinstein and Tom Hart. 

 "Ayuyang, like Weinstein, is a witty and upbeat artist who chooses to draw in a style that's a series of quick, simple smudges and lines that retain the spontaneity and vitality of the moment."

Thanks, Rob! You can check out the entire review at the link below.

On Parenting: Weinstein, Ayuyang and Hart:
http://highlowcomics.blogspot.com/2013/01/on-parenting-weinstein-ayuyang-and-hart.html

 You can buy it at the link below:

Profiles in Great Courage #1: Vernon Davis

Just watching the coverage leading up to the Super Bowl on ESPN and I got an idea...

Accentuate the Positive

Back to work now that the holidays are over. I am thankful for a great 2012 creatively with so many lifetime goals met and projects completed. Tom Spurgeon at the Comics Reporter wrote a nice piece about my debut as a publisher of Yam Books being a positive comics thing to happen in 2012. Really honored to be included! Here's the link:

50 Comics Positives In 2012: Rina Ayuyang, Publisher
http://www.comicsreporter.com/index.php/50_comics_positives_in_2012_rina_ayuyang_publisher/

I've just posted the catalog of upcoming 2013 releases at the Yam Books website. I'm very excited to be working with Sacha Mardou, Renee French, and Onsmith -- three artists whose work through the years has exhilarated and inspired me as an artist and as a comics fan. There will be more information to come as each book is released through the year.

And yes, I'm still going to be drawing comics this year. I hope! I mean, I plan! My book about all things corny and dancing, Blame it on the Boogie will debut this Spring. See, I have an actual deadline! So stay tuned!

In the meantime, I was in the Post It Show exhibited at Giant Robot in LA, curated by the talented duo Esther Pearl Watson and Mark Todd. I contributed 3 post-its drawings that I call my Cyd Charisse series because they depicted three of my favorite dance numbers of hers (not including solos). They are still available for sale at the Giant Robot website and shown below for your enjoyment!

Girl Hunt Ballet

The Broadway Melody

Dancing in the Dark

My Favorite 2012 Things

2013 is here! Whee! With that said, let us not forget the magic that was 2012. In the coming days or weeks, or someday, I'm going to post recaps of all the memorable events that I guess I was just too busy or dizzy to write about right after they happened, like my time at the CAKE show in Chicago, or being invited to talk comics with Gene Yang and Derek Kirk Kim at Stanford University. I will, however, spare you my recap about going to a live taping of "Dancing with the Stars" because I know you'd rather see that documented in a comic COMING OUT THIS SPRING (Yes, that was free advertising there). Oh, but my! Did the year go really fast! Seriously, each month seemed to start on the 15th day. Anyway, I've always tried to list my favorite comics for each year on this blog, and I'm now prompted  especially to do so for 2012 because I got to attend more comics shows than I ever did before in my life. So the experience has made my heart grow 3 sizes bigger for all things comics. Really guys, New Years resolution-- go to some comics shows in 2013!

Okay,  here is a list of some of my faves from 2012, Yam Books titles not included because we all know how I feel about those!

1. Daddy Lightning - A brilliant screwball comedy and absolutely accurate, heart-felt portrait of being a parent. It's the one comic that reminds me of why comics NEED to exist. Tom Hart is a superhero.


2. Barrel of Monkeys - Thank you, Bill K and your Rebus Books for translating two of my favorite French cartoonists' work into English. I can finally figure out all the twisted humor that Ruppert e Molot are writing about to go along with the lush linework that I've been oogling over for years now.


3. The Sky in Stereo #1 by Sacha Mardou. A smart, perfectly-paced story of a girl seemingly stuck in a rut, her struggles with her peers and a fateful encounter with a troubled, soulful boy.  It's one of those comics that rekindles the excitement you get from the pamphlet/floppy/issue format -- eagerly counting down the days the next issue is released, and then making a mad dash to the comics store on a Wednesday just HOPING it has arrived! Basically what I'm saying is I hope issue #2 comes out SOON.


4.  Barack Hussein Obama - I first enjoyed these strips on Steven Weissman's Flickr page and always wondered how the devil it would be printed into a book. Well, magnificently, apparently.


5. Birdseye Bristoe - Oh Dan Zettwoch! So glad we finally got a big wonderful hardbound book from this dude. His comics are so endearing and personable, and every page in this book is like sneaking a peak into Zettwoch's personal schematic journals.


