This Spring SAGE College will be host a Comics Club hosted by local creator Ira Marcks.

Comics Club: Adventures in Visual Storytelling is about discovering the art and craft of storytelling with cartoons. Cartoonist and writer Ira Marcks facilitates this workshop series and teaches about encouraging creative ideas, collaborative thinking, critical response and a sense of clarity through visual narrative. Each week will focus on a different skill, including brainstorming, plotting story, character design, and developing a unique illustration style.

Comics Club is about more than making comics. It’s about the language of drawing. Drawing is an amazing communication tool. It’s a universal way to share thoughts and information with people from all over the world. It’s also a highly effective way for filmmakers, graphic artists, and video game designers to share ideas at their purest stage of development. For 4th graders and up–middle school and high school students, included.

Where: OPALKA Gallery, SAGE COLLEGE

When: Thursdays: March 31, April 7, April 14, April 21, May 5 and May 12

Time: 4:15 to 5:45

Cost: $90 for the full six-week class, includes snacks and materials

Deadline: March 24

for more information or to to download a registration form visit the website or contact Amy Griffin at griffa@sage.edu or 518-292-8607

Last week I sat down with Ira to learn more about the program, his background as a creator and the different projects he has worked on and is currently doing.

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How did you get into comics and drawing?

I always have drawn, I remember my dad would read me books as a kid and I would like to draw little books from them. When we would read The Hobbit, I knew the book had a map in it, butI would still make him draw with me and do some world building.

I was drawing before I got into comics, just starting with the newspaper like most kids probably do…exclusively CALVIN & HOBBES by Bill Waterson because it is the best of all time. Even as a kid I kinda knew that. I studied graphic design in college and have always thought about layout and Calvin and Hobbes just always looked better than all the other ones. So CALVIN & HOBBES was the first, never got into DC Comics but did read Marvel books like the Chris Claremont era X-Men, they were back issues because they were a little cheaper. So some early X-Men and some Spider-Man and I fell for the whole 90s Image Comics era, reading a lot of Spawn. My girlfriend read The Maxx which was way cooler, Spawn was just a mashup of a bunch of normal superheroes to make one super dark normal superhero. I read that for a long time and then went to college and studied design, but by my Senior year I was back into comics and that has led me to where I am now which is some weird freelancy, cartoony illustration, and teaching.

What are your creative influences?

I would say mainly Bill Waterson, my book Witch Knots, about a boy who imagines animals that he can talk to and reveals something about themselves which started as a webcomic which I would post two or three a day (also available online at above link). I had done some longer projects before like some anthology work and been working on a graphic novel that I never really went anywhere so I started doing the webcomic around 2007 or 08. The webcomic was mostly inspired by Calvin and Hobbes, with the frameless 3rd panel, with a silhouette of a design.

Other than that I would say Ray Bradbury and other science fiction writers.

Cartoon-wise Rob Schrab, who did Scud: The Disposable Assassin, was something I was reading the single issues as they were coming out; Jhonen Vasquez’s Johnny the Homicidal Maniac,

basically, the indie guys that couldn’t really draw that well but they could animate and do all kinds of stuff. I like that diversity, I never really wanted to “be in the industry” and work on someone else’s book or character, I just liked the independent guys.

I met Jeff Smith creator of Bone is also a giant inspiration, the way he tells a story and pacing he uses is very influential on the way I draw comics

Career path wise just keep doing stuff and people will ask you to do things.

So tell me about the Making Comics Workshop?

I do all kinds of teaching stuff but I do these Comic Jam events where you start with a panel and give you a title such as “Zapped by a Shrink Ray,” “Pirate Goes Shopping, ” or “Time Travel Field Trip” for example. So you start with the title and draw the first panel and then it gets passed to the next artist who draws panel 2 and so on as it goes around the room, sort of like an improv. I do these 3-hour workshops all over the place during the summer. The one I will be doing at SAGE will probably start with something like that before moving on to more storytelling troubleshooting.

