Our “Recent & Regional” sidebar feature (formerly “Blogs du Jour,” seen at right on the main page of the site) gathers blog post headlines from our regions’s cartoonists and other comics-related folk into one convenient place. The list of feeds it draws from had gotten terribly out of date, but I’ve just updated it – so feast on the wealth of news, thoughts, and art! I finally found a great plugin to replace Google Reader for the job, which will make it easier to keep the feed list up to date (and removed that annoying background display issue that happened to Reader). Who knows – the future might hold more overdue website refurbishing!

24-Hour Comics was a huge success again this year in Montpelier, Vt, as about 20 cartoonists, artists and illustrators camped out in Montpelier City Hall from Oct. 1-2. Not everyone made it to page 24, although we had several people drawing comics up until the last minute.

Selections from the comics will be on display at Bagitos Bagel and Burrito Cafe in Montpelier starting this Friday as part of the city’s Art Walk event. But there was such demand to read the whole comics, so we decided to share them all with you here in PDF format. Enjoy!

Ari Elbaum

Brian Ziegler

Daniel Robert Walbridge

Denis St. John

Ed Epstein (part 1)

Ed Epstein (part 2)

Emery Brush (part 1)

Emery Brush (part 2)

Genoa H. Scherbatskoy

Ira Black Shadis

Jeff Potter

Kirsten Edey

Liz Walsh

Neil Flanders (part 1)

Neil Flanders (part 2)

Pam Watts

Phayvanh Luekhamhan

Radical Warren (part 1)

Radical Warren (part 2)

Colin Tedford

Just a reminder that submissions to our next anthology WOODS are due August 28!

This past Friday morning Mark “Sparky” Whitcomb, whose work appeared in PLAY and TIME, died peacefully at age 54 after a long illness. Calling hours will be held at the Knight Funeral Home (93 Hartford Ave., White River Jct., VT) on Monday night, April 25th, from 6-8 PM, followed by a celebration of Mark’s life from 8-9 PM. Please bring any memories or photos you’d be willing to share. Donations can be made to Bayada Hospice, PO Box 1590, Norwich, VT 05055. You can read more about Mark at the permanent memorial page that Stephen Bissette has posted.

Trees & Hills will have a table at the third Maine Comics Arts Festival!

May 22, 10:00 AM – 5:00 PM
Ocean Gateway Building, Thames St, Portland, ME

The Maine Comics Arts Festival (MECAF) celebrates the wonderful world of comic books, comic strips, graphic novels, web comics and more. The festival will feature a wide variety of comic creators, writers, artists and publishers. Located in the beautiful Ocean Gateway Building on the shores of Casco Bay in Portland, Maine. Presented by Casablanca Comics.

Admission: $5 (kids 12 & under free)

More info: www.mainecomicsfestival.com

We are finally upgrading our WordPress installation, so things may go wonky for a bit, but should thereafter be better than ever. Wish us luck!

EDIT (1/2 hour later): Updated & looking good so far! Someday we’ll give this site a proper overhaul, but at least now it’ll run a little smoother behind the scenes.

New England group tackles housing issues with new comic anthology

Trees & Hills comic group releases SHELTER this week at major comic festival

MONTPELIER, Vt. – The Trees & Hills comic group believes everyone needs a home.

And this week the New England comic organization releases “Shelter,” a new comic anthology featuring more than a dozen cartoonists from Vermont, New Hampshire and western Massachusetts writing and drawing about why we need homes and what happens when you don’t have one.

Topics of the comics include alternative living structures and how one of the most basic needs of a society may be moving further out of reach for many people. Twenty-five percent of all sales for the $4 comic will be donated to organizations that work to get people into homes.

“We wanted to take the next step beyond just making comics about an issue that is important to us to actually trying to help,” said Colin Tedford, one of the co-founders of Trees & Hills. “Both methods of social change can be equally effective.”

Trees & Hills formed in 2006 after Tedford, a New Hampshire cartoonist, met Daniel Barlow, a Vermont writer, at a 24-Hour comic event, a unique challenge that has participants create a 24-page comic in 24 consecutive hours. More than 50 comic creators turned out for the event, held at a museum in Brattleboro, Vt.

“Turns out there were a lot of people right in my own backyard making comics,” said Barlow. “Colin and I both realized that we could all benefit from working together.

