August Recap – Monachopsis, art book, Hiver Nucléaire omnibus

Recap

Hello little birdies! Whew, what a month. What a weird month. While scrolling online, I stumbled upon the word monachopsis. It’s a made-up term describing the feeling of being out of place, a little off. For some reason, it always kicks in the summer for me. Right now, some of my fall projects are being pushed back so I’m just kind of idling. Anyway! I love made up words so of course I bought The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows as soon as I found out about it. What can I say, I embrace my true emo self!

The Hiver Nucléaire collected edition is DONE and sent to the printer. It’s gonna look amazing! The book contains all three volumes plus a sequel that only appeared in a collective in 2012, and a whole new cover. All the pages were relettered and remastered as well so it is going to feel like an improvement over the original release. It might be my most luxurious book so far? It has FLAPS! Did I become a superstar overnight?! I’ve been posting some of the best artwork and old teaser posters on Patreon because I think they’re still pretty great. I’ll announce the release date when I can but it’s coming in October for sure!

The Prévost comic book festival was the summer’s last event. It’s more or less my crowd and market, but I got to meet really nice people in a wonderful setting. I’m pleasantly surprised at how popular Camp Spirit is, even after all these years. It’s a great book, so no wonder!

August 12 is a special day for book shops across Quebec so I made a drawing of Craig, Utown’s most educated punk. The original drawing has text but I decided to retouch it for the fun of it. Maybe a print will happen? I dunno why I like this drawing so much but I do.

I also drew some good summer outfits. I really missed doing this kind of exercise. Notice how I’m turning into a blouse lady.

Sketches! So many sketches! I’m working on a new sketchbook/artbook and gathering drawings on scraps of paper, margin doodles, discarded sketchbooks and other scribbles. Scanning and cleaning inked drawing is honestly one of the things I love the most. It’s so zen! I feel like I’m part scavenger, part archivist and part scrapbook artist. I’ll try and get the book done before Expozine in November. 

Announcements

And while I’m working on a new artbook, it’s still possible to get the one I made in 2018. Since I’m slowly running out of physical copies, I made a nice PDF and put it up on sale on Gumroad for five bucks. You can get it here. I’ll announce the 2022 artbook as soon as I schedule a print run.

That’s all for now. See you next month! In the meantime, keep your eyes peeled for the austice.

Cool stuff!

On the little screen:

• Rewatching What we do in the Shadows (the TV show). Might be in my top 5 comedies of all time. 
• Sandman is hitting all the right buttons: high collars, talking ravens, brooding protagonist, magic and y’know, Lucifer.
• Architects take a look at houses from different TV shows. Or the importance of set/background design, in TV or in comics, as a mean to tell a story!
• Stay on Board, a documentary about pro skater Leo Baker. It’s about what happens when you have to navigate between being your true self and doing what you love the most. Truly inspiring.

In my ears:

• Thrift shop finds of the month: Tracy Chapman, The Verve, R.E.M and Tori Amos. Music my dad listened to, music that always makes me feel good. 
• It’s Bandcamp Friday tomorrow, so consider supporting bands that you like, if they’re on there. Here are my recent purchases!

Some reads: 

• Glénat re-edited Ranma ½ in double-volume books and I finally gave in. This manga was hugely influential for me as a teen. My only complaint is how utterly, painfully French the translation is. 
• Why don’t Millenials have any hobbies? I have side hustles to side hustles, so I totally get this article. That’s kinda why I picked up film photography last year. There’s no money in this (yet).

Cool artists:

Speaking of photography, I found out about C’est Paulette, a local collective of designers and photographers. They also run an analog photo store/community called Club Photo 35. I went to visit their space last saturday and bought a new camera (it wasn’t supposed to happen!) Plus they’re really friendly!