This is not a class where I teach somebody to how to draw superheroes, in fact, we don’t even deal with superheroes, it is mainly about the narrative.

When I do this project with the kids you can talk about any point in visual narrative history from the old tapestries to the old Tales From the Crypt comics and how the points of view change. My interests are more along the Scott McCloud idea of how do we use cartooning as a tool to speak with clarity about our ideas, so that is the general theme of the class. I do bring a bunch of comics, depending on the age group, such as the autobiographical original graphic novel BLANKETS by Craig Matthew Thompson which is the story of a young man coming of age and finding the confidence to express his creative voice. I like that book a lot…

I also use comic strips like THE FAR SIDE and CALVIN & HOBBES, even something like DINOTOPIA by James Gurney which is an illustrated book series about an island inhabited by humans and sentient dinosaurs who have formed a complex, interdependent society; or Tim Burton’s little books of poetry or Edward Gory, who is noted for his illustrated books of characteristic pen-and-ink drawings often depict vaguely unsettling narrative scenes in Victorian and Edwardian settings.

Basically, it goes away from storytelling to the most effective way to use a picture to share a story so we use comics but it goes into more experimental stuff.

I notice you have WATCHMEN on your bookshelf….

Yeah, that is a good one and I will bring that along with some Spider-Man. I will also bring stuff by Chris Ware just to show how big and odd the formats can get. I like this Jason Shiga book, MEANWHILE, which is like an interactive comics about alternate realities so there are a few different versions of the story.

Who would benefit from attending the workshop?

I think anyone one who fundamentally wants to tell a story on things they create or work on with other people. Anyone who wants to work in media or likes video game design. I like to listen to podcasts on narrative driven games such as the classic MYST or RIVEN, which built a branch story system. I think it could benefit those people

People who want to draw comics, work in film or photography would benefit since we talk about composition. Anyone doing work in a visual medium I think would enjoy being part of the class. I make it fun too as I try to make it very conversational. You read a lot of this stuff as a kid or young person anyway so it is probably what you know best more than novels or film, you are familiar with comics.

How long have you been doing these workshops?

Since I moved to the area 7 to 8 years ago. Someone asked me to sub in for them at the Art Center here in Troy, might have been a cartooning class. I did some summer workshops, do classes for home school network: cartooning, basic video game design, graphic design, and more traditional art. I did freelance for a long time but I enjoy the teaching more.

Are you currently reading any comics?

Ah should have looked up something and read it and I could be like “oh I am reading this…”

I am currently deep into a couple projects so I think that I try and avoid other new things. I don’t mind being influenced, but sometimes you just don’t want to be.

I try to keep up on stuff or my students will show me stuff, like a Tumblr they are following. Anime stuff like PRINCESS MONONOKE is always relevant, so I try and dig into older stuff more.

Maybe I should go back and read some Captain America because the kids I work with are seeing all these movies and never really followed those characters. Not that the Batman v Superman movie is going to reveal anything mind blowing but maybe I should read Frank Miller since the movie has that feel to it, so I should go back and refresh myself on The Dark Knight Returns and maybe bring it in. Miller has some great storytelling and panel layouts even though they can get a little dark. Like I am not going to share Sin City with kids, but the way he uses contrast, same with Mike Mignola on Hellboy. It is great to think about and see how they use positive and negative space along with fundamental design issues.

I do go to the small press expo in Maryland with other local creators like Jess Fink and her boyfriend, just to see what is new. I have known them for a long time from Live Journal before I moved here. I saw a flyer for an art show and was like that art is familiar (Jess’s drawing) and was like oh wow she lives here.

I would like to catch up on SAGA, I hear that is good.

I was looking at your website and was interested in the music video you illustrated could you tell me about that project?

