Left of the Lake Magazine Issue 6

“Don’t Take Life Too Serious. It Ain’t Nohow Permanent.” – Walt Kelly

Comics! Comics! Comics! lEFT OF THE lAKE pRESENTS tHE cOMICS ISSUE!

Serving The Creative Communities From Chicago To Milwaukee

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Issue 6

A Re-Visioning: New Works in Polymer

Jeffrey Lloyd Dever Botanist's Illusion

Kathleen Dustin Erzerum Purse

Over the past thirty years, artists all over the world discovered the almost unlimited capacity polymer holds for mimicking any surface, material or surface effect. As a result, we are witnessing the birth of a new fine craft and art medium recognized by museums such as the Racine Art Museum and The Boston Museum of Fine Arts. This exhibit highlights new works by master artists and innovators who inspire others to re-vision the possibilities in this medium.

Featuring: Judy Belcher, Leslie Blackford, Jana Roberts Benzon, Heather Campbell, Rachel Carren, Dan Cormier, Jeffrey Lloyd Dever, Meredith Dittmar, Kathleen Dustin, Elissa FarrowSavos, Rachel Gourley, Alev Gozonar, Lindly Haunani, Tory Hughes, Emily Squires Levine, Maggie Maggio, Wendy Wallin Malinow, Laurie Mika, Sarah Shriver, Laura Tabakman, Cynthia Tinapple, Cynthia Toops, Melanie West, Phil Whitman and Elise Winters This exhibit is a collaborative event with the Racine Art Museum’ s Polymer 2.0: The Field in the 21st Century, RAM's Polymer Symposium at Johnson Foundation at Wingspread in Racine, Wisconsin from Friday, October 17 - Sunday, October 19, 2014. Many of the artists will be present at the opening reception.

Opening Reception:

Exhibit Runs:

September 18th, 4:30- 7:30 pm

September 9 to October 25, 2014

Special RAM Polymer Symposium Reception: October 18th, 4- 6 pm Free and open to the public.

Gallery Hours: Tuesday - Friday 10 a.m. - 3 p.m.

Thursday Evening 6 - 8 p.m.

Saturday 1 - 4 p.m.

For more information on upcoming events, visit www.carthage.edu/art gallery

A Message From The Publisher Anne Hambrock

The Kenosha Festival of Cartooning kicks off its fourth year this fall, running from Thursday, September 25th through Saturday, September 27th!

Please plan to join us in welcoming our roster of internationally recognized cartoonists as they come to Kenosha to give presentations, participate in outreach to area schools, chat with Greg Berg on the WGTD Morning Show, teach kids classes in cartooning, draw at the comic jam sponsored by Left of the Lake and much more! Our 2014 Kenosha Festival of Cartooning guests are: • Jeff Keane (Family Circus) • Lincoln Peirce (Big Nate) • Scott Stantis (Chicago Tribune Staff Editorial Cartoonist)

• Denis Kitchen (Kitchen Sink Press) • Todd Clark (Lola) • Rick Stromoski (Soup To Nutz) • Terri Libenson (The Pajama Diaries)

You don’t have to wait until September to see the outstanding gallery shows of original comic art sponsored by the festival!

“More Than Funny Too” runs all summer long ( June 7 – Sept 27) at the Kenosha Public Museum (5500 1st Ave Kenosha). This amazing show features art by all the festival guest speakers as well as art from the history of MAD Magazine, comic books, and historic newspaper strips. Artists include Frank Frazetta, Joe Kubert, Sergio Aragones, Wally Wood, Walt Kelly, George Herriman, and many others. Over 100 pieces of art spanning 100 years of cartooning history!

“The Oddly Compelling Art of Denis Kitchen” runs from August 1 – October 10 at the University of Wisconsin Parkside’s new Fine Arts Gallery. This outstanding show features work by Denis Kitchen, Robert Crumb, and other underground comic artists. Kenosha writer Michael Schumacher has written biographies of Al Capp (Li’l Abner) and Will Eisner (The Spirit) and their work is featured in this show as well.

Included this year is a partnership with Left of The Lake for a comic jam which culminates at Villa D’Carlo Friday night.

Saturday evening, at the Kenosha Public Museum, we will once again be auctioning off comic art and ephemera to benefit The Children’s Hospitals of Wisconsin’s Kenosha Clinic and the Open Wings Learning Community.

Space does not allow us to list every event here – please visit kenoshacartoonfest.com for the festival schedule and ticket information. All events are free and open to the public so tickets are free but seating is limited.

