Brain Frame Lit

photo by Lori Felker

Last weekend, a lot happened. On Sunday, Brain Frame celebrated its second anniversary, Brain Frame 13, in a performance spectacular and social event. More on that later.

On Saturday, I organized the first ever Brain Frame Lit as part of Saturday Strip: Comic Day at the Museum of Contemporary Art.

photo by Ian McDuffie

Brain Frame Lit is a new invention, arising from a unique obstruction. The MCA wanted me to organize something as part of Comic Day, but they wanted me to do it during the day, in an area full of windows. Brain Frame proper is at night, in the dark, and almost every performance utilizes digital or analog projection. Daylight would render such tools unusable.

So, I selected cartoonists with strong literary or narrative voices, and issued them the challenge of communicating their imagery through means other than projection. Everyone stepped up to the plate. I received the name Brain Frame Lit in an instant of clarity (it also looks like Brain Frame Lite, which is appropriate) and proceeded to make this stupid flier:

The performances were great. We decided to do it outside to maximize our new muse, the sun, and we maintained a full, attentive audience for the duration of the show. Halle Butler read a short story and had audience members follow along with an illustrated booklet. Eric Rivera distributed a package of drawings from Second Chances #1, and performed three vignettes from the story, in costume with a narrator. Ian Endsley ended the show with another incredible, disposable comic where each panel is drawn on the next page in a giant pad of paper. Ian rips off and casts away each page as he reads, demure, charismatic, affecting, through the comic. At the end everybody scrambles to grab the pages they'd like to take home.

For my reading (a redressing of They Glistened) I created a bunch of jello diagrams of the liquid aliens who star in that story, the Squishsacks. I drew the Jellyship, their symbiotic, organic spaceship, on the whiteboard behind me. I smashed the Squishsacks in time with the narrative, and drew corresponding, shitty diagrams on the board behind me. I had no eraser, but erased with my hands, so by the end of the performance I had black-pigmented green jello all over. I slept an hour and a half on Thursday night, and three hours (in two segments) on Friday night, and this was Saturday, and that night I slept four hours before Sunday and the execution of Brain Frame 13. Everything went really well, and I've been exceedingly happy all week.

photos by John Fecile

Uzi's Party (pre-production)

Welcome to the 21st century, where art funding comes from tireless self-promotion and constant solicitation of your friends and loved ones. When Kickstarter came on the scene I had misgivings, and even now, I would much rather win some big grant than crowd source a film budget. But my views have changed, a lot. I've seen plenty of friends start their own campaigns, and most of them succeed. Incredible things like my friend Sara teaching girls in Cambodia how to make comics, my friend Lale putting together the Chromazoid anthology, places like The Comfort Station earning air conditioning; these are all projects I was overjoyed to be able to support, and I've gotten some really great stuff out of it, in addition to my virtue rewards. I think a well run Kickstarter campaign is a blessing to everyone involved, and I'm very proud to be at a point where I feel I've earned my own.

I worked very hard on this campaign, but not nearly as hard as I will work on Uzi's Party once filming starts. Big gratitude to Jeff Perlman, Ryan Gleeson, and Aren Zolninger for helping me shoot my fundraiser video (it's all one take!); Tyson for mixing sound; mondo thanks to Christly LeMaster and everyone at the Nightingale for generous use of their space.

I'll write more about the film soon. It's an incredibly ambitious 16mm experimental teen drama with a supernatural twist. Right now all of my energy is devoted to promotion and solicitation. Luckily, I was born to live in the 21st century. I may not be able to pull a plough but I can lift 200 personal emails and three simultaneous event organizations on my back every day.

Help me out! Donate, and above all, spread the word! Please and thank you.

Possession Scenes Issues 1&2

Say hello to the first two issues of Possession Scenes, my new series of mini-comics drawn from films and television programs featuring the titular subject. Each issue is folded from a single page, and contains an informative title plate [issue #, source, year, director, cinematographer, actor possessed] followed by seven pencil renderings of sequential stills from the scene.

I chose to start with The Exorcist, because duh. Issue #2 covers the moment in Twin Peaks when Laura Palmer's murderer is revealed - during a subsequent killing.

Issue #3, in the works, features "the abortion scene" from Andrzej Zulawski's 1981 film Possession. I was tempted to make Possession the subject of Issue #1, but that would be too confusing.

The impetus for Possession Scenes was part desire to have something new for CAKE, part research for an upcoming film project involving possession (more details soon), and mostly curiosity about the visual strategies, trends and variations employed to show a character losing themselves to something supernatural. Possession is something in which I am personally and spiritually interested. Scenes of possession always ride the line between silly and frightening, whether fictional or actual.

Last night I watched The Mask, in preparation for Issue #4, and while I had to skip past much of the film to avoid the insufferable, hideous antics of Jim Carrey's creation, observing the cheesy CGI of the initial transformation and the way the mask glimmers and hypnotizes Stanley Ipkiss was a delight.