I called it an illustrated score. For brief moment a friend had a record label, so it had a band that made an album and the theme was more of a concept album about a kid who was born as a drummer and drummed a hole into the center of the earth, so lyrically it all kinda flowed together, so the ideas was to make a single music video to cover the whole thing. Since I am not an animator it had to be a giant scrolling image, so I mocked it all up into little parts and photo shopped it all together. Sometimes the images reflect the soundscape of the song and the instruments being played or more literal to what is going on in the song. The story follows the father and the mother and a lot of sound making shapes. So that was a fun project and a nice experiment because it allowed me to play through the different realms of art such as Celtic to schematics of motors. It took me about a year or so and it changed the stuff I was interested in. It got me thinking that maybe I am not so much into comics and allowed me to branch out into storyboarding into startups that were designing app “proof of concept” pitches.

When you draw is there a medium that you prefer to work with?

For a long time it was my P.H. Martin inks and watercolors on nice hot press Archer’s paper and that is how I did most of my comic work until this fall when I got a tablet similar to the Cyntik and have been doing a lot of artwork on it. I used to sit here all the time (at his art desk with the inks and watercolors) but haven’t in a long time. I recently made a label for Rare Form Brewing Company so I am not going to draw that by hand because I can do it in a few hours in the tablet. I always had an aversion to a drawing tablet because it can sterilize things and I like the looseness of the watercolor. But you can get some pretty good brushes (on the tablet) and I can say what I need to say with it. I just don’t like looking at a computer screen all day, it is nice to sit over here and look out the window as I work.

When you create do you listen to any music or are you just “in the zone” so to speak?

I am always listening to something..If I am writing I like to listen to something ambient instrumental thing, if I am drawing I like to listen to audio books or talk radio, but not when I am writing.

Do prefer the writing or the drawing more?

I think I like the drawing more but I don’t get bored but resentful of myself. I don’t get as much satisfaction drawing as I do when I write. I worte a book that my agent has been pitching but it is not going anywhere. It is good but not great like the novel that never went anywhere. I know I am not a great writer, I didn’t go to school for it, so that is a lot of fun for me to keep trying to get good at it. I don’t mind if I never sell that first book that I spent two full years on, it was a thing that just made me better and is more interesting to me now than drawing. Drawing is like a vacation, writing feels like I am really making art again and I have to really reach something within me.

With my drawing I don’t feel like I challenge myself, cartooning doesn’t seem to go there for me, maybe if I was more of a fine artist. I am in a band but I don’t consider myself a musician and need to express myself that way, it is just for fun.

But I wish I was drawing more.

I know you are into the indie comics but is there a property from one of the major publishers you might want to work on? Say something you read growing up?

I would like to do HELLBOY because I like the story format of referencing some myth, I like that and the setting is always cool.

Superhero stuff always boggled my mind. Maybe working on the everyman version of Hawkeye or maybe something “slice of life” with some action.

Or maybe taking an older, obscure character and treat them how they should have been or doing a new spin on it…maybe something along the lines of Alan Moore’s LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN.

Is hard to find time between teaching and doing your creating and art?

I make it work for me because it is a loose format. I am pretty good at making time for myself to work, so it not a problem. If it did I would just drop some of the things so I could keep an equal balance. Teaching inspires my work but if I don’t have time to make the inspired work then it is like I don’t want to teach as much.

Anything you are currently working on?

Besides the workshops, I have a few books I am shopping around. I am doing illustrations for these 4-panel comics called Everyday Creative which focusses on local creators of all kinds.

The book is called Creative Everyday, and with the support of the Workforce Development Institute, it will be shared with 10,000 kids around the region. Creative Everyday are True Tales about leading a creative life and trials and tribulations of Art and Life colliding and to inspire kids to explore Upstate NY’s Creative Economy.

I also have these little drawings and tropes called Signs From Other Worlds, not sure what I am going to do with it (check out his Tumblr page here) but it is a collection of drawings that show the hopes, fears, and weird ideas found in speculative fiction ranging from cosmic horror to cyberpunk, this ongoing project is about exploring the history of creative storytelling culture.

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I would like to thank Ira for taking the time to do the interview and hope readers here will check out his website, Tumblrs, and other projects that are mentioned in the interview. I would also like to thank him for the copy of his book Witch Knots, can’t wait to read it.