Chester Brown
Writer and artist, and the renowned creator of books such as THE PLAYBOY and I NEVER LIKED YOU, and the ongoing series' UNDERWATER and YUMMY FUR. His graphic novel ED THE HAPPY CLOWN (which just finished a new and improved serialization) earned him the accolades of Rolling Stone magazine, naming him one of their IT Comics Creators. Chester drew the eyes of historians, press publications and all those appreciative of comic art with the collection of his series detailing the life of Canadian rebel LOUIS RIEL from Drawn & Quarterly. Chester is currently working on a new autobiographical graphic novel, due in 2008 or 2009 from Drawn & Quarterly.

Chester Brown will be participating in Friday-evening programming featuring the on-stage reunion of Joe Matt with Chester and Seth. Please see the events page for more information.

Related Links:
Drawn and Quarterly

Evan Dorkin
The notorious creator of MILK & CHEESE and DORK will be joining the Toronto Comic Arts Festival for his first-ever comics event in Toronto! After starting at Marvel Comics, Dorkin made his name on hip, contemporary looks at youth in popular culture through his series HECTIC PLANET and his short humour strips in anthologies including INSTANT PIANO. Currently, Dorkin's work can be seen in annual issues of DORK and in Nickelodeon Magazine, MAD Magazine, and on the cover of the new Larry Doyle novel I Love You Beth Cooper.

Also this summer, Slave Labor Graphics will release vinyl toy figures of MILK & CHEESE, and we've all got our fingers crossed that they'll show up in time for TCAF...

Related Links:
HOUSE OF FUN
Evan Dorkin's Blog, BIG MOUTH TYPES AGAIN

Paul Gravett

Paul Gravett is a London-based freelance journalist, curator, lecturer, writer and broadcaster, who has worked in comics publishing and promotion for over twenty years, including co-publishing the highly-influence ECLIPSE from 1983-1989.

His extensive knowledge of comics and graphic novels is reflected in his two books, GRAPHIC NOVELS: STORIES TO CHANGE YOUR LIFE and MANGA: 60 YEARS OF JAPANESE CULTURE. The former is a rich, layered examination of contemporary graphic novels; a wonderful entry point for newcomers to the medium and a wonderful guide to the breadth of material available for even the most advanced reader. Meanwhile, his book on Manga has quickly become the book of note on an iteration of the comics medium that is gripping the world. His most recent book, GREAT BRITISH COMICS, is a very thick one that covers exactly what the title promises.

Paul Gravett will be speaking on multiple subjects at TCAF, please see the Events page for further details.

James' new art book, PROCESS RECESS 2, may be debuting in time for TCAF. James Jean is also the artist for The Beguiling's 20th Anniversary Poster.

Related Links:
James' Homepage
Process Recess

Joe Matt
For over ten years Joe Matt has been notorious in cult circles for the embarrassing frankness with which he reveals his distressing habits and predilections. Utterly unabashed and completely self-absorbed, he writes with an exhibitionist’s enthusiasm for his favorite subject, himself.

Matt was born in Philadelphia in 1963. By his own account (collected in the graphic novel Fair Weather in 2002) he was a spoiled, selfish, and unpleasant child with a bedwetting problem, who also happened to be obsessed with collecting comics.

In the early 80s, Joe Matt studied at the Philadelphia College of Art and worked in a broom factory. In 1987, he started drawing the dense single-page confessional strips that made him a comics hero when they were collected in 1992 by Kitchen Sink Press and published as Peepshow: The Cartoon Diary of Joe Matt. He began his ongoing comic book series Peepshow that same year with Drawn & Quarterly, the first six issues of which were collected as The Poor Bastard in 1997.

His most recent story arc, although only four issues long, took over 8 years to complete. The rest of his time was quite likely spent meticulously editing porn videos, collecting and archiving classic comic strips, wallowing in self-pity, and otherwise "procrasturbating," overwhelmed by the laziness that motivates him to urinate in a bottle in his bedroom rather than walk to the bathroom.

Joe Matt will be participating in Friday-evening programming featuring the on-stage reunion of Joe and his long-time friends Chester Brown and Seth. Please see the events page for more information.

