The Trees & Hills comics group will celebrate the end of a long winter this year by hitting the road for a spring tour.

   The 2008 SPRING THAW TOUR features the debut of several new comics by members of Trees & Hills and a chance to meet with local comic fans and other creators.

   Trees & Hills members will appear at two conventions in New Hampshire in May before trekking out to New York City for the MoCCA festival in June. [Read more →]

Center For Cartoon Studies
Commencement Ceremony: Saturday, May 17, 11am
Thesis Exhibition: May 17 - June 21

The Center for Cartoon Studies Commencement Ceremony takes place on Saturday, May 17 at 11am at Northern Stage in White River Junction, Vermont. This year’s commencement speaker is Alison Bechdel, critically acclaimed author of graphic memoir, Fun Home.

Thesis Exhibition: Opening Reception is Saturday, May 17, immediately following the Commencement Ceremony. The exhibition will run Saturday, May 17 thru Saturday June 21; it will be open to the public Monday thru Saturday, 10am - 4pm. Graduating seniors will be exhibiting their thesis projects, including preview pages of completed and to-be-completed graphic novels, short stories, visual narratives, and mini comic series. The Center for Cartoon Studies Gallery is located at 94 South Main Street, in the Colodny building.

It’s time once again for Hourly Comic Day! On February 1, cartoonists around the world will draw a journal comic for each hour they are awake. Here’s the skinny from Hourly Comic inventor John Campbell:

“THE GUIDELINES:

-for every hour that you are awake on february first (that’s february first for whatever time zone you happen to be in), you make a comic describing something about the past hour. maybe you ate some cereal? maybe you used the restroom?

-say you wake up at 7am. make a comic some time before it becomes 8am! then after 8am, make a comic before it becomes 9am! it is pretty simple.

-when you are done, scan the comics in and post them on the message board (this year’s will be HERE, and previous years went HERE and HERE.) , so we can all look at each other’s days. i think that will be neat!”

Western Massachusetts cartoonist Hilary Price will present her new book Pithy Seedy Juicy Pulpy at Broadside Books in Northampton, MA at 7pm on Tuesday, January 22. The book compiles many of her syndicated Rhymes With Orange strips, along with a mighty multitude of extras.

The Trees & Hills Comics Distro is under reconstruction; unrelated troubles caused some delays, but I’m hoping to have it finished and up to date soon (maybe within a week or so). When that’s done, I’ll begin work on the main site. Marek Bennett has been bubbling and frothing (so to speak) with blogging ideas, so the new, not-yet-entirely-settled-upon look will be more of a change than originally planned. If you have any suggestions, send them to treesandhills at gmail dot org.

Megan Baehr also recently redesigned her website, hopping on the WordPress bandwagon. Where will this madness end?!

The Stars & Skulls Crafty Craft Fair (in Holyoke, MA Dec. 2) was fun, and I sold a decent amount of comics. Nice people fed me weird chocolates, and other nice people fed me soup. I saw three mohawks, two of which appear below (the little kid wandered off too quickly). Here are some sketches from that day, for those of you who weren’t there:

I don’t have a camera, but I’ve finally starting sketching from life somewhat regularly, so here are some drawings from the New Stars release party at Comic Boom. We have: pastries Dan Barlow brought (sent by Phayvanh Luekhamhan), Marek Bennett making music, the Sputnik pinata, and Comic Boom owner Corey Milotte doing important work.

Presenting some unofficial PHOTOS from the event!

Here, Colin & Megan deal with a big crowd around the display table…

And here, the chief architects of the Trees and Hills Sputnik Project reveal their handiwork to the press. The elegant basketball-sized device boasts a gleaming aluminum coating, and a core of unknown composition, possibly enriched candy.

Thanks to Keene’s own COMIC BOOM for hosting the event!

Moving on from the release party (though photos & sketches should appear at some point), Trees & Hills will have a table at the Stars & Skulls Crafty Craft Fair Saturday, December 1 from 10am-5pm at the American Legion Hall, 162 Russell St., Hadley, MA. Anne Thalheimer and (I think) E.J. Barnes will also have tables.