The festival is directed by Anne Morse Hambrock and sponsored by the National Cartoonists Society Foundation.

4 A Message From Anne Hambrock / Left of The Lake

Issue 6

Left of the Lake

10 Behind the Scenes of Edison Lee

By John Hambrock

15 Starving Artist

By Jerry Belland

17 Just A Dream

By Dennis Bayuzick

18 4 Square

By Denis Kitchen

20 A Game of Pastries

By Joshua Frazer

21 Squint!

A Tiny Comic By Various Local Artists!

24 Legacy

By Scott Stantis

24 Soup to Nuts!

By Rick Stromoski

27 Orbis Mortalis

By Michael Schwartz

28 A Crooked Man

By Janette Louden

Publisher: Chet Griffith Graphic Designer: Joshua Frazer Editor: Lisa Adamowicz Kless Editor: Peg Rousar-Thompson Managing Editor: John Bloner, Jr. Contact Us At: editor@leftofthelake.com

30 Eat Me!

By Richard Bell & John Bloner Jr.

34 Super Heroes

By Justin Grimbol

34 Mr. Evil

By Jason Covelli

35 2FL: Chester Commodore

By John Bloner Jr.

37 Habitat

By Matthew Gonya

37 A Comic

By Matthew Hansel

38 Racine Horlick Cartoon

A Comic By Denis Kitchen

39 Left of The Lake Submission Info

Cover: John Hambrock

“John in the Lab with Edison”

Left Of The Lake

Coloring Book

Available at Artworks!

Experience Kenosha’s HarborPark Sculpture Walk 14 world-class sculptures along Kenosha’s beautiful lakefront.

SCULPTURE

WALK

H ARBOR P ARK

This larger than life exhibit will run through September 2015.

New sculptures will be exhibited for 2015-2017. www.kenoshaartsfund.org Brandon Minga / Nash 7

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d the t: A behin a scenes look

brock By: John Ham

The Brilliant Mind of Edison Lee launched with King Features in the fall of 2006, which means I’ve created over 2500 daily and Sunday comic strips.

When I compare the early strips with those I’m creating now, I see a vast improvement, both in the drawing and the writing. The drawing has gotten looser and the writing has gotten tighter. However, while the strip may have improved, and the style evolved, the process I go through to create each and every strip has remained essentially the same. I’ll usually start off by acknowledging I have deadline, followed by major panicking. After the dust has settled, it’s on to writing, followed by making coffee, panicking some more, baking cookies, purging the boiler (during the summer I’ll vacuum the air conditioners), then more writing. Somehow or another I’ve managed to make it work.

10 Behind The Scenes / Left of The Lake

Following is a step by step breakdown of how I generate 7 strips a week, 52 weeks a year.

Some cartoonists pick specific times to write.

This has never worked for me. I’ve found that I can’t just flip on the writing switch and jot down what comes to mind. Some days I can write a week’s worth of material in a few hours.

On others I may come up with absolutely nothing. And it’s not as though certain days are “magic” days for writing. I may come up with my best material on a Tuesday, or a Friday, although I’ve discovered that I write some of my best stuff when I have that deadline breathing down my neck.

My wife Anne contributes ideas and scripts as well, and I frequently ask her to read what I’ve written. I trust her judgment and, if she has any reservations about a particular strip or

strips, I’ll almost always put them aside for a rework at a later date. Plus if she doesn’t laugh at the jokes at this stage it’s unlikely adding visuals will change that. Tickling her to get a laugh only makes matters worse. I have found that a great visual can generate a bigger laugh than the script alone but no visual will save a joke that isn’t working.

Comic artists tend to either write first, and then draw, or else they draw first – maybe just doodles – and then turn those doodles into comics. I write first.

Generally, I write scripts on my laptop, although there are times when I’ ll use anything that’s available – the back of an old bank deposit slip, a gum wrapper, cardboard tubes, the bottom of my foot (I still have an idea for January 4th written in laundry marker on my big toe). I used to write everything on stacks of printer paper attached to a clipboard, but my horrible penmanship and my habit of going through numerous edits made most of my writings undecipherable. I also lost the clipboard. When I’m writing, I storyboard the strip in my head, and I write visual cues into the script to use during the penciling stage.