6. The Voyeurs, July Diaries - Gabrielle Bell! 2 books in one year and yet that is still not enough! We always want more! July Diaries is not only a great lead-in to the beautifully colored and designed Voyeurs book that showcases Gabrielle's work as it should be, but also a strong work in its own right.


7. Vanessa Davis' online strips - These vibrant strips on the Tablet magazine website always made me feel good inside, like listening to an oldies tune on the radio while driving down Highway 1 under the hot summer sun. Yes, that sounded corny, but it's SO GOOD.


8. The Living Things Series from Little Otsu - I first discovered these when I visited Mission Arts and Comics (which is an awesome store that everyone in the Bay Area should go to). Every single issue is a feast for the eyes. Yes, I say that a lot about things, but I mean it everytime I say it. You cannot go wrong with any of them: Hannah Waldron, Lilli Carre, Jo Dery, and APAK?!? And the ones published in 2012 are Jessica Seamans, Liam Stevens, Becca Stadtlander.


9. A Portrait Without a Face - by Esther Pearl Watson. A quiet, thoughtful mini-comic exploration on the Gaze through an artist's perspective and in context to relationships between people. A nice departure from her zany, hysterical Unlovable comics.


10. Studygroup Comics - Zack Soto never ceases to amaze with editing/curating good comics, and his online comics site offer a wide array of strong storytellers. Some great discoveries this year were Tyler Landry's Society, Julia Gfrorer's Black is the Color, and Renee French's smart and hysterical Bjornstrand. 

Waiting room

Wanna get away?

New York, New York! One Helluva Town!

 

Oh New York, you sure do take my breath away!



You too, BCGF... literally. 

As someone who is deathly afraid of flying, I will always begin my con reports with details of my flight experience because the amount of agony and stress over flying equals the same amount of time and energy trying to plan for a comics show in another city.

 

The San Francisco airport had an amusing exhibition on classic board games at my gate that did its best to calm my nerves before I had to board the plane. And, okay, the flight was fine, thanks to watching episodes of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and a ridiculous reality show about the glamorous life of young people in the Silicon Valley which according to this show is based only in the Pacific Heights neighborhood of San Francisco (Ai yi yi).



Here's the view over the majestic island of Manhattan. You can't help but overcome your fears and fall in love. Anyway, right after I got off the plane, I got a nice welcoming text from Annie Koyama. It made my heart melt because I was dreading the thought being all alone in Manhattan which is silly because, hello, 10 gazillion billion people live in Manhattan and it's definitely true what Ol' Blue Eyes says: New York is a "city that NEVER sleeps." Driving from the airport through Long Island, I could see a few signs of damage caused by Hurricane Sandy. Trees were knocked down, taking huge chunks of the sidewalk with them. Flags and signs were ripped apart. However people were still out and about which was comforting to see.



I met up with Lark Pien and her sister Jane who were hanging out near my hotel in the Garment District. They were looking for buttons. Jane had suggested going to the nearby Korean fast-food joint, Bon Chon. I enthusiastically accepted because it was one of the food suggestions that my friend Annie Yee told me about the day before, and, um, HOLY CRAP, the chicken there is amazing. Talk about CHICKEN JOY (Jollibee reference)! Anyway, it was nice seeing the Pien sisters together. They told me that they had volunteered the day before, giving away food and supplies to people in Red Hook. Really cool that they did that. Lark showed me the war wounds on her arm that she got from some National Guardsman trying to fling a bag of potatoes or something over her head, or wait, I think it was from a fist fight with one of the guards. Wow, Lark.



Later on, because we are pigs, the three of us met up with Annie Koyama, Robin and Dan Nishio for MORE chicken at Torishin, a yakatoriya that Robin suggested. Robin's food suggestions are always A++ and this was no different! My favorite was the pork belly and the crispy skin, and I did manage to eat one or two pieces of vegetable because I'm on a diet. What?



