{"id":6147,"date":"2022-09-06T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-09-06T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/plugoarts.com\/blog\/?p=6147"},"modified":"2024-09-03T18:19:32","modified_gmt":"2024-09-04T01:19:32","slug":"fantagraphics-see-you-at-san-diego","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/plugoarts.com\/blog\/fantagraphics-see-you-at-san-diego\/","title":{"rendered":"WHY YOU SHOULD READ: Fantagraphics’ SEE YOU AT SAN DIEGO"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It’s been many years since I’ve made the journey to San Diego Comic-con. Sure I’ve attend numerous Wonder-cons over the years, as a fan as well as a Pro and Press, a perk of Wonder-Con’s origins in the San Francisco Bay Area. But San Diego is at least a 10 hour drive from my art room here on Alameda island and so I’ve turned down more invite to attend than I’ve actually gone. Of the times I did go, my most memorable was my first (of course).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was not evening living in California at the time, but instead jumped onto a late night greyhound bus departing from a sleepy Tempe Arizona bus terminal, during my brief time wandering the desert of the North American Southwest). It was an overnight trip which landed me in San Diego early the next morning. As I was planning to only spend one day there, before catching the last bus back to Arizona I was determined to make the most out of that mission. The convention was much smaller back in the summer of 1994.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Being so radically mobile left me little room for purchases. Instead I dutifully made my rounds with portfolio in hand. I reconnected with the small number of editors I’d gotten to know via antics at THE SCHOOL OF VISUAL ARTS as well as New York’s own comic-cons; and my work for 90’s micro-comic-publisher Double-Edge Comics<\/a>; Amazingly, still online (I aught to reach out to ’em \u2013 I digress). Among the highlights of that day include a brief reunion with the legendary Walt Simonson, whose influence on my early development as an artist I wrote about here<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As a young aspiring artist, I could, on those rare Saturday afternoons, dispense with the usual chores to gather samples of my comic art. I would go out with a handful of friends to meet a real artist. In this case, it was the comics artist Walter Simonson who was on the verge of taking over the writing and illustration of the then nearly-canceled comic titled Thor. He was generously tearing out pages from his sketchbook to provide drawings for those who came to see him. I however, happened to have a piece of pink “oaktag” paper in my makeshift portfolio so I asked that he draw a character on it with the purple magic marker I had in hand. At the time, he promised he would never forget such a request. To this day I find myself wondering if remembers that drawing.<\/p>\nTHOR: RAGNAROK (& Roll) by Patrick Lugo<\/a><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

But it’s really the Klingon wedding that really stands out as the ultimate memory of San Diego Comic-Con. It was the end of a long day and I’d sought out a secluded location at the far end of a spacious balcony\/atrium at some upper level of the convention center. As I ate my final rations of fruits and nuts I noticed the growing congregation of Klingons. Each pronouncing their name, titles, family affiliations and notable victories, in Klingon (naturally) and English; at the top of their lungs. With the formalities of the wedding concluded, it seemed legal enough to me, the gathering quieted down to a more collegial murmur before I discretely took my own exit heading back to the desert and quietly letting fate decide I’d have to continue heading west; and maybe a bit north.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So that’s my San Diego Comic-Con story. It’s one you won’t find in the pages of Fanagraphics’ new book SEE YOU IN SAN DIEGO: AN ORAL HISTORY OF COMIC-CON,FANDOM AND THE TRIUMPH OF GEEK CULTURE, and that’s okay. You this thick book is stacked with such tales by writers, artists and \u2014 for lack of a better term: influencers of the time. Many of which you\u2019ll surely have heard of. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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