2023 in Review
Just a touch late, here is my annual “Year in Review” post where I give you (and myself, for that matter) a quick rundown of what I have been up to creatively and professionally over the last twelve months (Here are posts from 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022) in case you wanna jump in the time machine and see what I’ve been up to during the last decade or so… And also see me age in my photos!
Like 2015, the year I began doing these posts, 2023 was another one of those “pivotal life changes” moments for me: My partner C. and I finally decided to move out of the city and set up housekeeping in a lakeside cabin in the Laurentian Mountains, about an hour-and-a-half drive to the North of Montréal! It’s a very different lifestyle from the big city urban vibe we are both used to, but it is a change that we were definitely ready for and we’ve been so happy to be surrounded by the natural world (I’ve been posting some of our animal observations over on iNaturalist) and the changes of the season… Not to mention the joys of chilling on the dock all summer and jumping in for a swim in the lake whenever we want. I feel very, very lucky to be here. We’ve been renovating the house since we arrived in January 2023 and we’re far from finished… The great thing about that is you never have time to be bored!
Other than working on the house, I’ve been plenty busy with illustrations, comics, translation, and more this year… So without any further ado, let’s get into it!
Mes Lunettes Super Chouettes
In November of 2022 at Expozine (a very punk zine and comix fest in Montréal) I was approached by a tall, friendly guy named Hadi Barkat, who told me that he was the CEO of a Swiss publisher called Helvetiq and that he was looking for an artist on a kid’s book about glasses… Well, less than a year later the book is out in Europe! Available in both French (Mes lunettes super chouettes) and German (Brillante Brillen), the book, written by Swiss journalist Caroline Stevan, is an encyclopedic look at eyeglasses, vision, optics, and much more, full of fun facts, silly comics, and engaging games… Now if you don’t happen to parler français or sprechen Deutsch, I’ve got good news: Helvetiq will be releasing Extraordinary Eyeglasses in the USA on August 6, 2024!
Look Listen Learn: A Year of Noticing
Throughout the year I illustrated Look Listen Learn, a seasonal calendar that I created in collaboration with my friend, the author Jaimie Franchi. This project was a lot of fun, starting work on it coincided with my move to the woods, so the drawings were a great way to further connect with the land, plants, and animals all around me. All the money we raised through the project (and a bit more that I tossed on there) was donated to Nature Conservancy Canada, and I’m so proud that we were able to raise $500 to help preserve endangered ecosystems. I’m hoping to continue exercising this part of my creative brain in 2024, too!
“The People” in XINO
Speaking of collaborations, I had the interesting experience of writing a comic for another artist to draw, a first for me! The story in question, “The People,” was featured in the second issue of XINO, a new sci-fi anthology from Oni Press. This strange tale of life in the Palaeolithic Era was written by me, drawn by Artyom Trakhanov, colored by Jason Wordie, and lettered by Jim Campbell. The story will also be included in the upcoming collected edition of XINO, due in stores any day now (January 23, 2024) so make sure to grab it!
I’d had the kernel of “The People” percolating on the back burner for a couple years now, and I’m SO excited to have gotten to work with a real dream team to bring this to life. This comic is very “me” but it is also my fave collab I’ve done so far, it was a trip to let Artyom and Jason handle the art duties for a change but I couldn’t be happier with the amazing results… You can see a “making of” post I made about this project here. I can’t announce anything solid yet but there’s a pretty good chance we’ll be seeing more of the characters from this “excellent story” (Tegan O’Neil, The Comics Journal), so stay tuned for more news about “The People” down the line!
“The Bird is Gone” in NOW #12
Another appearance in an awesome anthology! I had a new version of my passenger pigeon story “The Bird is Gone” run in NOW #12, the wonderful series edited by Eric Reynolds. NOW ended up being nominated for an Ignatz Award!
“The Dogwalker” in Feathertale Review
One last little comic by me that was published in 2023! This quick and silly little comic marks my third time working with the fine folks at the Feathertale Review… always fun to find my work in their pages (or this time, as one of the dozens of individual postcards that made up their latest issue)! You can read the comic in all its glory here.
Translating Talli, Continued
Talli: Daughter of the Moon Vol. 2 by the wonderful Sourya came out in the fall from Oni Press. I was so happy to work with Sourya on this book, which I translated and lettered. Many thanks to editor Zack Soto for bringing me on board with this project, a wild, action-packed manga adventure about a young woman with great power fighting back against dark forces that want to wipe her and her kind from the face of the earth! I’m working with Sourya on the final touches on Vol. 3 as we speak, and that will be in shops next fall… Hopefully followed by two more volumes!
Collecting Buzzelli
I didn’t have a ton of book design or lettering projects come out in 2023 (some of the big ones I worked on, like the upcoming Boulet’s Notes and I’m Awful, Thanks by Lara Pickle, will see the light of day in 2024, and I already talked about Nick Cagnetti’s Pink Lemonade, which was collected in 2023, in last year’s recap), but I was delighted to work with my old friend Jason at Floating World Comics on The Labyrinth, the first volume of the Collected Buzzelli series, reprinting new translations of Guido Buzzelli’s amazing comics, originally released in Italian the 1970s. We have two more volumes of this series coming out soon, and it was a lot of fun to work on the series as a whole and create a consistent look for all of them… These are gonna look very nice on your bookshelf!