One of the most interesting challenges in this project is translating a scene into seven silent stills. That's not a lot to work with. The pacing is delicate: three pairs of images, then one final punch. I need to make the action and intention of the scene clear without using any text.

You can pick up issues #1 and #2 from me this weekend at CAKE. I'll be at table 6 with Lale Westvind, a few paces through the entryway, to your right.

Here's a nice article in Chicago Magazine about emergine cartoonists, featuring yours truly ("who is, by many counts, a major player in her scene's revitalization") written by Jason Foumberg.

Remember how I starred in a movie? It premiers next month on Saturday, July 13th at the Gene Siskel Film Center, with two more shows later in the week.

Auctioneer

I learned something new. I learned how to run an auction. I watched how-to auctioneer videos, I watched Herzog's documentary on auctioneering, I practiced tongue-twisters and counting rhythms, and then, with the help of the CAKE crew and my glorious intern Emma Rand, I raised over $2,500 for the 2013 Chicago Alternative Comics Expo.

The occasion was CAKE FRAME, a comics reading/comics drawing/comics art auction/Brain Frame Special Event organized by myself and Max Morris, CAKE fundraising master. The show was really, really great. I was nervous about auctioneering right up until I started. Then it felt awesome. Musical accompaniment from Alex Inglizian and Stephen Ptacek helped a lot. It also helped to be raising money for my friends. Sometimes after a regular Brain Frame I get lost in spirals of self-doubt related to self-promotion and the fear of self-aggrandizement, but doing all of this for CAKE neutralized those pesky emotions. Need more fun proof? Here's some documentation of the live-drawing portion of the evening, featuring Jeremy Pettis and the Mega Clit:



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What other fulfilling pursuits have I recently co-created with talented friends? Funny you should ask! The sophisticated and thoughtful duo Bonnie & Maude, AKA Kseniya Yarosh and Eleanor Kagan, were kind enough to invite me onto their femme-centric film podcast while I was visiting Brooklyn last month. We spent about an hour talking about the 1972 Bob Fosse film Cabaret. Cabaret is my favorite movie. If you want to hear me nerd out haaaard on this dark, queer musical, check out the episode. Lots of spoilers; but if you haven't seen it, maybe you should listen anyway so you can forget what you anticipate the film to be based on the fact that it's a musical (you're wrong).

Look, I even kind of had the hair. 'Hilarious' photo courtesy of my freshman year at SAIC and the 2006 Chicago Jazz Fest. There is wine in those cups that I bought for my friends with my fake ID! Good old Lyra, always collaborating with talented friends.

Brain Frame 12

Announcing Brain Frame 12!

An extraordinary feat of engineering. A plane. A bridge. A tower. A tightrope; its walker. A survey; its proctor. A suture; your doctor. An event: the twelfth in a series of performative comix readings.

Join us in another new location (Bridgeport) for the next session of BRAIN FRAME, the show that proves over and over that you can not anticipate how some comic books might be interpreted. Extraordinary engineering feats this episode include: shadow puppets, sanitary napkin disposal bags, a breakdance crew,an eating disorder, some drums and possibly bass. With:

Nate Beaty
Thorne Brandt
Kevin Budnik
Eamon Espey and Lisa Krause
Meghan Lamb
Anne Elizabeth Moore

As well as live synthscapes by Tyson Torsentenson.
Refreshments will be available including gf/vegan goods from local bakery D’ology.

Saturday, May 18th, doors at 8pm, $7

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I designed this poster with Clay Hickson and printed it with Andrew Ghrist. Clay and I (who grew up in the same small town in northern California but didn't meet until both moving to Chicago for the same school, pretty neat huh) sat down and sketched the body of the plane together, then I inked it and drew the people, then Clay drew the squiggles and did all the airbrushing, then I finished the text. Clay has a ton of really beautiful airbrush and wiggle work over at his website, you should really check it out.

The simplicity of this poster was a big relief after the insanity of the last one. Printing was a bit tricky, mostly mixing the colors, but they came out well.

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I've been putting out the Brain Frame newsletter for five months, now, and they're getting pretty fancy. This latest effort even matches the poster colors to the email borders, check it out.

The Infinite Corpse

These are my first panels for the Infinite Corpse. I was assigned to follow Art Spiegelman. I colored it with watercolor pencils. Here's what our panels look like in combination, on the website:

After my submission, you can follow the story either with a strip by John Porcellino or a strip by August Lipp. In the future, there may be more options. That's because the Infinite Corpse is just that - infinite.

This is a project that Trubble Club (mostly Aaron Renier and Nate Beaty) have been working on for a full year. It's a chain comic that never ends, branches off in innumerable dimensions, and currently features the work of over 200 artists, growing daily. Anyone can contribute their follow-up to a random three-panel segment. Submissions are reviewed by a panel of Trubble Club members, but most of them get in, so go ahead! In the beginning, when Aaron was gathering the original strips that make up the framework of the Infinite Corpse, it was in true exquisite corpse fashion. I wasn't able to see any panels except the ones I was following. Now, with the catacombs online, artists will be able to build longer story arcs and reference other parts of the narrative (if they want).

