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MoCCA Art Fest 2006: Part II
Ed Mathews
Attendance at the 5th Annual MoCCA Art Festival was lighter on Sunday than on Saturday afternoon, which some attributed to the Puerto Rican Pride parade. MoCCA will be dealing with pride parades forever if the festival stays in June, so they should either move the date or resign themselves to that fact and send out PR to ahwtever community newspapers they will be sharing the weekend with. One year, MoCCA was held on Gay Pride weekend and Sunday traffic was also smaller than Saturday traffic that year. A little advertising to the local gay press could have made that a different story, however.
 Back to the books. Keith Knight has a style that's got that underground comix vibe, complete with political commentary and biting satire. THE PASSION OF THE KEEF is Keith's most recent collection didn't pull any punches tackling, well, everything. Voting troubles in Louisiana, the war in Iraq, and race relations. Pick up a collection today.
 MAULED is a series anothology that focuses on stories where people get, well, mauled. Brian Musikoff is editor and contributor to the anthology published by Manual Comics. It's 100% Hoboken art and the central theme allows the contributors to tell stories in a manner they might not explore in other anothologies.
Then, and what really makes these festivals a joy, are the minicomics. Minicomics really allow new faces to try just about anything in the name of art or in an attempt to grab your attention and sometimes a little bit of both. BERNIE: The Wackiest Jewlipino on Earth! by Cheryl Gladstone is an 8-page mini comic on card stock that opens the door for the reader on just about as personal a journey as one can take with a cartoonist: we see the story of a Jewish/Filipino mom with her lesbian daughter dealing with topics from body hair to interracial dating. While short, I just can't get that woman's "voice" out of my head, making this minicomic a success!
THE ANATOMY OF US by Karla Krupala is more of an academic excercise and is practically described as such on the front page. As a work in progress, it asks for the reader's feedback. Here's some of it. I love the paper used for the cover as it has a gunmetal gray with shiny bits in it. This is a sketchbook. It's a nice sketchbook, but I'd like to see more sequential storytelling.
ELSEWHERE by Gary Sullivan is a fun piece to read through. It's a series of disconnected images and stream of consciousness which makes sense after you realize what is going on. It's certainly a modern image on Coney Island and as a full piece, it works for me.
MACHINE VISION #1: Becoming.Machine, Becoming.Organic, Becoming.Abstract. by Jerel does just what the title indicates. It is an interesting mix of styles and I am interested in reading #2 to see where this is going, because it is not really told in a linear fashion. In any case, just looking at the variety of styles Jarel is capable of makes this a minicomic worth looking at.
 MAN ENOUGH: a queer romance is a minicomic by Young Bottoms in Love contributor Bill Roundy. Mr. Roundy recently debuted his minicomic at another MoCCA function and the stroy is that of a date between a gay man and a female-to-male transexual. It's a fun little romp, and the back-up story is one familiar to YBIL fans: My Life in Gay Porn is retold from the pages of YBIL here in full color.
Saturday: Part III - More photos and Saturday night's musical performances by cartoonists! 
Ed Mathews is Co-Editor in Chief of PopImage.
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Part I
Part III
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