I usually wait until I have all of my ideas written before I start drawing them up. I do this because I like to have the order set. Some strips are more appropriate for a Saturday, oth-

ers for a Wednesday. Sometimes I’ll ink up a week’s worth of material in a specific order, and then completely rearrange them. Paying attention to the order of my material is somewhat important to me, sort of like the order of songs on an album.

My tools are pretty old school. Here is a list of everything I use to create my strip: • Bienfang 2 ply Strathmore – which I buy in pads of 20 (“11”x 17” sheets, cut in half ) • #2 pencils (My accountant informs me that I can NOT depreciate these!)

• Lots of cap erasers (My dogs love ‘em) • Speedball Super Black Waterproof India Ink (This stuff is drawn to white carpet like Orville to a Twinkie) • Winsor & Newton Scepter Gold ll #2 sable brush for inking • Micron #8 pen for lettering • Dr Martins Bleed Proof White for clean ups I start each strip by lettering the words in light pencil, then working up quick character sketches for position.

After I have everything where I want it, I start tightening up the pencil drawings. I discovered that if I get too tight at this stage I lose some of the energy and spontaneity.

I finalize the art by inking over the pencils with my brush and ink. When the ink is dry, I erase the pencils, touch up any bobbles with the bleed proof white, and the art is ready to scan.

Left of The Lake / Behind The Scenes 11

I can usually pencil and ink 6 daily strips in 8-10 hours. Sunday strips can take 4-6, depending on the complexity.

Using Photoshop, I scan the strips in grayscale at 600 dpi. I need to save one file as a black and white bitmap for newspapers that print their daily comics in black and white, and a second, layered CYMK file for the papers that run theirs in color. The colored version is also needed for the various outlets that publish it online. We do not handle the CYMK to RGB conversion for online use.

Then, at 11:30 pm on the night before they’re due, I hand off the layered files to my wife

12 Behind The Scenes / Left of The Lake

Anne (I’m exaggerating, although there have been times when I’ve done this), who colors them using a Wacom tablet and her own special set of colors created specifically for the strip.

At the end of each week, I need to have 6 daily and 1 Sunday strip inked, colored, and ready to send to Reed Brennan Media Associates, the company that handles the final editing and distribution for King Features.

That’s it in a nutshell!

If you have any questions, shoot me an email at john@edisonlee.net.

Left of The Lake / Behind The Scenes  13

Jerry Belland / Starving Artist  15

Photography: Jon Bolton

Discover America’s Largest Craft Collection Learn more about current RAM art exhibitions and events at ramart.org Racine Art Museum 441 Main Street, Downtown Racine

262.638.8300

Dennis Bayuzick / Just A Dream  17

18  Denis Kitchen / 4 Square

20  Joshua Frazer / Throne of Pastries

Lotl Presents

squint (A Tiny Comic)

$%&!#!!@ Ouch!

KSO 75th Anniversary Diamond Gala Friday, August 22, 2014 • 6:00 pm Kenosha Country Club, 500 13th Avenue, Somers, WI

Honoring our sponsors and donors

Eat , drink and be merry at our gala event. Heavy hors d’eouvres served.

KSO 1st Annual Shindig On The Shore Friday, September 5, 2014 • 6:00 - 9:30 pm Pennoyer Park, 7th Ave & 35th Street

Free concert of pops and movie music

Featuring vendors, concessions, KSO shirt sales and KSO musicians, bringing the party to the park

Ode To Joy

Saturday, October 18, 2014 • 7:30 pm Reuther Auditorium, 913 57th Street

Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony

Melissa Cardamone, Soprano • Allison Hull, Alto • Alan Taylor, Tenor • Philip Kraus, Baritone VOX 3 Collective, Guest Choir • Guest artists sponsored, in part, by the Kenosha Community Foundation and Carthage College

Symphonic Sweets

Sunday, December 14th, 2014 • 3:00 pm Reuther Auditorium, 913 57th Street

An afternoon filled with Christmas joy

Choirs from the community join KSO in a glorious “Hallelujah!” Special guest: Santa Claus

Pizzicato Promenade • Valentine’s Celebration Saturday, February 14, 2015 • Time and Location: TBA

Dance the night away with the Kenosha Symphony Orchestra Sway along to a Strauss Waltz and step to a light-hearted polka

Our Town, Your KSO Saturday, April 18, 2015 • 7:30 pm Reuther Auditorium, 913 57th Street

A celebration of our cultural history

Featuring the music of the iconic American composer, Aaron Copland Guest artists: Tremper Chorale, directed by Mrs. Polly Amborn

