Giant Robot Store and GR2 News
James Kochalka at GRNY, February 17 – March 14 Reception: Saturday, February 17, 6:30 pm – 10:00 pm Giant Robot Gallery 437 East 9th Street Between 1st Ave. & Ave. A, in the East Village New York, New York 10009 (212) 674-GRNY (4769) / grny.net Giant Robot is proud to present Little Paintings by James Kochalka at GRNY. Indie cartoonist James Kochalka is well-known for having a raw, humorous, and powerful style and prolific pace; he draws one diary strip a day for his Web site, and still manages to create an ever-growing catalog of graphic novels. His range extends from the autobiographical (American Elf) to kid-friendly (Peanutbutter & Jeremy) to serious (The Cute Manifesto) to raunchy (SuperF*ckers) to iconic (Monkey vs. Robot). His comix work has won four Ignatz awards and one Harvey award. He is widely regarded as the inventor of the daily-diary comic strip, and has inspired countless younger artists. Kochalka has also released several CDs with his band, James Kochalka Superstar. His song “Britney’s Silver Can” was named one of the 100 best songs of 2006 by Rolling Stone, and his song “Hockey Monkey” is being used as the theme song to new Fox television sitcom, The Loop. For the art show, Kochalka is making 150 acrylic 2″ by 2″ paintings on 3″ by 3″ paper. Subject matter will feature cats, monkeys, monsters, self-portraits of himself as an elf, and creatures “inspired by classic videogame characters like the ghosts in Pac-Man or the aliens in Galaxians or Galaga.” The multitude of pieces will not be framed but are quite suitable for framing. A reception for the artist will be held from 6:30 to 10:00 on Saturday, February 17. For more information about Kochalka, GRNY, or Giant Robot magazine, please contact GRNY.
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Tonite also GRSF’s show – over 100 drawings.
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Some pics from the GRLA show tonite! That’s Albert Reyes’s “house”
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The inside page of the Paper mag is a page about the panel discussion I participated in as part of Paper mag when they came through LA. It was about art magazines which was moderated by the great Carlo McCormick. I didn’t sift through every page, but they nicely marked a page for me, and it’s pretty small mention for having a name on the cover. Nothing too exciting to report, so it’s still a mystery.
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This one gets a post all it’s own. Thanks for writing. I think Japanese magazines have a look that’s all their own. Sure there’s great examples of cluttered, and it’s a place where their Kanji text looks like a logo every time it’s used in a headline. I think if you look at the weekly mags, they look just as bad as US Weekly. Cluttered, packed with junk, and so on. It’s about the content and that has to be done quick. But then take a look at Brutus, it’s a bit cluttered, but the work that goes into that editorial is amazing. It’s a bundle of content, for a low price, and it’s decently done. Relax magazine was once the gold standard for nice magazines in Japan. Clean layout, great images, awesome content, and I could hardly read it. It’s done like a design magazine. Casa Brutus, another fine example of a nicely done magazine. These aren’t indie magazine operations, these are funded and are owned by large publishing houses. They have ads, they make their money, and the design doesn’t suffer. I think there’s plenty of ads in Japan, it just depends on which magazines and so on. I think part of what you see here isn’t the creme of the crop… unless you dig a bit. It’s fun to see the magazines like Cutie which do the street snap photos. Why can’t they do that in the US? They shouldn’t. It would be filled with crappy photos. The kids in Japan, spend a lot on their gear if they’re in certain areas and they always look good. Catalogs are another story. I guess I don’t really look at catalogs, except Muji. Those catalogs are quite nice. It’s like a treat when I can grab one. umeboshi onigiri said… Speaking about catalogs, I’ve alwaysliked looking at catalogs from allover the world, (when I canfind them). It’s interesting for meto see the difference in layouts,products, ads, etc.The same formagazines, I’ve always liked scanningthe mag stands looking for newor different magazines. I’ve always noticed that manytimes catalog and magazinedesigns from Japan look cluttered.Compared to a western magazine,it might have 3 times more productsshown on a page. I feel sorry forthe proof reader. And then thereseems to be a lot less ads.How do they survive without ads?When my Japanese friendslook at a western magazine orcatalog, they tell me that theylook sparse and have too manyads. So from the design standpoint,is it a cultural perception aboutwhat a magazine should look like?,is it a matter of economics?,a perception of how space shouldbe used? Design is so importantto Japan, I’ve always just wonderedwhy it looks like not much attentionis put into the design of theirmagazines and catalogs.
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