Related Links:
Drawn & Quarterly's Joe Matt Page

Paul Pope

In America, he's been called the "comics destroyer;" in France, he's been called the "Jim Morrison of comics" and "comics' Petit Prince." New York’s Paul Pope creates comics that defy genre and period, straddling the line between artistic capriciousness and commercial appeal. One of a handful of young cartoonists consistently gaining critical praise and media attention, Pope has been featured in Canada on MuchMusic and Space channel, among others, and his work has appeared in print outlets like Spin, Entertainment Weekly, Jalouse, V Magazine and The Village Voice. He is also the only American cartoonist to have worked for Japan's largest manga publisher (Kodansha), for more than five years now. Pope’s recent work includes the near-future sci-fi romance 100%, the career spanning THB, as well as recent stints on iconic comic character series like Batman and Spider-Man.

Just in time for TCAF, Adhouse Books will release PULPHOPE: THE ART OF PAUL POPE. It's going to be great.

Related Links:
Paul Pope's Homepage

Seth
Canada's Seth is perhaps the best-know Canadian graphic novelist in the world. Drawing deeply from a disparate group of inspirations Seth has distilled one of the most distinctive and recognizable cartooning styles of the past decade and his sophisticated style has been sought by "The Washington Post," "Details," "National Post," "Spin," "The New York Times," "Saturday Night," and the "New Yorker."

Seth's comics work includes his series PALOOKA-VILLE, which is released "as frequently as his busy schedule will allow". Graphic novel collections of his work include IT'S A GOOD LIFE, IF YOU DON'T WEAKEN, CLYDE FANS BOOK ONE, and WIMBLEDON GREEN. In 2004, Seth teamed with his father John Gallant, to produce his father's memoir of the Great Depression, BANNOCK, BEANS, & BLACK TEA. Seth is also the designer of Stuart McLean's "Vinyl Café Diaries" books, stage shows and CDs, and the designer of Fantagraphics' 25 book COMPLETE PEANUTS series.

Seth's illustration has recently graced the cover of "The New Yorker", and in early 2007 his new graphic novel, GEORGE SPROTT (1894-1975) was serialised in The New York Times.

Seth will be participating in Friday-evening programming featuring the on-stage reunion of Joe Matt with Chester and Seth. Please see the events page for more information.

Related Links:
Drawn and Quarterly
GEORGE SPROTT (1984-1975), at The New York Times

Attila Adorjany
Attila is a Toronto based illustrator, comic creator, and toy designer. His comic credits include work for Boom Studios, Image, Moonstone, Speakeasy, and Mister comics. Most recently in the realm of comics Attila has been working on covers for Boom Studio's Warhammer Line and working on several personal projects including Night with Co-creator and partner in crime Joe O'brien.
Related Links:
Daily blog: http://freshandtasty.blogspot.com
Gallery site: http://www.redeisngthe.com and http://www.600poundgorilla.com

Neelam Arora
Neelam's work has appeared in the anthologies WHAT'S WRONG? and SPX 2003, and she has created several self-published comics and picturebooks.

Related Links:
Neelam Arora's Homepage

Roxanne Bielskis
Roxanne has been involved with comics since she fell in love with Jughead at an early age. She started writing her own stuff in high school and started putting books out in 2002, under the title Poverty. She is currently the resident cartoonist for Torontoist.com and Shameless Magazine.

Related Links:
http://www.povertycomics.com/
http://www.torontoist.com
www.shamelessmag.com

J. Bone
A talented Toronto-area artist and writer, Bone is the co-creator of the series ALISON DARE, and artist on MUTANT, TEXAS and MR. GUM for Oni Press. He has contributed to numerous series for publishers including Marvel, Dark Horse and DC Comics. J. is also a talented illustrator and is trained as an animator.

J. is currently collaborating with Darwyn Cooke on THE SPIRIT from DC Comics, and is looking for a publisher for his series JETT VECTOR. Hint. Hint.

Related Links:
Oni Press

Scott Chantler
Illustrator and animator, co-creator and artist of the J. Torres-penned graphic novels DAYS LIKE THIS and SCANDALOUS published by Oni Press. Scott's first solo book, an historical adventure set in the Canadian West, is titled NORTHWEST PASSAGE, and the annotated hardcover edition will be published by Oni Press this summer.

Scott is also the illustrator on a little project you might have heard of called STEPHEN COLBERT'S TEK JANSEN IN ALPHA SQUAD 7.

