Laughlines cartoon and comic show pre-announcement

Just a heads-up for cartoon fans: Visual Arts Brampton is expanding Laughlines to two spaces this year. The 2011 show will run on the normal schedule at Artway Gallery, from 26 March to 29 April 2011, it will also run at Artway Invitational Gallery from mid-April to mid-May. Read between the lines, if you will, with regards to the later timing.

Featured on display will be Steve Nease, whose political cartoons and Pud comic strip appear across Ontario, and caricatures by Peter Emslie, a Sheridan College character design-prof with roots at Disney. Local illustrator Ryan C. Thompson will also display his humourous art.

Who are the other exhibitors? One very interesting reboot is confirmed, and we're trying to finalize an illustrator and graphic novelist. Details to be released in the next few weeks, as things are confirmed.

Steve Nease helps launch Laughlines 10

Steve Nease was photographed drawing Pud at the Oakville Beaver this week. A similar photo was taken by the Oakville Beaver itself, with the possibility of appearing in the press.

This, as mentioned before, is the tenth Laughlines exhibit so far, and all ten have featured Steve's works. On April 19, Pud will star at an event, at Shoppers World.

This event is listed in April's City Parent magazine.

Laughlines event moved to April 19

April 19th at Shoppers World, Visual Arts Brampton celebrates 10 years of Laughlines, an annual exhibition of cartoon and humourous art. Every year of the exhibit, we've featured Steve Nease, whose editorial and political cartoons appear in papers province-wide.

• Draw your own comic strip, to take home, or leave it for display at Fridge Front Gallery.
• Colour a picture of Pud and his family.
  
• Meet Pud himself, courtesy of City Parent magazine.
• Meet the Brampton Arts Council mascot, Millie the Artbug.

Pud to appear at Shoppers on April 12

Please note that this event is now on the 19th.

We've just tentatively confirmed that Pud, who appears in the Brampton Guardian's PUD comic strip, will be appearing on April 12, 2008 at Shoppers World Brampton mall. Pud will be greeting visitors to Artway, along with a colouring table.

This appearance, courtesy of City Parent magazine, will be in conjunction with the annual Laughlines exhibit. Annually since its creation in 1998, Laughlines has featured the editorial cartoons and PUD comic strips by Steve Nease.

(Also at the mall that day is the 21st Annual Brampton Regional Spelling Bee, in cooperation with the Spelling Bee of Canada.)

Steve Nease talk attracts an audience

I'll post more later, but here's an interesting story about the name of the Pud comic strip. It was posted in response to this blog post, which questioned the reason Steve used the name:

As a kid, Steve loved the Lionel Barrymore movie "On Borrowed Time". When he had a child named Ben, he started calling him "Pud" (Bobs Watson as John "Pud" Northrup), after the child in the film.

In the 1980s, he did an editorial cartoon about how children flock to advertisements. The editorial was illustrated in two panels, and received great response from readers and newspaper co-workers.

He decided to do up some more samples, which he showed the editor. The editor decided he could use extra content to fill up the space on the editorial page, and the strip's been going strong since.

At the time the strip started Fleer had stopped putting their "Fleer Funnies starring Pud" strip in the Dubble Bubble gum packages. He decided he could safely name the strip after this character, without confusion. Four years later, the comics in the gum packages restarted.

He says he's considered renaming the strip, and has a title that he's batted around in his mind (which he didn't reveal to us), but he's just never got around to it.

VAB in "What's On" section of the Star

Editorial cartoonist Steve Nease talks about his works Wed. 7 p.m. (free). Visual Arts Brampton, 1 Bartley Bull Pkwy #10.

Let's hope this brings in the crowds.

Yes, that is our corridor on TV.

An argument started inside Shoppers World mall last night at 7:15 pm. Whether it was between either three or four males, and whether they were in their teens or 20s, you take your pick, the news reports have been thoroughly ambiguous. The fight soon spilled outside to the parking lot, and things got "louder and angrier", according to Citynews.

The corridor they went through to get to the parking lot? It was the Artway corridor.

As a result, Torontonians watching Global News Morning got to see Peel Regional Police wander past the Steve Nease Laughlines exhibit. People watching Citytv's Breakfast Television only got to see the doorway.

Editorial cartoonist Steve Nease to talk at VAB Studio

Editorial cartoonist Steve Nease will talk about his works, at on Wednesday, May 23, 2007 from 7:00 to 8:30 pm at the Visual Arts Brampton Creative Studio.

Nease began creating political cartoons in 1978 for the The Oakville Journal Record, launching his PUD comic strip at the Oakville Beaver in 1984. His reflections on the news and on family life appear in Metroland newspapers across Ontario, including the Brampton Guardian.

Steve’s political cartoons hang on the walls of people such as former PM Paul Martin, Mike Harris, and Don Cherry.

His works are on display at Visual Arts Brampton's Artway Gallery until May 25. Artway is located at the northwest entrance to Shoppers World mall, and is on visible regular mall hours. Shoppers World is at 499 Main Street South in Brampton, Ontario (at Steeles Avenue and Main Street South (Highway 10)).

Visual Arts Brampton has shown his most recent works every April at Artway since 1999 in their "Laughlines" show.

The studio where the talk will take place is across the road in the Bartley Square Mall, 1 Bartley Bull Parkway, located on the corner of Steeles Avenue and Main Street South (Highway 10).

Both the exhibit and the talk are free.