First trailer for Bill Sienkiewicz documentary ‘That Polish Guy’ debuts at SDCC

The film explores the artist’s career through interviews with Vincent D’Onofrio, Jim Lee, Jimmy Palmiotti and more.

The first trailer for Bill Sienkiewicz: That Polish Guy dropped during a San Diego Comic-Con panel, giving fans a look at the upcoming documentary on the influential artist. The title comes from a nickname Sienkiewicz received from actor-director Clint Eastwood.

Sienkiewicz was joined by the documentary’s director Remsy Atassi and producer Sal Abbinanti at the con to discuss his career and the making of the film, followed by an audience Q&A.

“I’m incredibly excited about the documentary; it’s both humbling and nerve-wracking to see my life’s work splayed out on-screen accompanied by observations by so many of my creative heroes,” said Sienkiewicz. “But more, I’m excited because the documentary discusses the obsessive need to make art, as part of the unifying human experience, a drive that defies language, place or even medium of choice. That drive is something we all share and I’m proud, in the words of the great Cormac McCarthy, to carry that fire.”

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Smash Pages Q&A: Sal Abbinanti on ‘The Hostage’

The creator of ‘Atomika’ returns with a new Kickstarter project that’s been 10 years in the making.

Sal Abbinanti might be familiar to comics readers for his series Atomika, but even those who read that series will be surprised by his artwork in the new graphic novel The Hostage, which is being crowdfunded now.

Abbinanti has been drawing the book on and off for years, but it has its roots in a trip he took to Brazil decades ago. Since then he couldn’t get the image out of his head of homeless children living just around the corner from the bright, colorful tourist district of Rio. In The Hostage, he found a story and an aesthetic that allowed him to tell the story in a way that is unsettling and unsentimental.

For the campaign, Abbinanti enlisted a number of friends to draw work for stretch goals, but the star is what Abbinanti was able to achieve in the pages. He was kind enough to talk about The Hostage, its road to publication and his crowdfunding campaign.

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