Related Links:
Scott Chantler's Homepage
Oni Press

Svetlana Chmakova
Svetlana was born and raised Russian, and came to Canada at the tender age of 16. She finished high school here, then graduated Sheridan College with a three-year Classical Animation Diploma and is currently a freelance artist, as well as a fledging North-American equivalent of a manga-ka.

Svetlana has drawn for how-to-draw-manga books, RPG manuals, toy designs, animation and book covers. In addition, she has written and drawn the critically acclaimed Tokyo Pop graphic novels DRAMACON and DRAMACON 2, and creates the monthly strip ADVENTURES OF CG for "CosmoGirl" magazine. She is also featured in the new tutorial/art book MANGAKA AMERICA from Harper Collins.

Related Links:
DRAMACON at Tokyopop

Joey Comeau
Joey is a firm believer in the idea that if you can't be a good example, you have an obligation to be a horrible warning. He writes the comic A SOFTER WORLD, and has penned the novels LOCKPICK PORNOGRAPHY and IT'S TOO LATE TO SAY I'M SORRY.

Related Links:
A Softer World Homepage
Joey's Livejournal

Nick Craine
Nick Craine is the artist who has adapted movies including DANCE ME OUTSIDE and HARD CORE LOGO into graphic novels. Craine is probably best known to superhero fans for his recent work on Peter Milligan and Mike Allred's X-FORCE and X-STATIX series for Marvel. Craine is currently hard at work on PARCHMENT OF LIGHT: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, a new graphic novel that might just be debuting at TCAF.

Related Links:
Nick Craine's Website

James & Jesse Davidge
James Davidge is the writer of THE WANDERING STARS. He lives in Calgary, Alberta, where he works as a science and math teacher. His first novel, DRIFTWOODELLESMERE, is available through Bayeux Arts.

Jesse Davidge is the artist of THE WANDERING STARS. He works as an animator in Vancouver, BC, for various movies and video games.

Related Links:
The Rosencrantz Comics Website

Claudia Dávila

Born in Santiago, Chile, Claudia Dávila moved to Canada in 1973 and grew up in the culture-rich cities of Montreal and Toronto. She began drawing and painting at an early age, and was fortunate to attend art-focused public high school Wexford C.I., followed by York University for Visual Arts. She emerged to develop a multi-faceted career of graphic design, art direction, illustration, painting and cartooning. Five years were dedicated to the award-winning children’s magazines Chirp, Chickadee and Owl, first as Associate Art Director and subsequently as Art Director. She is presently creating a book-art piece relating to survival in Toronto after the end of petroleum energy, for which she received a Toronto Arts Council grant. Claudia’s art is informed by her various interests, such as the environment, social politics, yoga, vegetarianism, ayurveda, and metaphysics, as well as the issue of the end of fossil fuels, and as such is a member of the Toronto Peak Oil Discussion Group. This year at TCAF she will be launching her first comic, SPOILED, an allegory about humankind's connection with nature in relation to petroleum.

Related Links:
Luz: Girl Of The Knowing Webcomic

Ray Fawkes
Creator of the SPOOKSHOW graphic novel, and the vertigo mini-series MNEMOVORE. Ray's new graphic novel with artist Cameron Stewart, APOCALIPSTIX, will be debuting at TCAF this year.

Related Links:
Piper Snow Studio

Matthew Forsythe
Matt Forsythe is a Montreal-based illustrator and creator of the 
acclaimed webcomic, OJINGOGO. His comics have appeared in the FLIGHT 
and CYCLOPS anthologies.  He is a member of the HORHAUS collective 
and a co-editor of the DRAWN! The Illustration and Cartooning Weblog.
Related Links:
Matt's homepage: http://www.comingupforair.net/
Drawn!:  http://www.drawn.ca
Portfolio: http://horhaus.com/weblogs/mattgallery

Emily Holton
Emily Holton will be debuting her new book, Little Lessons In Safety at the Conundrum Press table (see publisher listings for signing times). It is a collection of Holton's bookworks and drawings, produced over the past five years. Her "scratchy intelligent line drawings" (Broken Pencil) and lean text play with the format of children's readers, comics, celebrity fashion magazines, and cut and paste murder mysteries. Smart, strange, and funny, Holton's work recalls artist Raymond Pettibon, filmmaker Miranda July and southern gothic writer Carson McCullers - all at once. There is a boy with a bird for hair, feral children who grow up to be cowboys, treeplanters who never come back, and fashionista Karl Lagerfeld perfoming a bris. Her stories, "exploring a richer, weirder understanding of language and sentiment" (Brian Joseph Davis), reveal themselves in layers - eerily straightforward and yet never quite what they seem.

