We are excited to announce the winner of 2016 The Dash grant - recent Seattle transplant, Brendan Kiefer! We were won over by his project description- a mini-comic about his relationship with an eccentric landlord, “…a hoarder, ex-bodybuilder, and medieval poetry professor who became mostly housebound due to an unfortunate accident. According to him, he also served as Janis Joplin’s bodyguard, went on a date with Farrah Fawcett, and was Hunter S. Thompson’s Austin drug connection and barroom brawling partner. As tenants, we had to deal with his weekly paranoia, freak-outs, emotional abuse, and hour-long stories or ‘lectures’. Though it was a relationship built on resentment and mistrust, he became an integral part of the lives of my partner and myself.”
Some of Brendan’s previous mini-comic titles are Blue Boy, Hospital Comic, Pissy Pants, and Boys. He is editor and contributor to the fantastic anthology Rough House (#2-3). He was awarded a silver medal from The Society of Illustrators in 2014 and holds a BFA in Studio Art from TCU in Fort Worth, TX.
We received many applications this year and we look forward to seeing the finished books that come from these proposals. Please take a look at these highlighted artists and support them in their projects. They will receive their choice of a hand-silkscreened Short Run festival poster, t-shirt, or tote bag.
“The American Dream & Me” will be Matt’s final mini-comic in a trilogy about the dynamic professional wrestler Dusty Rhodes, known for his common man charm. The minicomic also features poignant autobiographical vignettes about his own conspiracy and esoteric theories (he attended a meeting of the Mutual UFO Network) and small town Midwest life, all told through the device of a wrestling “promo”.
Matt Reints lives in Minneapolis, MN. Matt’s other mini-comics include Dustyisms, Inertia, Rafters, The Van, and AM in the AM.
We are looking forward to reading Anna Vo’s sepulchral real-life horror story of living through her formative years in a government housing apartment in Maroubra, a violent and repressive town in Australia. “…The landscape contains ghostly figures wandering back and forth between unknown points, and distant cackling from wasted teens who live in the mansions across the road.” We can’t imagine nastier characters than the “Bra Boys”, who are heralded in the town despite their admitted crimes.
Anna Vo is a Portland sound artist, musician (An Out Recordings), illustrator, comic artist, zinester (Fix My Head, Distortion) and curator (most recently, “A Sun That Never Sets” an art show for women of color.)
jbbartram-illu
izzy806
prguitarman
kaledo-art
yousharknotpass
turnnoffyourmind
vaporwave
janainaart
snowghoul