I am flabbergasted by the seamless genius of the Infinite Corpse. I can hardly believe I have such innovative and talented friends. Please, spread the word and contribute.

Recent Days (Urgent Care)

In between two jobs, running Brain Frame, a few commissions, attending all the coolest Chicago events, making 'boner' puns, and occasionally relaxing, I've been working hard on my autobiographic book Recent Days. It's been in the works for two years. I'm on a tear, now. Here's an amusing update.

Night Terrors

Tyson's solo project, Night Terror, has finally released an album. I had a dream that it was called Night Terrors. I told Tyson and then he named it Night Terrors. It is available for $8 from Living Tapes, a label based in Los Angeles, and it's really good. You can also listen to the whole thing and buy a digital copy here.

I designed this new logo, and adapted it for the various merchandise seen below. Please buy the tape, or, if you're in Pittsburgh, New York City, Baltimore, or Chicago, come to one of the following shows on our upcoming mini-tour. I'll be doing scary slide projections and operating a fog machine. Click here for more detailed information.

+ 04-18 Pittsburgh at Brillobox w/ Majeure (mbr. Zombi)
+ 04-22 Brooklyn at Death By Audio w/ Alan Watts; The Flag; Trabajo
+ 04-23 Baltimore at Golden West w/ Cross; Vlonde
+ 04-26 Chicago at Lake Paradise w/ Bitchin' Bajas; Quicksails

The pin is 1/2" on each side, and printed on silver paper. Here's the original tape cover design.

Brain Frame 11

ANNOUNCING BRAIN FRAME 11

You awake one morning from uneasy dreams to find yourself transformed in your bed into a giant insect. What has happened to me? you think. That evening, the hive mind calls you to a new location. Six of your brethren take the stage to enact their own creative transformations. One artist reads from a giant pad of paper, ripping each page as the story unfolds. Another draws a love interest with a skin disease, his artistry projected on a screen above him. A woman wears a coat; a man wears a thong; a trumpeter blares staccato notes in an unknown key. BRAIN FRAME, you hear yourself intone. Expanded comics. Expanded minds.

Featuring:
Bill Cleveland
Krystal DiFronzo
Ian Endsley
Marieke McClendon
Otto Splotch
Jim Trainor

As well as live synth soundscapes by Tyson Torstenson.

IMPORTANT: Brain Frame has moved to a new location! This show will be at Heavy Gel, a new artists studio and resource center. Located on Lake Street around the corner from Western, it's a short walk from the Damen or California Green Line stops, or the Western or Damen bus lines. Street parking abounds.

Local bakery D-ology will be selling vegan, gluten-free, and non-considerate cookies, and BF alumni susan sarandon will be selling Brain Frame's first t-shirts. View the design here.

SATURDAY, MARCH 23RD, 8PM
2335 W LAKE ST, $7

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Aaron Renier and I designed this poster. You can view a larger version here. It's a hospital noir murder mystery. It begins in the upper left, where the 'Sapphic Slasher' breaks free, killing all her doctors. We can tell from the television in the nurse's lounge on the upper right that she was scheduled to receive a lobotomy. She ties up a nurse, stripping her and taking her clothes, then wanders into the cafeteria where she wreaks havoc, weilding a ketchup bottle like a prosthetic phallus, squirting ketchup all over the tables and floor. After that, she walks past the vending machine into her room, applies lipstick, then finds the Top Doc and, with a little wine and persuasion, leaves the woman naked and sated, smoking a cigarette on her desk. Next, she walks out into the lounge, scrawls names all over the window, and exits the building, escaping in Top Doc's red car.

All of this information and more is visible through careful inspection of this perspective-defying, bird's eye blueprint, Family Circus footstep method, insane print. Aaron and I developed the story and layout together, then he drew all the people and stuff, then I drew all the blood and shadows, composited and colored this poster. Then, last night, Andrew Ghrist and I printed it. If you come to the show, you can buy a copy for the one-time-only price of ten dollars.

For Purchase

I've opened an online shop. You can check it out here. Currently, merchandise includes heavy hitters like Compiled and Dock Ellis, and then a lot of posters including Go Down, Mr. Square, and Motion Sickness prints. More to come soon, including beautiful Risograph prints of Banana Glove Game.

But wait! There's more! All of the Brain Frame screen prints are ON SALE until this Saturday! Half-size posters are $15, full size $20, and the newest print, seen above, is only $10. This is not a joke. These are totally insane, totally limited edition, totally high quality prints that should be sold for at least $65 if there were any standards at all where art meets commerce. But hey, I'm broke too. Get them while the getting's good.