SHELTER is a follow-up to 2008’s comic anthology, SEEDS, which tackled the topic of food – including social issues, such as eating local and healthy (but also how yummy it can be too). The comic was an instant success and is nearly sold out of its second printing.

SHELTER debuts at the Small Press Expo in Bethesda, Maryland on Sept. 25-26. Following the show, the 52-page comic will be available for sale at the organization’s Web site, www.treesandhills.org.

The comic features a cover by Matthew Young, a graduate of the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, Vt. and contributions from Ignatz Award nominees Colleen Frakes and Cayetano Garza Jr.

Other creators in the comic are Marek Bennett, Anne Thalheimer, Jesse DuRona, Tom Pappalardo, Sam Leveillee, Madsahara, Blake Parker and Matt Levin. Tedford, Barlow and Thalheimer served as editors.

TREES & HILLS COMIC GROUP RELEASES FIRST BOOK
“First Harvest” debuts this week at major indie show in New York City

MONTPELIER, Vt. – Trees & Hills comic group releases its first book collection of comics this week at the MoCCA Arts Festival in New York City.

“First Harvest: Trees & Hills comics volume one” features more than 150 pages of cartoons from two dozen creators in Vermont, New Hampshire and western Massachusetts.

The book contains reader favorites from Trees & Hills’ first four mini-comic anthologies, published between Fall 2006 and Summer 2008, along with new work by creators in the New England region. Contributors include industry legends such as Stephen R. Bissette and Mark Martin and up-and-coming talent like Colleen Frakes and Marek Bennett.

“There’s some amazing work in here and we’re proud to put it in book form where it will remain in print,” said Dan Barlow, a Vermont writer and the co-founder of Trees & Hills. “These are the roots of the Trees & Hills comic group and they are strong.”

“First Harvest” will be available on June 6 & 7 at the Trees & Hills table at the MoCCA Arts Festival. The book features a color cover by Vermont artist Megan Baehr and will sell for $10. The book will also be available to purchase from the Trees & Hills Web site one week after the show.

Trees & Hills comic group formed in 2006 with the mission of developing a strong community among cartoonists and other comic creators in Vermont, New Hampshire and western Massachusetts.

Last year, the group published the successful “Seeds: An Anthology of Comics About Food” mini-comic, featuring comics about nutrition, eating organic and local and alternative food lifestyles. “Seeds” sold out just months after the debut and is now in its second printing.

Copies of “Seeds” will also be available at MoCCA this week. The $5 comic comes with a recipe booklet and a packet of organic seeds from a Vermont farm.

New Hampshire cartoonist and Trees & Hills co-founder Colin Tedford said the publication of “Seeds” last year has inspired the group to a new focus on socially-progressive comic anthologies. “First Harvest” closes the door on the first chapter of the group, he explained.

“Each new anthology we produced marked a progression, but Seeds was a real turning point for us – we realized, ‘This is what we need to do,’” Tedford said. “First Harvest is a record of where we’ve been. It feels good to have that, where a few years ago there was no such thing.”

Fall 2009 sees the release of “Shelter,” a new Trees & Hills mini-comic anthology focusing on issues of housing and homes. The comic will debut at the Small Press Expo in Maryland on Sept. 26.

“First Harvest” contributors include Megan Baehr, Matt Levin, Chris Grotke, Matthew Reidsma, Anne Thalheimer, Mark Martin, Bryan Stone, Colleen Frakes, Morgan Pielli, Stephen R. Bissette, Daniel Bissette, Meagan Frappiea, Colin Tedford, Keith Moriarty, Blake Parker, Benjamin Kalish, Miles Cota, Ray Prado, M.R. Wilson, Bill Couture, Marek Bennett, Jade Harmon, Mark Gonyea, Jennifer Omand, Matthew Young, Tim Hulsizer, Cayetano Garza Jr. and Gregory Giordano.

For more information, visit www.treesandhills.org

1. The Keene Sentinel recently published a nice article about Trees & Hills, which has apparently been picked up by some other New Hampshire papers as well. EDIT: Arg, it’s behind a subscription wall now! I’ll see if i can get a copy to post.

2. Center For Cartoon Studies Fellow Alec Longstreth describes his current business model and the rationale behind it.

2a. Friend of T&H Matthew Reidsma discusses Alec’s post and his own experience.

3. Matt Reidsma posts the first part of his interview with T&H dynamo Marek Bennett. EDIT: Part 2 is up.

Enjoy!