The next day, I ventured over to Williamsburg for the big show. I was there a little early and there was a funeral happening at Our Lady of Mount Carmel church, next to the show venue so I strolled around the neighborhood a bit. I stumbled upon Desert Island Comics! Cool! I eventually high-tailed it back to the show, and met up with Tim Hensley upstairs in the gymnasium who was already setting up the Yam Books table. What a guy! If you meet Tim on the street somewhere, ask him to show you his watch which is a LCD screen that scrolls out the time and the words "Ticket Stub". Here's the pic of the venue during the calm before the storm:



The first official purchaser of Tim's book, "Ticket Stub" was Dan Nadel, Picturebox boss-man and co-organizer of BCGF. He managed to sneak over before the show opened and the crowds would be rolling in. And boy did they ever roll in! Hoards of people! Masses! Mobs! There was some talk before the show, that the aftermath from the hurricane and storm would keep people away, but that sentiment was quashed right from the start. I'm not sure if the show is always that crowded, but after such a crazy natural disaster, it was really uplifting to see. The BCGF Tumblr site's photo of the show demonstrates so accurately how crazy it was the ENTIRE day:

 

I kept looking around in amazement. The sea of people made me really happy! Lots of people compared the feeling of this show to this year's SPX which I did not go to. BCGF was just a great morale booster for the comics scene. I was physically hurting from the lack of ventilation due to the crowds (I'm really bad with hot weather, that's why I moved to the Bay Area), but the happiness of seeing so many people in one space, weaving through immense aisle traffic for comics made me forget how dehydrated and sweaty I was. (Also I really shouldn't have worn a sweater!). I do have one regret though which was not being able to venture out to see cartoonist heroes like Roz Chast and Richard MaGuire, or to get to purchase the awesome books from Bill Kartalopoulos' Rebus Books or Lilli Carre's debut book "Heads or Tails" -- or basically everyone's book because people who would visit our table would always be carrying something amazing. Luckily though, many were nice enough to come around to visit our table.

 

It was a great honor to have Matt Groening stop by to pick up a Ticket Stub. He talked to Tim about his contribution to the Treehouse of Horror, Issue #15.

 

This is a great pic taken by Lark of Charles Burns with Tim. I swore I saw Charles at Torishin the night before and when I asked him about his dining experience, he assured me that he wasn't actually there and that he has doppelgangers all over the world. One time, he found himself face to face with THREE doppelgangers or I guess that would be a dreimalganger? Anyway, I told him that "he" ate a lot of chicken skewers like a champ.

 

It was great to finally see some of the NYC dudes that rarely come to the West Coast shows, like cartoonist, photographer, book designer Jonathan Bennett! He has been working on some strips in The Believer, but he promised that he was in the process of making more comics hopefully for next year. I can't wait!

  

Here's Matthew Thurber and Dash Shaw. Dash expressed his thanks for having a collection of Ticket Stub published. I remembered him writing about the minicomic on the ole Comics Comics blog and I was really glad to hear that many people shared the same love of the Ticket Stub minis as I did. Lots of people were never able to actually see them since Tim only printed about 20 copies of each issue.

 

And, oh lord, Gary Panter! He and Tom Kaczynski were signing at the Fantagraphics table. I've been a major fan of Mr. Panter forever, especially because he says great things like this. I also got to see Tom K's new book with Fanta, "Beta Testing the Apocalypse". The colors look great and there is new stuff in there, folks! Got to get that and his latest offerings through Uncivilized Books. Post York and True Swamp, GEEZ!!

  

Here's a blurry Chris Ware with a Ticket Stub! I kept hearing that his panel with Art Spiegelman and Richard MacGuire was off the charts. I hope to see video of it soon! I told Chris that it was refreshing to hear at his talk with Dan Clowes at the Oakland Museum of California that he can be self-depricating about his work and talent even though he is a complete and utter genius.

 

It was nice to see Chris Cilla's face all the way from Portland. He had these great silkscreened t-shirts at his table. Just a great guy all around! Other Portland folks like Julia Gfrorer, Zack Soto, Aron Steinke and Jason Levian were also in attendance!

  

Adrian Tomine was able to take a break from signing at the D+Q table to get a copy of Ticket Stub. I'm still trying to figure out what Tim drew in Adrian's copy. 

  

As I was walking around, scrounging to break a 20 dollar bill for some ones or fives like a character in Walking Dead looking for food or a first aid kit, I ran into one of my favorite people, Tom Spurgeon. We talked first about sports, social media and then comics. We know our priorities. It was nice to finally meet him as it has been over 12 years since I've only known him through Comics Reporter, one of the best comics websites out there today. Tom moderated a panel with Tim, Charles Burns and Anouk Ricard. I can't wait to see video of that too! 