Related Links:
Conundrum Press
http://www.emilyholton.com

Eric Kim
Eric has lived in Canada all of his life and attended Sheridan College. His work in entertainment began with 4 Elements Studios in Montreal, and then onto visual effects in Toronto. Since then, he's begun his career in comics with J. Torres on the series Love As A Foreign Language which just finished from Oni Press. He also illustrated the DEGRASSI: THE NEXT GENERATION: BOOK 3 graphic novel and created the comic strip series BATTLE ACADEMY which ran in The Toronto Star's "Brand New Planet" magazine.
Related Links:
www.inkskratch.com.

Blair and Mike Kitchen
Blair Kitchen is an animator working in Toronto, Canada. He is also the publisher of Possum Press, publishers of the animation-style superhero comics POSSUM.

Mike Kitchen is an animator who has worked on such films as Final Fantasy, Hellboy and Constantine. Mike is also the creator of the cartoon crime series SPY GUY and SPUD & HARRY for his own Ultraist Studios and a contributor to CEREBUS READERS IN CRISIS #2.
Related Links:
http://www.ultraist.net/
http://www.possumpress.com/ .

Gareth Lind
Gareth Lind is the creator of WELTSCHMERZ, a staple of Toronto cartooning. WELTSCHMERZ first appeared in 1994 and has run in Toronto's Eye Weekly since 1997, as well as in several other papers and on the web. It has become one of Canada's premier satirical comic strips, hilariously skewring the powerful and turning a fun-house mirror on our attempts to grapple with an increasingly bizarre world.

Gareth Lind was born in Pennsylvania in 1964 and moved to Toronto in 1997. He now works as a cartoonist and graphic designer in Guelph, Ontario.

Related Links:
http://www.weltschmerz.ca/blog/

John Martz
One of the founders of the incredibly popular illustration and cartooning showcase website Drawn.ca, John Martz is also a talented illustrator and cartoonist himself! You can find his work in the SYNCOPATED COMICS VOL 3 anthology, and in a new project debuting this summer.
Related Links:
DRAWN.CA
John Martz' homepage

Johanne Matte
Johane Matte is a Montreal artist who works in animation and video games. She self publishes her mini comic Horus, a fantasy adventure set in ancient Egypt.

Johanne is a regular fixture in the FLIGHT anthologies, and has a story in the fourth volume. Johanne will be signing at the FLIGHT tables at TCAF.

Related Links:
Johanne Matte's Homepage

Tyrone & Alana McCarthy
Tyrone McCarthy graduated from Ontario College of Art & Design, majoring in Illustration. He received the Herb McCarthy Award (no relation). Since graduating Tyrone's been busy with Illustration work and self publishing his comic CORDUROY HIGH.

Alana McCarthy is an acclaimed illustrator and painter, with many design, advertising and editorial jobs in her portfolio. Both of them are members of the collective SketchKRIEG!”

Related Links:
http://www.tyronemccarthy.com/
www.AlanaLand.com
SketchKRIEG!

Marc Ngui
Toronto native Marc Ngui is the creator of the sundicated comic strip ZAK MEADOWS, which has been collected in graphic novel format as ENTER AVARIZ. His most recent work is LORDIE JONES from Conundrum Press. Marc Ngui studied architecture at the University of Waterloo, and has spent the last few years doing illustration, comics, diagrams, storyboards, animation, multimedia installations and performances, and travelling with his talented wife Magda.
Related Links:
http://bumblenut.com/

Ryan North
Ryan North is a pretty okay dude who lives in Toronto, which is in Canada. He has two degrees in the computer sciences, if you can believe that! Dinosaur Comics is his comic about talking dinosaurs who have adventures, and it is good times for every single person involved. You can read them every day for free at www.qwantz.com, and can buy the first book collection, Dinosaur Comics: Your Whole Family Is Made Out Of Meat, which has like a billion jokes in it!
Related Links:
http://www.qwantz.com

