We're really honored to feature Craig Thompson. Craig is arguably one of the best cartoonists of his generation. In addition to having sold tons of books, he's also got a beautiful way with words and pictures and has garnered the appreciation of hundreds and thousands of people, including a lot of artists.

So, it's wonderful to sit down with him, and it was really kind of a shock to hear him name me as one of his early inspirations; that's very kind. And Craig also expands the web by mentioning some other people at the end of this interview that we should be contacting.

But more importantly, I want to talk about how that web expanded, because we went to a little, not only out of the way, but sort of secret cafe in Providence, Rhode Island to film this interview. It's surrounded by artist lofts, and we hadn't even started yet, and we're filming outside, and a woman, Claire, came up to us and we had her ask the questions because she was interested in what we were doing.

By the tail end of this interview, and especially after the interview, we realized that Claire was deeply interested in these values. So much so that she was probably living them more than Craig or I. She and her partner, Femi, who also appeared for a few moments in the interview, have an art studio nearby where they host events and have art shows, and Claire, for instance, hates Instagram had some things to say about the soothing scrolling that is hurting her generation.

And way more interestingly., the way you find out about events in their art studio is, you have to call their landline, which is a rotary phone. And so we were really happy to connect with artists almost half our age, who really believed in the value of face-to-face contact and walking across town or walking from town to town, and reaching out the slow way, and the the mindful way and also the cumbersome way.

We were really honored to to be speaking with them. It's in the interest of connecting all these generations that these oral histories have been started and preserved.

So, I want to thank Claire and Femi, and I also want to thank Craig for sitting down with us, and thank what's left of the really interesting parts of Providence, Rhode Island for being there, and the secret cafe and everything else have a listen.

Thanks!

Byron Black is a cartoonist known for his contributions to the National Fantasy Fan Federation, and for his own creation: The Steppenwolf Chronicles.

The 90s Mini Comics Oral History aims to collect the stories of ANYONE who made self-published mini-comics in the roughly 10 years before the broad acceptance of the internet (the 90’s, give or take.)

Eli Bishop is a writer, illustrator, and actor based in San Francisco. His stories center on regular life, monsters, healthcare, dreams, depression, and dinosaurs. You can find more of Eli at his website and Instagram: http://errorbar.net/ https://www.instagram.com/error.bar

The 90s Mini Comics Oral History aims to collect the stories of ANYONE who made self-published mini-comics in the roughly 10 years before the broad acceptance of the internet (the 90’s, give or take.)

Liz Prince is an American comics creator, noted for her sketchbook-style autobiographical comics. Prince initially started publishing on her own on the internet and later became a published author with Top Shelf Comics publishing her first graphic novel "Would You Still Love Me if I Wet the Bed?" which earned her an Ignatz Award.

Thanks so much for listening!

The 90s Mini Comics Oral History aims to collect the stories of ANYONE who made self-published mini-comics in the roughly 10 years before the broad acceptance of the internet (the 90’s, give or take.)

Chetan Patel is a Toronto based creator who started his mini comics in the early 1990’s. And continues to create his own comics today.

Links:www.tictoctom.com

https://www.instagram.com/tictoctom

https://youtube.com/@geekshop.2814?si=y0ok9eU17wz1R64g

Thanks so much for listening!

The 90s Mini Comics Oral History aims to collect the stories of ANYONE who made self-published mini-comics in the roughly 10 years before the broad acceptance of the internet (the 90’s, give or take.)

Vjeran Pavlaković is a historian and professor in the Department of Cultural Studies at the University of Rijeka. He received his doctorate in 2005 at the University of Washington. He lives in Zagreb, Croatia. In the 90s and early 2000s, Vjeran created mini-comics and zines under the name "Verno the Inferno". He is also a contributer to the alternative comics publisher Komikaze. Thanks so much for listening!

The 90s Mini Comics Oral History aims to collect the stories of ANYONE who made self-published mini-comics in the roughly 10 years before the broad acceptance of the internet (the 90’s, give or take.)

Jessica Abel is cartoonist, author, and creative coach known for her extensive contributions to the comics world. From mini-comics such as Art Babe, to longer format comics such as La Perdida, as well as two textbooks about making comics, Abel has been a notable name in the comics community since the 90s when she began making minis.

The 90s Mini Comics Oral History aims to collect the stories of ANYONE who made self-published mini-comics in the roughly 10 years before the broad acceptance of the internet (the 90’s, give or take.)

Leela Corman is a painter, educator, and graphic novel creator, working in the realm of diaspora Ashkenazi culture. third-generation restorative work, and New York City history.

Her books include the graphic novels Victory Parade, a story about WWII, women's wrestling, and the astral plane over Buchenwald (Schocken/Pantheon, 2024), Unterzakhn (Schocken/Pantheon, 2012), which was nominated for the Eisner, the L.A. Times Book Award, and Le Prix Artemisia, and won the ROMICS Prize for Best Anglo-American Comic and the MoCCA Award of Excellence, and the short comics collections You Are Not A Guest (Field Mouse Press, 2023) and We All Wish For Deadly Force (Retrofit/Big Planet, 2016). Her short comics have appeared in The Believer Magazine, Nautilus, The Nib, Bandcamp, and other publications. She is a founding instructor at Sequential Artists Workshop, a Yaddo Fellow, a MacDowell Fellow, and the recipient of the Xeric Grant, the Sustainable Arts Foundation Grant, the Helix Fellowship, the Koyama Provides Grant, and the 2024 New Jewish Culture Fellowship. Raised in New York City, she now lives in Providence, Rhode Island, where she is an assistant professor at Rhode Island School of Design. http://www.leelacorman.com

Bluesky: @leelacorman.bsky.social

Instagram: @leelacorman

Art:

http://www.leelacorman.com/

Support Her Work:

https://www.patreon.com/leela

Order her books:

https://www.fieldmouse.press/shop/p/you-are-not-a-guest

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/552601/victory-parade-by-leela-corman/

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/32003/unterzakhn-by-leela-corman/

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The 90s Mini Comics Oral History aims to collect the stories of ANYONE who made self-published mini-comics in the roughly 10 years before the broad acceptance of the internet (the 90’s, give or take.)