Go to Jamaicad.com!

Hey, I finally got Wordpress together and moved my blog over to jamaicad.com. This blogspot is going to stay up as an archive, but if you want to see anything new you'll want to go here:

jamaicad.com

-j

Dee's Siren Song Gallery Opening Dec 18th

Mission: Comics & Art presents "Dee's Siren Song" by San Francisco based artist Jamaica Dyer, who's first graphic novel, Weird Fishes, a collection of her web comic was recently published by SLG Publishing. The show opens with an artist reception and book signing at 7pm on December 18, 2009 and runs to January 27, 2010. Well known comic writer and Internet purveyor, Warren Ellis has this to say about Dyer's work "The only explanation for Jamaica Dyer is that she was built by aliens and dropped here to show us all how crap we are compared to her."

Santa Cruz native and recent Mission resident, Dyer's work includes comic books, illustration and animation with an eye to the fanciful and surreal. Her book Weird Fishes, as she says, "is a story about growing up and realizing that all your childhood eccentricities might make you a total outsider as you enter your teenage years, along with the realization that reality isn’t really what it seems. Dee is at the center of the story, and she sees giant talking ducks and other imaginary creatures, and her best friend is a boy from school nicknamed The Bunny Boy has worn the same Halloween costume for years. When he decides to start being cool and stop hanging out with Dee, suddenly the friendly ducks become monsters and her reality changes forever."

"Dee's Siren Song" by Jamaica Dyer
Showing Dec. 12, 2009 - Jan. 27, 2010
Opening Reception and book signing - 7pm Dec.18, 2009
Mission: Comics & Art
3520 20th St. Suite B
San Francisco, CA 94110
www.MissionComicsAndArt.com
415.695.1545

This gallery show follows the progression of Dee from a simple sketch to an estranged teenager, into her adventures in college. For the first time you'll see artwork from the new comic in the Weird Fishes storyline and get a glimpse of what is coming next as Dee becomes an adult and delves into her fantasies about her lost Bunny Boy.

For more information see:
www.jamaicad.com
www.missioncomicsandart.com

Facebook event page here.

Sketchcrawl 25

I got to go to Sketchcrawl in San Francisco this Saturday! I've wanted to go to these for years, so it was a great first-time hanging out with a bunch of animators, students and fellow artists in Yerba Buena gardens drawing the architecture, drinking tea and drawing people. I even got to break in a new moleskin!







I found this photo of us over at the Sketchcrawl forum.

Signing and SLG Gallery Opening

My gallery at SLG Boutiki Gallery opened last night! The reception was great, a bunch of cool fans and gallery-walkers came around. If you missed it, you can stop by all month long over at 577 S Market St in San Jose!











My signing at Atlantis Fantasyworld in Santa Cruz happened last weekend! Joe and Amy and Hillary were great hosts, and big thanks to the better half of Santa Cruz for stopping by to say hi and pick up books. Here's a couple pics:




And, to make it even more photo-heavy around here, here is a gallery of some lovely faces holding my book!

APE Day 2

(this is one of those few times I'll double post comics here and on Weird Fishes.)

There are so many people to mention that I didn't get to draw! Jon Bean was a great table partner, and Serena and Karl were both fabulous, and Ted played the ukulele! Dan was great. Visit Julien and his comic The San Lukas Arboretum. And check out Lark Pien. Thanks to everyone for making the weekend happen!

Also, check out my etsy store, where I put up some of the wallets and mini paintings that I was selling at the show.

If you picked up a copy of Weird Fishes and want to be famous, send me a picture of you with the book and I'll put you in a gallery!

This Wednesday (Oct 28th) I'll be at Atlantis Fantasyworld signing copies of Weird Fishes. Come visit me there all day!

11/6 First Friday : The Art of Jamaica Dyer at Slave Labor Graphics
Part of the First Friday Art Walk in San Jose, Slave Labor Graphics is hosting a show of watercolor paintings from Weird Fishes. You may have viewed them on my website or you’ve seen them reproduced in black and white in the graphic novel, but there’s nothing quite like seeing the original work in person. Opening reception at 8pm, and the show will be up all November.

Ape Day 1!

An amazing time! Hopefully you enjoy my journal/sketches/watercolor comic depicting the moments I can remember from the show. The artists on the Personal Stories panel are all fantastic, go check out Shaenon Garrity, Gene Yang, Nate Powell, Dash Shaw, Dean Haspiel and Phoebe Gloeckner. Plus you simply must check out Kate Beaton andBarron Storey. I am grateful for all my friends, fans and con-goers who stopped by, chatted, and picked up my book. Here's a spoiler for day two: we sold out of copies. Yay!

Here's some supplemental photos. My friend Traci was gracious enough to attend my panels and take photos!











