Tag: NCSFest

Colleen Doran, Alex Ross, Sarah Andersen among this year’s NCS divisional nominees

The National Cartoonist Society announces the divisional nominees for the 77th Annual NCS Reuben Awards.

The National Cartoonists Society has announced the 2022 NCS Divisional finalists for the 77th Annual NCS Reuben Awards, which annually recognize creators of comic strips, illustrations, comic books and more. The winners will be announced Sept. 7, and the nominees for their biggest award, the Reuben itself, should be announced soon.

The awards recognize the artist or cartoonist, so you’ll see work, the writer or publisher aren’t called out in the nominations. The graphic novel category nominees for this year include Colleen Doran, artist of Chivalry; Alex Ross, creator of Fantastic Four: Full Circle; and Christian Meesey, artist of Time Shopper. For comic books, the nominees include Brett Bean, artist of I Hate Fairyland; Ben Bender, creator of The Littlest Viking; and Robert Goodin, creator of The Kurdles.

Webcomics creators are recognized in two categories — long form and short form. In the long-form category, the nominees include Phil Foglio, Brad Guigar and Sheldon creator Dave Kellett. In the short-form category, Sarah Andersen, Tex creator Jesse Atwell and Rich Powell have been nominated.

Below is the full list of the nominees.

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Edward Sorel awarded the Reuben; Powell, Petersen + more win NCS awards

The National Cartoonist Society recognized cartoonists and artist across several categories this past weekend.

The National Cartoonist Society has named Edward Sorel as the 2021 Cartoonist of the Year, presenting him with their annual Reuben Award.

The Reuben, along with the annual NCS Divisional Awards, were announced over the weekend during the Reuben Awards gala dinner.

Sorel’s work has appeared in The Nation, New York Magazine, The Atlantic, The New York Times, Vanity Fair, Village Voice, National Lampoon, Fortune, Forbes, Time, Esquire and countless other publications. The 92-year-old artist’s memoir, Profusely Illustrated, was published last year.

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Comics Lowdown | A look back at this weekend’s big comics events

Check out the news from both DC FanDome and NCS Fest, both of which had sessions you can still watch online.

This past weekend was filled with comics events of all shapes and sizes, from DC FanDome — which was about way more than comics, but they still had a strong presence — to the annual NCS Fest, which again went virtual and incorporated content from both the National Cartoonists Society and the Lakes International Comic Arts Festival in the UK.

In case you missed any of it, here’s the lowdown …

DC FanDome

This year’s FanDome was much shorter than last year’s, as DC opted for one day of livestreaming content rather than two. And it was better for it. The production was very tight, and I haven’t seen any issues raised about connection issues or the sorts of problems that can plague events like this.

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Ray Billingsley wins the Reuben Award

The creator of the comic strip ‘Curtis’ is the first African-American cartoonist to win the Reuben Award.

Ray Billingsley, creator of the long-running comic strip Curtis, has won the 2021 Reuben Award. He’s the first Black man to win the award since it was first established in the 1940s.

“This has been a huge step for me, and also a momentous step for the NCS because I’m the first Black guy to win the prestigious Reuben Award, and for that I’m very grateful,” Billingsley said in his acceptance speech. “This has been a very long journey, and I have literally lived my life on a deadline.”

Billingsley started his career drawing for KIDS Magazine when he was 12. After college and an internship with Disney, he went on to work on the nationally syndicated strip Lookin’ Fine, which ran from 1980 to 1982. He has also worked in animation, advertising and for various magazines and greeting card companies. Curtis launched in 1988 at King Feature Syndicate and is still published today. You can read it on the Comic Kingdom website.

You can watch the announcement of Billingsley’s win below, which includes his acceptance speech:

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Walt Simonson, Jared Cullum win 2021 NCS Divisional Awards

French cartoonist Boulet received the Sergio Aragones International Award for Excellence in Comic Art.

This weekend is NCS Fest, the annual event hosted by the National Cartoonists Society that includes, among other activities, the NCS Divisional Awards and the annual presentation of the Reuben Award.

This year’s event is being streamed online, and the NCS has interspersed some of the awards presentations throughout the stream. Yesterday Hellboy artist Duncan Fegredo presented the award for best comic book, which went to Walt Simonson’s Ragnarok: The Breaking of Helheim. The comic is published by IDW, which also publishes the other two nominees in the category, Usagi Yojimbo and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Jennika.

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