Summertime and the Livin’ is Easy Saturday, June 13, 2015 • 7:30 pm UW-Parkside Bedford Hall, 900 Wood Road Gershwin tunes and hit movie music

Featuring music from Pirates of the Caribbean and Jurassic Park

www.kenoshasymphony.org • (262) 654-9080

Rita Tallent Picken Regional Center for Arts and Humanities

•Fine Arts Gallery •E.H. Mathis Gallery •Foundation Gallery 900 Wood Road Kenosha, WI 53141

Scott Stantis / Legacy

Rick Stromoski / Soup to Nuts

THE FINE ART GALLERY PRESENTS:

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“Watermarks: Going with the Flow, the Human Form and Water, an Inseparable Duet” September 19th, 2014, 7-8pm

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I

n the Beginning the Eternal created all worlds.

One was set apart to never be inhabited. It was the dark lonely world of Orbis Mortalis. You may ask yourself “Why?” Why create a world that no one should enter? It was this question that caused the first corruption and the reason Orbis Mortalis is filled with a blind and lonely people.

Can those that have fallen into corruption ever be redeemed?

Can order be restored?

mortalcoilproductions.com Michael Schwartz / Orbis Mortalis 27

28  Janette Louden / A Crooked Man

by Richard Bell Adapted and Illustrated by John Bloner, Jr.

N

ot so long ago there was a group of caterpillars that lived in the forest and had all the food, water and shelter that they needed. Each morning it took them

an hour to put their shoes on and each evening, an hour to take them off again.

Two caterpillars, Kenny and Kyle, were best friends, and thought they were the fastest runners in their troop. Everywhere they went they ran as rapidly as possible and didn’t care who got in the way. They were always first in line for bingo or table tennis or when the wading pool was open. Kenny and Kyle even had special running shoes that were custom-made from the finest grass clippings. They especially liked to run circles around the slugs and laugh and call them names.

One afternoon as they were resting in the shade a big turtle whizzed by.

Our two caterpillars were very impressed. “Wow!” Kyle cried, “Did you see that?”

“Barely,” Kenny replied. “If it comes back, let’s jump on and go for a ride.” So they climbed to a low hanging branch, hung on by their crochets, and waited.

THIS IS AMAZING!

I CAN HARDLY BREATHE!

After what seemed like hours the turtle returned from where it had been and the caterpillars let go as it passed underneath. They bounced and rolled but hung on for dear life.

Before they knew it they were speeding like mad across the field. The caterpillars were terrified. They shouted for the turtle to stop but it didn’t hear them.

A half hour later the turtle came to rest beside a peaceful pond and the caterpillars slid off. They had no idea where they were.

Meanwhile, high above, a crow awaited its next meal. ,

FAULT R U O Y L L THIS IS A N! AI FUZZ-BR

You’RE THE ONE W NOW HOW DO WE HO AGREED TO IT. GET BACK HOME?

THE END

32  John Hambrock / Studio

www.leftofthelake.com

Super Heroes of the 90s had the best mullets I had a mullet too But I called it a fox tail.

I also had mustache When I was only eight years old and I wore fish net stockings on my arms

Girls didn’t like me But we played spin the bottle And I was sure that if I tried Hard enough, I could control the bottle With my mind As they say “With great power comes great responsibility.”

34 Jason Covelli / Mr. Evil

Justin Grimbol

And I could drink ten cans of soda In an hour.

I showered daily But still managed to stink

Matthew Gonya / Habitat

Matthew Hansel

www.leftofthelake.com Image by: Ashley Nigl

38  Denis Kitchen / Horlick High School Reunion

Submit Your Work To Left Of The Lake Left of the Lake Magazine is published quarterly and accepts work continuously. We welcome submissions from both new and established artists and writers, nationally and internationally, but first consideration is offered to the creative people in our region of Southeast Wisconsin and Northeast Illinois.

General Guidelines: • All work must be original and not previously published • No simultaneous submissions Submissions Welcome: • Poetry (maximum of three pieces) • Fiction or Non-Fiction (400 words or less) • Visual Art, Photography, or Comics (maximum of two pieces) How-To Submit: • We prefer electronic submissions, either as an attachment or in the body of an email. Send work to editor@leftofthelake.com and please include your name, address, and a short bio of 30 words or less.

Questions? Contact us! editor@leftofthelake.com Left of The Lake / Submissions Information 39

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Left of the Lake Magazine is Printed in The USA. Š 2014 Left of the Lake.