Sunday comic coming as soon as I catch up on work!

Weird Fishes and sketching

The Weird Fishes GN is now out in select comic shops! Here the lovely Amy A. shows off a copy at Atlantis Fantasyworld!



Here's my zombie girl halloween drawing featuring my lovely roommates, Ignacio the cat and myself. Yeah, living with a comic artist has perks like this.



Accidentally went shopping the other day. I'm starting to do more sketches in this style... little autobio moments with thought bubbles and paper doll elements :)

Only a few days until APE! Excited and nervous! Info in the post below.

October: APE, book release, signing!

I realize that I hate writing blog posts but I love writing in my sketchbook, so why not write my blog entry in my sketchbook! Then it's just a matter of getting it so people can read it.... oh here it comes!



Hurray! So here's the links: APE, Weird Fishes at SLG, Atlantis Fantasyworld.

Hope to see you all at the show! Please come say hi and buy my book! Very excited. I have a few artists I've recently gotten into to geek out over, like Kate Beaton and Dash Shaw, so when I'm not signing stuff I'll be trying to get them to sign stuff. Oh APE, my favorite show of the year...

Mini Canvases and Black Orchid

In preparation for APE, I started working on some TINY canvases that I got at the art store. They're like 2 inches wide. And they will be for sale at the con. I absolutely love working on them. (oh, NSFW!)



I've been working on some children-safe stuff lately, and then I realized how much fun I have drawing sexy ladies on those canvases. Luckily, this week on Warren Ellis' forum there was a thread to recreate the Black Orchid, and I came up with this:



Started a new painting, working on a few new illustrations, and sketching out a new comic! I also went to Dr. Sketchy's, and I gotta get those drawings scanned. Too much fun, that Dr Sketchy!

Sketching in Coffee Shops

I finally got myself back into the habit of bringing my sketchbooks around with me. In school this practice was strictly enforced, and it's no big surprise that I ended up going out with my school buddy Charlene, who is amazing at finding great spots to do drawings. Plus, this past week my computer's graphic card melted (uh huh!) so I got to spend even more time out drawing people rather than at home working on the laptop. Enjoy!








Oh AND, the Silicon Valley Metro did a big article about Slave Labor and they did a pretty cool interview with me. And they used my art on the cover! You can read the article here.

I'm very excited about October! It's just been announced that I'm going to be one of the special guests at APE this year, which is pretty amazing. APE has always been my favorite convention, I haven't missed a year since I was 16, and I've done almost every sort of promotion, from being on foot and handing out 'zines from my bookbag, to piggybacking at friend's tables, to various collaborations and table-sharings, but this year I'll be debuting my first graphic novel, be signing at the SLG table, and have a panel of my very own. Whew, it's been a fun journey so far!

Right now at SLG studios they have a jazz-themed gallery, and here's the finished piece I did for the show:



I haven't had much of a break since Comic-con, where I did some promotional work for Weird Fishes, met a bunch of great people that I'll hopefully get to work with in the near future, went to one or three great after-parties, attended Awesomecon and got to see The Mighty Boosh live, which was incredible. It was literally a day packed with Boosh: a great panel and a party that basically everyone who's anyone went to, where Bollo and Naboo DJ'd while Vince danced onstage wooing the girls down below. Ahh, good times.


And here's a kitty.

Weird Fishes Trailer

Slave Labor put together this amazing trailer for Weird Fishes. I'm really moved by it... you can only spend too much time living with your comic and going through the whole writing process before you forget what you've actually put together. This trailer lets me see the story in a completely new way... now I want to see it as a movie! Wow!

Comic-con!

Comic-con's arrived in a storm and I did some last-minute planning to get myself there. I'll be doing some promotion at Slave Labor for the upcoming Weird Fishes graphic novel, I am told there will be postcards and I'll bring a pen for sketches and goodies. So far, the times I'll be sitting at the SLG booth are:
Thurday 10-11:30, 5:30-7, and Friday 10-11:30.

I'll be jumping around a bunch of different tables, tracking down Noel and Julien, and trying to sit in on some animation panels.

Rock Poster

Got a call yesterday that I can do anything I want for the poster as long as it's for a rock show and has the information they need on it and gets done ASAP. So I scribbled up this girl and got to try out some new brushes in the inking and play around with lettering and adding color. Really quite happy with it, and super fun too! These are getting printed as posters and put all over Santa Cruz this week.

Here's another piece I did recently as well, based on some vintage cartoons my client liked. I think the end result was very whimsical, and I like how my hand-lettering turned out too.

Kitty Sketches

I'm thinking about doing a children's project with kitties, so I've been doing lots of sketches of the ones I have around here. Enjoy!