Bryan Lee O'Malley
Bryan Lee O'Malley's first original graphic novel, LOST AT SEA from Oni Press, expertly captures the aimlessness of what it felt like to be a teenager. The uncertainty of what lies ahead and the feeling that, no matter who or where you are, you're alone. But also how effortlessly friends can be made. O'Malley's new series, also from Oni Press is SCOTT PILGRIM. A series of awesomely sweet arcade rawk graphic novels which focus on Scott Pilgrim, an ordinary 23-year-old guy living in Toronto, playing in a rock band, dating Asian high school girls, falling for an Amazon.com delivery girl who is quite literally, the girl of his dreams, and having huge important fights with evil ex-boyfriends. SCOTT PILGRIM has recently been optioned for development as a motion picture by Universal, with Edgar Wright attached to direct.

We're all really hoping that Scott Pilgrim Volume 4: Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together, will be available at TCAF this summer. But no one is promising anything...

Related Links:
Bryan O'Malley's Homepage
Scott Pilgrim.com
Oni Press
Kupek

Ramón Pérez 
A freelance Cartoonist by day and and aspiring writer by night, Ramón's day to day is entrenched in comic book storytelling and editorial illustration for various publications ranging from the straight laced to the fantastical. His comics repertoire includes Degrassi: Extra Credit V2 for Fenn Publishing, Incredibles for Dark Horse Comics, as well as an upcoming arc for DC's JSA: Classified featuring Wildcat. On the side, in his non existent spare time Ramón enjoy drawing and writing his own creations. Along with co-creator Rob Coughler, he is one of the masterminds behind the popular weekly webcomic BUTTERNUTSQUASH and is about to launch his new adventure strip titled KUKUBURI at this years TCAF.

Related Links:
calaverakid.com (art gallery)
butternutsquash.net (butternutsquash)
transmission-x.com (kukuburi)

Lorenz Peter
Lorenz Peter is a musician, painter and cartoonist living in Toronto. He has been self-publishing the Side Effect minicomic series since 1993 and is the creator of "Gregory Spalding, the Most Boring Vampire Ever." His first graphic novel, Chaos Mission, was published by Pedlar Press in 2003.

In 2005 Lorenz' was awarded a Doug Wright Award for Best Emerging Talent, for his autobiographical Graphic Novel Dark Adaptation.

Related Links:
Peddlar Press
Doug Wright Awards Bio

Nick Postic & Nick Marinkovich
"The Nicks" as they're called are the creators of the mini-series IMPALER, from Image Comics. Their previous credits include art chores for the Underworld movie adaptation and the Underworld: Red in Tooth and Claw mini-series for IDW Publishing. Their work has also appeared in Digital Webbing Presents as well as a back-up in the Nothingface graphic novel.

Related Links:
http://www.impalercomic.com/

John C. Ralston
John C. Ralston is currently nearing the end of his "A Year In Comics" project, which sees him printing a new page of comics every day of 2007. He'll be exhibiting at TCAF with copies of his minis and much more.

Related Links:
A Year In Comics

Zen Rankin
Zen Rankin is a Toronto-area illustrator, and a member of Sketchkrieg!
Related Links:
http://www.zenrankin.com/
Sketchkrieg Blog

Paul Rivoche
Paul Rivoche is a Toronto-based cartoonist and illustrator. Freelancing for 30 years, he has worked in many areas of commercial art, including animation background designs and storyboards for Warner Brothers’ adventure cartoons, comic book artwork and covers for DC and Vertigo, magazine illustration, artwork for children’s publishing, advertising art, paperback covers, and more.

He recently wrote and drew three short comic stories for Adhouse Books’ acclaimed “Project” anthology series, PROJECT:TELSTAR, PROJECT:SUPERIOR, AND PROJECT:ROMANTIC. These were great fun to create, and he is currently working on more stories featuring his own characters.

Most recent projects are background designs for Warner Brothers’ LEGION OF SUPERHEROES cartoon, designs and storyboard art for the upcoming direct-to-video version of Darwyn Cooke’s THE NEW FRONTIER, and a recently-published graphic novel for Scholastic Canada, titled LOUIS CYR, CHAMPION OF STRONGMEN.

