Join us for a discussion on ‘The Myth of Nostalgia’

We’re thrilled to be putting together a discussion panel at this year’s WonderCon – and we hope you all can join us.

The topic of the panel is ‘The Myth of Nostalgia’ – a topic near and dear to our hearts.  We’ll be discussion collecting and memory with out good friends Pete Maresca (from Sunday Press Books) and artist James T. Walker (from pretty much all your favorite animated shows).

How does nostalgia for certain periods of time go in and out of style?  Can nostalgia be invented?  What happens when the collector becomes the creator?  Join us and tell us what you think!

Friday March 17 from 5-6 PM.  In room 203AB at the Anaheim Convention Center.  See you there!

Congratulations to Larry from Pennsylvania, the randomly selected winner of the Gadabout TM 1050 User’s Manual.

Thanks to our Geek Dad friends at Wired.com for hosting the contest – everyone’s comments were so terrific to read, that I’m glad we didn’t have to be the ones to pick one winner at random. 

We’ve sent off the manual, and depending on whether the post office uses a Gadabout, Larry will have already finished reading it! 

A week of French food, French wine, and French comics – Vive la bande dessinée!

You would hardly think the small town of Angoulême could hold such a big festival.  But the Angoulême International Comics Festival is big.  With 21 exhibition areas, the 4-day event drew over 200,000 comic fans from all over the world.  The festival is the largest in Europe, and one of the largest in the world. 

And with such a high profile, the festival brings in some amazing artists.  The guest of honor for this 39th festival was world-renowned comics author, Art Spiegelman, winner of the 1992 Pulitzer for his graphic novel ‘Maus’.  He received the festival’s Grand Prize, making him only the second American in the festival’s history to receive the award, (after Robert Crumb in 1999).  The festival included a retrospective of his work, along with a special exhibition of his personal comics collection.

And there was a lot of amazing work to take in. 

The Flemish Literature Fund knows how to make a splash.  The institution, which promotes Flemish authors in Belgium and abroad, had the best booth at Angoulême.  For the last four years, they have been presenting original graphic novels and translated work from Flemish authors in the form of a Belgian café, the ‘Café BD Chez les flamands’.  The attention to detail in the design and set up of the café was remarkable – you really thought that you wandered from a tent into an old café somewhere in Antwerp.  And the books, of course, were beautiful.

But the book we saw everyone carrying was American Barbarian by Tom Scioli, published by Chris Pitzer at AdHouse Books.  Tom and Chris are the nicest guys and we were happy to meet them (and even happier to bring our own copy of the book home).  It’s nice to see a publisher taking so much care with their books.

Curio & Co. had a terrific time in France at the 39th annual Angoulême International Comics Festival.  See you next year Angoulême!

Let's face it - we've all thought about using time travel to win contests.

Our GeekDad friends over at Wired.com are hosting a contest to give away a copy of the Gadabout TM 1050 User’s Manual. All you have to do to win is visit the post and leave a comment saying how you would use the Gadabout time machine. The contest is open until 11:59pm Pacific Time, Wednesday, February 8, and the winner will be announced at the end of the week.

Remember, the Gadabout’s manual specifically states that using the Gadabout for criminal acts will void your warranty, so no cheating!

We travel to France for the largest comics festival in Europe.

Angoulême is France’s capital of comics, animation and visual arts.  The city is home to the Angoulême International Comics Festival, Europe’s largest event dedicated to comics attracting nearly a quarter of a million international visitors.  Curio & Co. will be there with a booth in Le Nouveau Monde section (F18, BD Alternative, Nouveau Monde, Place New York).  We’re pretty excited.

Though the festival only lasts about a week, the city has plenty to over comics fans year-round.  There’s la Cité Internationale de la Bande Dessinée et de l'Image. This large complex is housed in three buildings along the Charente river and includes a museum, a heritage library, a specialized public library, a documentation center, an international artists' residence, a bookshop, an art house cinema, an internet consultation point and a tasty restaurant (bien sûr, we’re in France after all!).

And as if that isn’t enough, Angoulême has been a centre of the paper-making and printing industry since the 14th century… we can almost smell the new paper!

Stop by and say "bonjour" if you'll be in Angoulême!