  

I was so happy to finally meet Nick Abadzis in person too, whose book collection of his "Hugo Tate" comic just came out last Spring. We're going to have him on the Comix Claptrap soon, so make sure you stay tuned. Yes, Thien and I are still podcasting. Sorry.

Also nice to see another West cartoonist, John Pham make it the show. John had these gorgeous video game zines printed on the Risograph, as well as stunning paintings that he exhibited at Giant Robot recently. The show had a really nice mix of cartoonists in this show! Veronica Graham, from Oakland-based Most Ancient, had a table and came over to say hi! She had these insane books made out of vellum! It was also a welcomed surprise to see Damien Jay, who traveled from LA to visit his family in New York. Chris Diaz from San Francisco showed us all the drawings he got from Gary Panter, Adrian Tomine and Charles Burns. He walked away with a nice piece of original art by Tim. I got to talk to Warren Bernard, Executive Director of the SPX show about the amazing guests he had at the show two months ago. Also, I was very honored to have Nine Antico, one of the featured guests of the show, pay us a visit. In general, BCGF was a huge success for Yam Books. I can't think of a better way to end the convention season. We sold a lot of Lollygags, and Ticket Stub did really well which made both Tim and I very happy especially since the show marked the end of his Transcontinental Ticket Stub Tour.

  

After the show, Tim and I got to stop by Desert Island. They have the latest issue of Smoke Signals which Tim has a full page spread of Alfred Hitchcock strips. You need to definitely check that out! We dropped off some books and then met up for Thai food with the ole Artist With Problems (AWP) crew: Alex Holden, Karen Snider, Jon Lewis, Tom K, Robyn Chapman, Robin Enrico, and Sam Henderson. They are always so much fun and so welcoming. It was hard to leave those guys, and hard to leave NYC in general. 

 

 I could go on and on about how the next day I visited the Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum with my high school friend Becky and her family, and being mesmorized by Pierpoint Morgan's amazing library, but I will save you the trouble. I will say though that New York was really great to me. I'm still crushing on the city big time.

 
JP Morgan had three copies of the Guttenberg Bible. That jerk! 

Thank you to all the people who visited and supported Yam Books at the show! Thank you to Robyn Chapman for helping and hanging out with us at our table. Huge props (can we still say that?) to Gabe Fowler, Bill Kartaupolos, Dan Nadel enough for putting together a well-curated show in the midst of chaos the past couple of weeks. And lastly thank you to Lark Pien and to Tim Hensley for making each show that Yam Books has attended this year such a success. We'll see ya guys soon at a show near you in 2013!

 

APE Times!

Still a little woozy from all the craziness that was the Alternative Press Expo (APE) last weekend, but wanted to write a quick recap since, as I've been saying for weeks now, the show marked Yam Books' eagerly-anticipated debut of its first planned book "Ticket Stub" by Tim Hensley. Here's Tim and I at our table. The only thing missing was our bud and table mate, Lark Pien who was hanging out with cartoonists Megan Kelso and Ellen Forney down in Florida for a cartoonist residency for the week.

It was super duper having Tim at the show to finally celebrate the fruits of our labor. All of our hard work and all the emails back and forth paid off with a beautifully-designed book that we are really proud of. The last time I saw Tim in person was at APE a couple of years ago when he was a part of the gigantic Kramers Ergot 8 book tour. He's a funny, VERY humble and talented guy. My only regret is that I didn't rescue him from staying at a hotel called the Vagabond Inn right next to The Stud bar. Don't look at me! I didn't book Tim's travel arrangements! Needless to say, lesson learned for both of us! Anyway, it was really heart-warming to hear all the nice things about Ticket Stub at the show. And despite it being a pretty slow APE this year, many actually bought the book. See! Dan Clowes even bought TWO!

Tim took the time to sign and draw in everyone's books with his blue ink and crowquill pen which he would run away every 5 minutes to clean in the Concourse Exhibition Center bathroom. If you saw a gross, blue-stained sink -- that was Tim and his vampire blood. Here's Roman Muradov in awe of Tim's inking skills.