Related links:
http://www.rocketfiction.blogspot.com/
http://paulrivoche.creativesource.ca/

Dave Sim will only be appearing on Saturday, August 18th.

Craig Taillefer
Craig is a professional cartoonist working in the fields of Comic Books and Animation. He is the creator of WAHOO MORRIS, a self-published comic series about a band trying to make it, and illustrator of the the Harvey Award nominated web comic THE CHELATION KID written by Robert Tinnell.

Related Links:
http://www.craigtaillefer.com/

Tara Tallan began work on her science fiction story Galaxion when she was twelve. Since then she has gone on to become a serious sci-fi nut, including having spent ten years working at Canada's oldest science fiction bookstore, Bakka (now known as Bakka-Phoenix).

Tara wrote, drew, inked, lettered, and published Galaxion from 1993 to 1999, and during that time appeared at comic conventions across North America. She was nominated for the Ignatz Award for Promising New Talent in 1998 and the Friends of Lulu Kim Yale Award for Best New Talent in 1998 and 1999. She has a prose short story published in the Bakka Anthology, alongside such science fiction luminaries as Tanya Huff, Robert J. Sawyer, and Cory Doctorow. She has also been hired for several freelance art projects, including a comic book designed to sell Spenco ^TM insoles (no, I am not kidding). She has had precisely no formal art school training.

Tara is currently serializing the final iteration of Galaxion at webcomics site Girlamatic.

Related Links:
Galaxion at Girlamatic

Jillian Tamaki
Jillian Tamaki's work has appeared in the New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, The New Yorker, Bitch, Bust, Ascent, and CBC Arts Online. With her cousin, Mariko Tamaki, she's currently expanding the comic Skim into a graphic novel for Groundwood Press (an imprint of Anansi). Raised in Calgary, she graduated from the Alberta College of Art and Design in 2003. Her work has been exhibited at the Giant Robot store and gallery. She currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Jillian Tamaki's book for Conundrum Press, Guilded Lillies, has been nominated for a Doug Wright Award for Best Book. Jillian will be signing at the Conundrum table over the course of the weekend, please see the publisher section for details.

Related Links:
Conundrum Press
www.jilliantamaki.com

Diana Tamblyn
An Ignatz-nominated Toronto cartoonist who has been actively writing and drawing mini-comics for almost 10 years now. Creator of the short works THERE YOU WERE, WRITER'S BLOCK, and DUTY MUST BE DONE: The Story of Frederic Banting, amongst others. Her last release was THE TOCA LOCA PROJECT, and she will be debuting a new mini-comic THE ROSIE STORIES at TCAF this summer.

Related Links:
Diana Tamblyn's Homepage

Peter Thompson
Reminiscent of sometime-collaborator, comics jam-mate and fellow Ontario native Marc Bell for its sheer dizzying and exhausting inventiveness, Canadian artist Peter Thompson's angular, detailed, logic-defying, artfully-constructed illustrations have shown in many galleries and now are becoming known to comics fans thanks to the publication of The Chronicles of Lucky Ello, from Drawn & Quarterly.

Related Links:
Peter Thompson at Drawn + Quarterly

Maurice Vellekoop
A talented illustrator and artist, Maurice Vellekoop resides on Centre Island in Toronto. As renowned for his illustration work and paintings as his comics, Maurice has produced a number of exquisite books including VELLEVISION, a collection of his art and comics, two volumes of MEN'S ROOM, short erotic comics, and THE ABC BOOK, a homoerotic primer. In 2004 Maurice completed a series of six erotic prints based on Greek Mythology.

Maurice's most recent release is A NUT AT THE OPERA, a collection of fun Opera illustrations featuring a fantasitc cast of characters, with accompanying text.

Related Links:
Maurice Vellekoop at Drawn & Quarterly
Lambiek's Biography of Vellekoop
An Extensive Vellekoop Fan-site
Vellekoops' Erotic Greek Prints

George A. Walker
George A. Walker is an award-winning wood engraver, book artist, author and illustrator who has been creating artwork and printing books at his private press since 1984. Walker exhibits his wood engravings and limited-edition books internationally. He graduated with Honours from the Ontario College of Art in 1983, and from Brock University with a BEd. George has taught popular Book Arts courses at the Ontario College of Art and Design since 1990, where he is an Associate Professor.

