Curls Studio will be at Tidewater Comicon on Saturday, May 20, 2023 at the Virginia Beach Convention Center with celebrity guests, comic book creators, voice actors, and much more. Children get in free with the purchase of a regular adult pass.
Tom Welling, Michael Rosenbaum, Adrianne Palicki, Jim Shooter, Dan Gilvezan, Jimmy Palmiotti, Amanda Conner, Sargent Slaughter, and many more!
Virginia Beach Convention Center 1000 19th Street, Virginia Beach, VA 23451
We’re taking part in Kickstarter’s Make 100 incentive raising funds to produce 100 limited edition hard enamel pins with a beautiful original illustrated Red Rose design. The pins will be produced at 30mm tall with sleek rose gold plating and red glitter color. Each pin will be fixed with a clear rubber clutch and come with a backing card. The first 25 pledges will receive a 3″ tall holographic die cut sticker featuring Red Rose as a thanks to you from Curls Studio. There are also several opportunities to purchase additional products I’ve created through the “add-on” feature while pledging.
The 2022 PANTONE Color of the Year is Viva Magenta — vibrates with vim and vigor. It is a shade rooted in nature descending from the red family and expressive of a new signal of strength. Viva Magenta is brave and fearless, and a pulsating color whose exuberance promotes a joyous and optimistic celebration, writing a new narrative. There is a sense of romantic love, passion, courage, and action within the symbolism of a Red Rose.
Looking back on 2022 it seemed to be another transitional year — still getting back into the swing of things with lots of changes behind-the-scenes. Comic conventions ramped back up and we exhibited at 10 events (including our first time at Maryland STEM Festival). I started experimenting with new custom booth designs at a few of the shows (a nod to Lucy’s psychiatry booth from Peanuts happened at Small Press Expo). I even started cosplaying in 2022 — that’s something I never thought I’d be doing!
Curls Studio kicked off the year with a successful Kickstater campaign for “Thank You Mom” hard enamel pins to celebrate Mother’s Day on May 8. We also debuted a new soft enamel pin at Awesome Con called “Watermelon Umbrella Rainbow Duck,” which was part of the event’s collectable pin program.
My illustrations were published in Ranger Rick magazine and I was featured in Uppercase magazine to discuss creativity. I Love To Write Day’s 20th Anniversary featured new Curls comic strips to celebrate the creative process.
At New York Comic Con we showcased a new charm with the Pizza Face character and had a great time in the city — we even got to play some ping pong and go to Coney Island.
The “DC Region Cartoonists” poster released in the fall and features 25 cartoonists from the area. If you want more information about how to order a poster, let me know.
I did a lot of studying at STEM and STEAM events and attended a few art exhibits. I read a bunch of books, took notes, wrote a lot, and drew in my sketchbook. Loads of ideas were generated on paper and are now marinating in my brain. I also changed up my diet and workout routine quite a bit and am living a healthier lifestyle. We are looking forward to what this new year will bring!
The “I Love To Write Day Creative Writing Journal” is now available on Amazon — it’s being published to celebrate the 20th anniversary of I Love To Write Day, a grassroots campaign John Riddle launched in 2002 to have people of all ages spend time writing every November 15. John reached out to me to contribute comic strips about creativity and the creative process to the publication.
87 creative experts including writers, authors, musicians, artists, photographers, actors, directors, and more professions have contributed tips on how to be creative and shared their own creative journey. It also includes 30 challenges that give you the opportunity to “think outside of the box” to use your imagination like never before.
Every weekend in October Curls Studio exhibited or attended a convention of some sort. We ended the month with Baltimore Comic-Con on October 28-30 and had a wonderful time tabling amongst the best and brightest in the Kids Love Comics section. This year’s table layout was great and the show even had signage for Kids Love Comics and Artist Alley, which was beneficial to both attendees and exhibitors so everyone knew the show floor well. On Saturday I wore my Curls Utz parody shirt (Curlz) and we started the day giving Jamar Nicholas “Leon’s Favorite Cake” which is German Chocolate Cake with buttercream frosting and crushed pistachios on top. We did this to celebrate his new book with Scholastic. Later in the day I attended John Gallagher’s art seminar at our Kids Love Comics pavilion.
We debuted the “DC Region Cartoonists” poster featuring both National Cartoonists Society members and non-members who all live within an hour or so of Washington, DC (you can never get the timing just right with all the traffic around here). Here is a photo of me dressed as Abby Hatcher and Mark Wheatley with the poster. This is my first time officially cosplaying at a show because I thought it would be a fun surprise and so close to Halloween so why not (although if you look closely at my SPX outfit and booth display from earlier this year, you could come to the conclusion that maybe I was Lucy from Peanuts). If you would like to purchase a poster, please contact me.
On Sunday I got to meet Jill Thompson and showed her my page in the Scary Godmother Baltimore Comic-Con Yearbook. The original piece was auctioned off on Saturday at the show and the family who purchased it came by the Curls Studio table to have me personalize the back. I was happy to see so many people enjoying the book and collecting everyone’s autographs. I also had a blast next to Mark and Chris Mariano and talking about their book, Loud Cow.
Be on the lookout for a special episode of the Unpacking Peanuts podcast called Charles Schulz 100th Birthday party. Hosts Jimmy Gownley and Harold Buchholz interviewed me and others for the show and I look forward to listening as well as checking out their other episodes.
You can purchase the shirts I wore at Baltimore Comic-Con from my Cotton Bureau shop and there’s also my online store for mostly everything else if you could not make it to the show in-person. Curls Studio would like to thank the show organizers and volunteers for hosting this event. Next year SPX and Baltimore Comic-Con are on the same weekend in early September, so we’ll have to figure out how to do that because I don’t want to pick between them (both are so good for different reasons). We might have to do a set-up where Joe and I will be at different shows on different days and mix it up. We will figure it all out and you’ll see all the details right here on the blog and our socials.
