Your Guide to the World of Furry Fandom
Also at WonderCon we met an artist who works under the name Sprinklebat. Here’s another creator who (as you see on their web site) offers their works on a variety of pins, stickers, prints, and other products you can wear or display. In this case, those works tend to feature cute chibi characters with Really Big Eyes. Go ahead, look. You will be drawn in. Trust us.
image c. 2019 by Sprinklebat
And another artist from WonderCon. Crowlines is a crafter from San Diego who specializes in terribly (that means wonderfully) chibi funny animals on pins, keychains, and other useful goodies. So head on over to their Etsy store and check out their latest wares. You’ll see what we mean.
image c. 2019 by Crowlines
Another artist we ran into at WonderCon: Denae Frazier. She does fine art and pin-ups on many subjects both fannish and “mundane”, but what really caught our eye right off the bat was her affinity for both Disney’s Stitch (of Lilo & Stitch) and Dreamworks’ Toothless (of How to Train Your Dragon)… individually, and together! (Has she met Chris Sanders? Probably!) In fact she’s complete so many pictures of those two together that she created a calendar for 2020 featuring those prints. Check out her web site to see those and more.
image c. 2019 by Denae Frazier
You may recall about three years ago when we introduced you to Charles Thurston and his hand-made books for young kids, introducing them to various nerdy topics and story settings. Well we ran into Mr. Thurston at WonderCon and discovered his latest project: Detailed artwork created entirely with hand-cut pieces of paper. A very, very time-consuming way to create — and he does it well. Fortunately for us, many of his works are also available in less-fragile print versions. Visit his web site to see what we mean.
image c. 2019 by Charles Thurston
Another new project we found out about thanks to Animation World Network: “Jessy and Nessy is a 40 x 11’ mixed-media preschool series about Jessy, an innately curious little girl and her best friend, Nessy, a five-and-a-half-thousand year old sea monster, with a penchant for pickles… At the heart of the show is Jessy; an inquisitive, fun loving, spectacle wearing six-year-old, who happens to see the world a little differently through her magical glasses, or as Jessy calls them — her ‘Inspectacles’. They allow Jessy to see and talk to all types of animated characters, including Nessy, who lives in a fountain in Cara Park opposite Jessy’s apartment building. Together this unlikely duo explore life’s curiosities like why birds fly south, why things don’t fall up instead of down and even why some people snore? Jessy and Nessy reveal how all these seemingly everyday curiosities have fantastical answers — leading the home viewer to explore their own curiosities and to find the extraordinary in the ordinary.” Look for the new show later this year on Amazon Prime Video.
image c. 2019 JAM Media
Somehow we missed this last year: Plush, a new full-color comic miniseries from Antarctic Press, written and illustrated by Holly Daughtrey. “Carrie, a crafty plushie maker and artist has lost a great deal in her life, but she’s coping with the help of her late mother’s gift: A special cat plush that suddenly comes to life one night to help. Yet not everything seems right. Is this truly magic? Or is it all in her head?” Check out the preview pages over at Antarctic.
image c. 2019 Antarctic Press
So Animation World Network recently brought us a big announcement from the folks at Warner Brothers. Here’s the highlights: “Bugs Bunny! Daffy Duck! The Looney Tunes are back! The classic Warner Bros. Animation characters return in Looney Tunes Cartoons, a series of new shortform cartoons debuting at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival, which runs this year June 10-15. The next chapter of the iconic Looney Tunes story, featuring a cartoonist-driven approach to storytelling, will have its world debut on Monday, June 10, as part of the Opening Ceremony festivities, with Looney Tunes Cartoons shorts playing in front of the previously announced opening film, Playmobil: The Movie… Looney Tunes Cartoons is a series of new short form cartoons starring the iconic and beloved Looney Tunes characters. With a crew of some of the premiere artists working in animation today, each ‘season’ will produce 1,000 minutes of all-new Looney Tunes animation that will be distributed across multiple platforms — including digital, mobile and broadcast.” We’ll see how things work out this time. We know from several recent attempts at “new” Looney Tunes that the old Warner Brothers magic is hard to recreate — especially the timing. Stay tooned.
image c. 2019 Warner Brothers
Wow — it’s been more than a year since we first mentioned Tuca & Bertie, the new adult animated TV created by Bojack Horseman production designer Lisa Hanawalt. Now, finally, we have a release date! Look for it on May 3rd, coming to Netflix. Oh, what’s it about? Tiffany Haddish (Girls Trip) and Ali Wong star as a pair of bird women who are best friends — despite one of them being outgoing and sexually adventurous while the other one is, well, not. Animation World Network has a detailed preview and a YouTube link.
image c. 2019 Netflix
The folks over at Previews magalog let us know about this new book. “From the visionary Shaun Tan, an inspirational story for older picture book readers and beyond. Cicada tells the story of a hardworking little cicada who is completely unappreciated for what he does. But in the end, just when you think he’s given up, he makes a transformation into something ineffably beautiful. A metaphor for growing up? A bit of inspiration for the unappreciated striver in all of us? Yes, yes, and more.” It’s available now from Arthur A. Levine Books.
image c. 2019 Arthur A. Levine Books
