SVA Talent Pool: Recruiting Cartoonists

This story originally appeared in PW Comics Week on May 1, 2007 Sign up now!

by Laurel Maury, PW Comics Week -- Publishers Weekly, 5/1/2007

On a gray Sunday in April, a group of comics and book publishing professionals filed into a classroom on Second Avenue on the East Side of Manhattan. They were there to meet undergraduate students in the cartooning program at Manhattan's School of Visual Arts and offer criticism and guidance—but their presence was only partly altruistic. SVA's three linked events—the portfolio review; the junior thesis art show; and Fresh Meat, an annual minicomics book fair—have grown into attractive and lively venues for recruiting young talented comics artists and writers.

"I don't know why people aren't storming the place," said agent Bob Mecoy, who began representing then-SVA junior, Hilary Florido, last year. While still a senior, Florido began working on a book for First Second, the Holt/Roaring Brook graphic novel imprint. Sheila Keenan, a senior editor at Scholastic's Graphix imprint, was more blunt. "I'm looking for the next Jeff Smith."

Over the past few years SVA students have moved steadily into the professional cartooning ranks, working for traditional comics publishers like DC and Marvel. But SVA graduates are also signing book deals with such trade book houses as Wiley and First Second and with original manga publishers like Tokyopop. Better known graduates of the program include such artists as Amy Kim Ganter (Sorcerers and Secretaries), Raina Telgemeier (The Babysitters Club) and Becky Cloonan (East Coast Rising).

James Killen, graphic novel buyer for Barnes & Noble, was present at the student portfolio review and told PWCW, "I want to see who the up-and-coming people are." Also on hand: a New York Times art director; Marvel editors Nate Cosby and Mike Short and two representatives from DC Comics. Soyoung Jung, editorial, marketing director of NetComics, the Korean manhwa publisher, was there and so was the indie online comics journal The Comics Foundry. Brandon Buford, an editor at King Syndicates, longtime supplier of comic strips to newspapers, represented both old school newspaper comics and new wave indie publishing—he's also the editor of Syncopated, a self-published anthology of short nonfiction comic stories inspired by New Yorker writer Joseph Mitchell. Random House editor Chris Schluep, editor of Kazu Kabuishi's Flight anthology, was there scouting the talent. Pantheon and Archie Comics each sent one editor, while Scholastic sent four.

Marvel's Cosby was candid about why he attends: "I come to see the emerging talent and I take down names. But I also come to see where comics are going."

Jessica Abel (c.) surrounded by her
students at the SVA thesis art show

Keith Mayerson, a tall, bearded professor in the cartooning program, said that SVA has 202 students in cartooning and illustration majors, with 116 seniors. "We want to be the Harvard of comics," he said. "I find teaching SVA students so exciting. These cartooning and comic art kids are from all different backgrounds."

SVA cartooning and illustration chair Thomas Woodruff started the three events in 2002 and was quick to point out how the program has changed. "When I came in 2000, it was mostly fan boys wanting to draw superheroes," he explained. "Now that's the minority, and there are so many girls. Our eight top students are all girls." Woodruff pointed out students Marguerite Dabaie and Chari Pere, best friends, who were awarded the program's Shakespeare & Co. scholarship, which will enable them to self-publish their work. Dabaie draws musings about being a Palestinian Christian. Pere is an illustrator who will be represented by Mecoy.

SVA has developed a reputation recently for producing students like Dabaie and Pere, who draw in a style that's related to manga, Mayerson explained. Hillary Florido draws in that style, as does fellow student Yali Lin, who is working on a manga version of Romeo and Juliet for Wiley. But all kinds of drawing styles were present at the junior art exhibition. Teylor Smirls, a stick-thin junior co-ed from West Virginia, has drawn a great little bloody slasher comic for her junior thesis. "My dream is to draw for Goosebumps," said Smirls. Another student, Jean Huh, draws classical shojo manga in a lovely, spare style, and Paul Kaminski's Angry Chicken is a wicked-funny series that looks like something from the 1990s underground.

Mayerson said SVA has a long history of producing comics creators. Founded in 1947 as the Cartoonists and Illustrators School, SVA's cartooning program boasts such legendary former faculty members as the late Will Eisner and Harvey Kurtzman. Today the faculty includes contemporary comics stars like Jessica Abel (La Perdida), Matt Madden (99 Ways to Tell a Story) and Nick Bertozzi (The Salon). Given the growth and development of the comics market and the demand for new talent, Mayerson said his greatest concern is that the program may become too commercial. "Comics are an art form," said Mayerson. "It's important that these kids get to do their own stuff."

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