New guests announced add a Hollywood flare to comiCulture.
comiCulture is pleased to announce the addition of Cinzia Angelini and Matt Mogk to the roster of special guests. Angelini is an animator and story artist who has worked on such films as Minions, Spider-Man 2, and Bolt. Her presentation is titled “The World of Animation: A Glimpse Behind the Scenes.” Mogk has been described as the leading global authority on all things zombies. He is a cast member of AMC’s “Talking Dead,” the live after-show of “The Walking Dead,” and he has also been featured on television networks National Geographic Channel, History Channel, and Spike. Both Angelini and Mogk live in Los Angeles.
Val Mayerik, co-creator of “Howard the Duck,” to participate in comiCulture
comiCulture is thrilled to announce that Val Mayerik will join the event on Sept. 26 as a special guest. Born in Youngstown, Ohio, Mayerik got his first assignment at Marvel Comics with a series featuring the barbarian Thongor. From there, he went on to illustrate the classic monster series of the Frankenstein Monster and the Living Mummy and was the co-creator of Howard the Duck. He has worked for almost every major comic book publisher. Since the 90’s, Mayerik has done most of his work in the advertising industry, but he has recently been inspired to come back to the world of comics. Following a successful Kickstarter campaign, he is currently working on Of Dust and Blood, an original graphic novel about Little Big Horn. He is also illustrating an upcoming story in the comic series Angel Punk. Mayerik also paints western art and is an avid horseman.
comiCulture announces special guest Randy Duncan
comiCulture is pleased to announce that noted comics scholar Randy Duncan will join the ranks of the comiCulture guests. Dr. Duncan is professor of communication at Henderson State University in Arkadelphia, Ark. He is co-author, with Matthew J. Smith, of The Power of Comics: History, Form and Culture (Continuum 2009) and co-editor, with Smith, of the Eisner-nominated Critical Approaches to Comics: Theories and Methods (Routledge 2011) and the Icons of the American Comic Book (Greenwood Press 2013). He is co-author, with Michael Ray Taylor and David Stoddard, of Creating Comics as Journalism, Memoir and Nonfiction (Routledge 2015). Dr. Duncan is co-founder, with Peter Coogan, of the Comics Arts Conference. In 2009 Duncan received the Inge Award for Outstanding Comics Scholarship. In 2012 he received the Inkpot Award for Achievement in Comics Arts.
Skateboard Art
We’r
e working hard to schedule an amazing lineup of educational and fun activities for comiCulture 2015. One such planned session is the Skateboard Art afternoon workshop. In this program, guests will be able to create a work of art, led under the direction of international artists Beto Janz (b. 1981) and Daniel Amora Mora (b.1987). Scores of broken skateboards have been collected, and prior to the workshop, the artists will rework them with designs, many based on the symposium’s theme of “mortality.” Janz, a Brazilian artist working in Toronto, Canada, will create pieces based on his 2010 series “Broken Decks / SKULLS.” For this project, he fashioned split skateboard halves into skull-like forms, which he placed around the Brazilian city of Curitiba in a guerrilla marketing-style effort to promote a local skateboard shop. Amora Mora, a practicing printmaker and painter from southern Baja California, Mexico, envisions the skateboards as matrices for woodcuts. Using traditional printmaking tools, he will carve patterns into the wood. Participants of the event will then have the opportunity to paint onto the prepared boards, and then at the end of the activity they will be able to take the works home. Space for this workshop is limited to the number of broken skateboards we have on hand. Bringing a broken deck of your own will guarantee your spot.
Beto Janz
Danial Amora Mora
Save the Date!
comiCulture, a biannual comic and pop culture educational symposium at the University of Houston-Clear Lake returns September 25-26. Stay tuned for details!
comiCulture 