Later that day, Jim Woodring came over to praise Tim on his stellar book, Wally Gropius. He came over twice wanting Tim to sign his copy, and each time, Tim was off cleaning his ink nib to which Jim would say "What the hell?!? Where's my drawing?" or something like that. The second time, Jim managed to shame Tim from afar as he was walking with Mike Baehr:

Friday night before the APE show, I caught the tail-end of Adrian Tomine's signing at Pegasus Books. I have never seen that place so packed to the gills in my life. I also got the chance to attend Gabrielle Bell's reading at Escapist Comics. Gabrielle's storytelling is hilarious and thoughtful. She is one of my favorite cartoonists, stretching the boundaries of autobio comics. She talked about her painstaking process, the real life experiences and people that inspire her stories. At the event, I talked to illustrator/designer Brian Kaas and Tom Kaczynski who is doing a bang-up job with Uncivilized Books. Here he is describing how much of a bossy publisher he is, as Ben Katchor brings up the depressing topic of e-books replacing printed books, to which Tom reassured that the future for us is bright. Oh Tom, it's okay. I have my emergency survival kit near me at all times.

The show picked up at the end of both days, and we managed to sell a good amount of Ticket Stubs, Lollygags, and mini-comics. We also sold out of a couple of titles from our pals at Koyama Press. Michael DeForge, the West Coast people demand your presence ASAP, so please table next year. Also many were blown away by Jesse Jacobs' "By This You Shall Know Him". Tim also had some stunning original art for sale. Chance Press' Jordan Hurdler made out like a bandit with a sweet piece of original Ticket Stub art -- the cover art for Ticket Stub, Issue #9 which doubled as the first page of the book collection. I am still weeping that that isn't hanging on my wall.

The best part of these shows for me is getting the change to talk to cartoonist heroes and friends who inspire me: Got to see Emily Nilsson and Greg Means tabling for Sparkplug Comic Books and Tugboat Press. I love them so much! Visited with the Press Gang guys comprised of Jason Levian (Floating World), Francois Vigneault (Family Style), and Zack Soto (Studygroup12). I'm really happy for those Portland guys hosting The Projects show this weekend too. I didn't get a lot of chances to leave my table (I couldn't even go to the panel I was a part of on Sunday!) so thank you to the comics dudes who stopped by to chat like Eli Bishop, Jeff Roysdon, Tyler Cohen, Geoff Vasile, Mark Todd, Eric Haven, Chris Diaz, Jonas Madden-Conner, Alvin Buenaventura, Mats Stromberg, Kyle Peterson, Jesse Reklaw, Sam Spina, and Fred Noland who is back at making comics -- Thanks God! And it was really special to meet Janice Headley and Mike Baehr who did a good job at keeping crazy Los Bros fangirls like me at bay! Oh look, here's Ben Catmull showing us pictures of the set design he created for an upcoming film project.

Yoo hoo! Jason Shigaaa! "You'll be a daddy sooooon!" (Hi Ken!) Oh, here's Drawn and Quarterly trouble-maker, Tom Devlin. He kept going on and on about Facebook and El Chavo cocktails. Then suddenly like some ghost outta Minneapolis, Zak Sally decided to scare the crap out of us. He happened to be vacationing in the Bay Area. Man, talk about another reminder to keep making good comics. We hear ya, Zak. No need to haunt us, dude.

All weekend long, I managed to stop myself from fainting when I saw Los Bros Hernandez walking into the joint to sign every Love and Rockets book in the galaxy and greet their adoring fans. It was pretty much their weekend and why not! They were everywhere! If not in our heads and hearts, but next to us at Henry's Hunan for dinner. We are pretty lucky to have such dudes to look up to in our craft. These guys never stop reminding you that you can do your comics on your own terms. Thus, Jaime gave me his blessing (sort of) to continue my embarrassing Dancing With the Stars comic. Every year I keep saying I will travel down to Comic Con to meet the Los Bros in person, and it never happens. I can't ask for a better way to finally meet them, right here, at my local comic show on the last stop of their 30th Anniversary Tour. Shit is crazy! Anyway, can't wait to go to their exhibit at the Cartoon Art Museum which, by all accounts of course, sounds freaking amazing.

All in all, APE 2012 was a special time for me. Thanks to everyone who stopped by and gave your support for Yam Books. A special thank you to Ken McCarty for helping me set up the table and figure out addition and subtraction -- You are the best!! Now onward to BCGF!