A Few Fun Drawings
A lot of my working hours were chewed up with bigger projects (especially Mes lunettes super chouettes, which I drew and designed in just a few hectic months!), but I did squeeze in a couple small illustration gigs for repeat clients with drawings in Montreal Review of Books, Maisonneuve, and THIS, all great Canadian magazines worth checking out!
Interviewing Los Bros Hernandez (and More)
Shifting to “creative-adjacent” projects, I love talking shop with comics creators, and I got to chat with two of my heroes, Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez in honor of the 40th anniversary of their seminal sci-fi/punk/indie/Latino/everything series Love & Rockets. I’ve been reading Los Bros’ work for about three decades now, and they had a HUGE influence on my view of what comics could be and what kind of stories the medium can encompass. As a young punk (and comics nerd, and mixed-race kid) coming of age in Southern California, their modern, multi-cultural, multi-genre stories really spoke to me, and solidified my burgeoning desire to create my own work in the medium (I also eventually went on to write my undergrad thesis on Jaime’s Locas stories). It was a real delight and an honor to talk with these comic book giants. You can read our full interview at Broken Frontier!
Some other fun interviews I conducted this year included hosting the “Greetings from Montréal” panel at TCAF with some of Montréal’s top creators (Lee Lai, Ariane Cloutier, Boum, Julie Delporte, and Tania Mignacca) and two round-table discussions at MCAF: Sympathy for the Devil (video) with Aisha Franz, Walter Scott and Joe Ollmann, and Drawing Inspiration (video) with Fábio Moon, Sara Alfageeh and Cole Pauls (those two panels can be watched in full on MCAF’s YouTube channel, links above). And finally I’ll mention I put on my “creator” hat to be one of the inaugural guests (along with Chris Bergeron) at the new literary salon “Livre and Let Livre,” hosted live in Montréal by authors Michelle Franklin and Sylvain Neuvel… It was a ton of fun!
Promoting Pow Pow Press
The main “creative-adjacent” gig that I did in 2023 was working part-time as the “Marketing Manager” (ooh, fancy) at Pow Pow Press, the English-language branch of the folks who published my graphic novel TITAN in French. As is probably obvious, one of the most rewarding feelings for me is helping other creators out, whether that means designing book covers or running a comic book festival… So it’s been a pure pleasure to work with the Pow Pow team to get these amazing books from Québecois authors into the hands of readers in the USA and beyond. In 2023 the Pow Pow Press backlist started being distributed in American comic books shops via Lunar Distribution, and we had a major new title come out in November: Naked: The Confessions of a Normal Woman by Éloïse Marseille, which was named one of CBC Books’ “Best Canadian Comics of 2023”, hit the #1 spot in “Hot New Releases in Nonfiction Graphic Novels” on Amazon.ca, and has been hailed as “a memoir that’s as honest as they come… deeply engaging and beautifully made” (Mike Donachie, The Toronto Sun). I’m really stoked for everything Pow Pow Press has acheved so far, and 2024 is promising to be a HUGE year for the press with upcoming releases like Botanica Drama by Thom, The Jellyfish by Boum, and The Mongoose by Jonna Mosi… It’s gonna be a banger!
What about Blue Moon?
Once again I’ve managed to push work on Blue Moon (my upcoming graphic novel) back, usually to make room for more pressing contracts and deadlines, and I just agreed to another couple of projects in 2024 that will eat up a lot of my time, but I WILL be making more time for MY book in 2024, too! I have finally started actually drawing Blue Moon and so far I’m really loving the way it looks, and feel more energized and inspired to get back to the grind on it… I’m excited to see where I will be with this project at the end of 2024!
What’s to Come in 2024?
As per usual, I will be working on a range of projects throughout the year: I am scheduled to illustrate another kid’s book/comic book with La Pastèque (the folks who published 13e avenue) and hand-letter a big graphic novel, so those two projects will take up much of my work year (not to mention Blue Moon). But I am also definitely still open to taking on new gigs (I’m a glutton for punishment, if you’ve got a project that’s a good fit (design, translation, illustration) for me don’t hesitate to get in touch). I’ve also been feeling a desire to incorporate a more tactile, physical element into my art practice, such as getting back into printmaking (I was definitely inspired by a recent trip to Oaxaca). Stay tuned in the coming year to see if I succeed in that!
As I mentioned, I have a bunch of projects I was involved in one way or the other that will be published in 2024, including the collected edition of XINO (out in January), Lara Pickle’s I Feel Awful, Thanks (which I lettered, out next March), Buzzelli Collected Works Vol. 2 (out in June), Boulet’s Notes (which I edited, translated, lettered, and designed!) hitting stores in July, the English edition of Extraordinary Eyeglasses (out in August), Talli Vol. 3 (also out in August), a couple things I can’t talk about yet, and probably some things I’m forgetting about! Phew!
As always, thanks so much for your interest in what I am doing and your support! Best wishes to you for a happy, healthy, and productive 2024!