George A. Walker is also the author of Graphic Witness: Four Wordless Graphic Novels: Frans Masereel, Lynd Ward, Giacomo Patri and Laurence Hyde.

Graphic Witness reproduces in the entirety four rare wordless novels by well-known printmakers working in woodcut from 1918 1951. Frans Masereel (1899-1972) was born in Belgium and is considered the father of the wordless graphic novel. Graphic Witness includes the first reprint of his classic work, The Passion of a Man, since its 1918 publication in Munich. American Lynd Ward (1905-85), author of the provocative Wild Pilgrimage, is considered among the most important of wordless novelists. Giacomo Patri (1898-1978) was born in Italy and lived in the United States. His White Collar featured an introduction by Rockwell Kent and was used a promotional piece by the labor movement. Southern Cross by Canadian Laurence Hyde (1914-87) was controversial for its criticism of U.S. H-bomb testing in the South Pacific. An introduction by George A. Walker places each wordless novel in its context and examines the influence of these works on contemporary culture, including film, comic books and contemporary graphic novels. Also featured is an afterword by graphic novelist and illustrator Seth.

George A. Walker's appearance at TCAF is generously sponsored by Firefly Books, publishers of GRAPHIC WITNESS.

Related Links:
George A. Walker's Homepage
GRAPHIC WITNESS at Firefly Books Website

Tom Humberstone
Tom Humberstone has been writing, drawing, and self-publishing comics under the alias of VentedSpleen for three years.

His comics Art School Scum, So I Draw and How to Date a Girl in 10 Days have garnered favourable reviews in various publications including Dazed and Confused, RedEye Magazine, and the popular web-based comic journal Silver Bullet Comics.

He has exhibited at several comics conventions including the UK Web and Mini-Comix Thing and the Bristol International Comic Expo.

Related Links:
http://www.ventedspleen.com/

Vera Brosgol
Vera Brosgol was born in 1984 in Moscow, RUssia, which she promptly vacated for more American climes.

She earned a diploma in Classical Animation at Sheridan College, where despite the cold she managed to make a short film.

Her comics have been published by Image Comics, Oni Press, and Random House Canada as part of the FLIGHT anthologies.

She is currently hard at work on the film adaptation of Neil Gaiman's CORALINE.

Related Links:
Vera's Homepage
Vera's Sketchblog

Eleanor Davis
Eleanor Davis was born in Tucson, Arizona where excessive heat, the preponderance of asphalt, and low social skills kept her from standard childhood activities such as going outside, playing, making friends, etc. After realizing that what she wanted more than anything in the world was to live in a small city where people sit under shady trees and are nice to each other, she moved to Savannah, Georgia - possibly the most pleasant city in America.

Eleanor lives and works with her boyfriend Drew Weing. Together they run Little House Comics, where you can buy their comics and artwork.
Related Links:
Eleanor Davis' Homepage
Little House Comics

Sarah Dyer
Sarah Dyer is a writer/artist/colourist, and founder/editor of the ACTION GIRL! comics anthology. She's coloured just about every illustration husband Evan Dorkin has ever made, and in addition she also runs JinJur.com, a collection of articles and commentary on more "domestic" pursuits.
Related Links:
House of Fun
JinJur

Tim Fish
Tim Fish currently resides in Boston, has a swell day job he'd love to ditch, and draws comics as much as possible. His past work includes the self-published bittersweet gay romance series Cavalcade of Boys; Web comics for Popimage and Edge; the graphic novel Strugglers; as well as commissioned and commercial art. His first project for Marvel Comics was published in 2006. Tim likes all sorts of music, old movies, and maps. Tim dislikes stupid things that aren't supposed to be stupid, and comic books that don't have their pages numbered.

Tim Fish's most recent publication is the benefit-anthology YOUNG BOTTOMS IN LOVE, collecting five years worth of the webcomic that ran at PopImage.com.

Related Links:
Tim Fish Works
Modern Tales.com
TBIL @ Popimage.com

Meredith Gran
Meredith Gran is the creator of the webcomic OCTOPUS PIE. In her day job, she's an animator in Brooklyn, NY.

Related Links:
Octopus Pie

Kevin Huizenga
Kevin Huizenga was born in 1977 in Harvey, IL and spent most of his childhood in South Holland, IL, near Chicago. He attended college in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and moved to St. Louis in 2000 where he lives and works.

He began drawing comics in high school, xeroxing his first issue (with friends) at the neighborhood Jewel Osco in 1993. Since that time he's made approximately 30 more. In 2001 the Comics Journal named him "Minimalism Cartoonist of the Year" and called #14 of his "Supermonster" mini-comic series "one of the best comics of any kind released in 2001."

In 2001 he also started the Catastrophe Shop http://www.usscatastrophe.com, an online shop for self-published mini-comics.

Kevin's most recent works are CURSES, a collection of his short stories featuring character Glenn Ganges and published by Drawn & Quarterly, and GANGES, part of the Ignatz line of books published by Fantagraphics.

Related Links:
Kevin Huizenga at Drawn + Quarterly The Balloonist- Kevin's Blog

Jon Lewis
Jon Lewis, whose heritage is half Norwegian, grew up in Minnesota. At the age of seventeen, he fell ill for a few years, so he never finished school. Instead, he started making his own mini-comics, taking advantage of the burgeoning mini-comics underground of the late eighties. In 1994, his work won him (as well as his fellow artist Tom Hart) the Xeric Grant, which he used to publish the first issues of the series TRUE SWAMP. This series, and the following GHOST SHIP, featured a fantastic atmosphere, displaying Lewis' interest in Norse folklore and legends. His next series, SPECTACLES, was more realistic. He most recently released the graphic novella POWER OF 6.
Related Links:
http://www.indyworld.com/lewis/index.html

Rina Piccolo
Rina Piccolo has been drawing and doodling for longer than she can remember. Her professional career began in 1989 with her first published cartoon, and she’s been happily chained to the drawing board ever since. Rina’s work has been seen in numerous magazines, books, cartoon anthologies, and greeting cards. She is the author of three cartoon collections: “Stand Back, I think I’m Gonna Laugh…”, “Rina’s Big Book Of Sex Cartoons”, and “Kicking The Habit: Cartoons about the Catholic Church”.

More recently, Rina has enjoyed continued success as the “Wednesday chick” on King Features’ daily panel “SIX CHIX”. In 2002, Rina lauched her very own comic strip, “TINA’S GROOVE”, syndicated by King Features Syndicate.

Rina was born and raised in Toronto, Canada. She now lives with her husband in New York City with their canary, Olive.

Related Links:
http://tinasgroove.com/rina

Dave Roman
Dave Roman draws the webcomic series, Astronaut Elementary, and is partially responsible for several books including Agnes Quill: An Anthology of Mystery (Slave Labor Graphics), Jax Epoch & the Quicken Forbidden (AiT/PlanetLar), Teen Boat (Cryptic Press). He’s had stories in Flight volumes 3 and 4 (Ballantine/Villard) and Bizarro World (DC Comics). Dave is also one of the co-founders of Lifemetercomics.com and an editor Nickelodeon Magazine.
Related Links:
http://www.yaytime.com
http://yaytime.livejournal.com/
http://astronautelementary.com
http://comicsbakery.com

Jeffrey Rowland
What can be said about the legend that is Jeffrey Rowland? Seriously. The guy does TWO webcomics. Draws 'em and colours 'em and everything. There's WIGU, for which he is perhaps best-known, and OVERCOMPENSATING, which is an absolutely-true diary comic. Also, he runs a company that prints and distributes T-Shirts that you love, it's called TopatoCo. and it has a shirt with the words "DOCTOR MONKEY KNOWS WHAT YOU DID" on it, and an appopriately stern-faced Dr. Monkey illustration, scowling away.

Jeffrey Rowland is awesome and we are happy he's coming to Toronto.

Richard Stevens
Former graphic designer rstevens has been working on the incredibly popular webcomic series DIESEL SWEETIES since April of 2000. He has produced two books from the series, including the original graphic novella HOW I BLEW MY THURSDAY NIGHT. Richard teaches graphic design and visual communication at the Hartford Art School, and coined the phrase "I'm A Rocker, I Rock Out" for which T-shirt wearers everywhere will be eternally grateful.
Related Links:
Diesel Sweeties Online
Rich's Homepage