In partnership with SAW Gallery and Pink Triangle Services (PTS), the Trans Arts Collective is presenting the Queer Youth Comics Project (QYCP). The QYCP is a French and English workshop series teaching LGBTTQ youth how to write and draw comics for self-expression in a supportive environment. This is an innovative initiative to establish more arts programming for lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, two-spirited and queer youth in the Ottawa/Outaouais region between the ages of 16 and 25 and their allies.
The last workshop will be a community panel discussion on queer youth open to the public. Discussions will be generated from the workshop participants’ comics. All members of the public are invented to attend to learn more about queer youth. We hope to continue the community dialogue on LGBTTQ youth with an exhibition at the Shenkman Arts Centre in January 2010.
Workshop Dates:
Tuesday, September 14, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
Tuesday, September 26, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
Tuesday, October 12, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
Tuesday, October 24, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
Tuesday, November 9, 6:00-9:00 p.m.
*French and English workshops will be at the same time but at different locations except for the final workshop. The November 9 workshops will be at Club SAW.
English Workshop Location:
Club SAW at SAW Gallery
67 Nicholas Street
Ottawa, ON K1N 7B9
French Workshop Location:
Pink Triangle Services (PTS)
251 Bank St, Suite 301
Ottawa, ON
K2P 1X3
Workshop fee is $100 per workshop participant.
Donations to the project are welcome. Business and community sponsorships are available. Volunteers are needed.
For more information, please contact:
Trans Arts Collective
queeryouthcomics@gmail.com
or
PTS
pinktriangle@bell.net
(613) 563-4818
For QYCP updates, please visit www.facebook.com/qyouthcomics or www.vecroyale.com.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics. 

Okay, dear readers, I have a confession to make. I've been doing this weekly Wednesday Webcomic feature for over twenty weeks now, and... well... I've run out of Webcomics!

There are still lots of big name webcomics out there that I haven't covered, PvP, Dr. McNinja, and Achewood (to name a few), but try as I might, I've never gotten into them. All of the webcomics I really dig, I've already covered in the last twenty weeks.

So... I'm turning to you (Cult)ure readers! Please, share with me your favourite webcomics, so that they can be featured in our Wednesday Webcomics posts in the weeks to come. You can list them in the comments section of this post, or email me at kevin@culturemagazine.ca.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics. 

I haven't spent much time surfing around Gregnog.com yet, but his "I am a Host at The Olive Garden" series of strips are just the kind of slice of life comics that I love. Anyone who has ever worked a crappy job can relate to the 26 strips found here.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics. 

Moe is just good old fashioned gag humour. While some of the strips are real groaners, others can't help but produce a smile or a laugh with their child like innocence.  The strip is updated two or three times a week.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics. 

The "about us" description on Buttersafe's website is rather appropriate: "Buttersafe is updated with a new comic every Tuesday and Thursday. These comics will have pictures and probably some words. Nothing else is guaranteed."

This sort of unpredictability is part of what makes the Buttersafe so fun. Some strips are black and white, some are colour, some are simple stick figure images, some have intricate illustrations, some are created by Raynato Castro (Tuesday's comics), some are created by Arthur Culan (Thursday's comics).

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics. 

The Nonaventures of Wonderella is Justice Pierce's superhero parody staring the decidedly non-heroic protagonist Dana Price, aka Wonderella. Featuring a diverse supporting cast that includes the likes of Wonderita (the sidekick) and Hitlerella (the arch nemisis), and depicted in brightly coloured images with an almost South Park cardboard cut-out feel, the strip is guaranteed to bring a smile to your face, regardless of whether you are laughing along with Wonderella, or at her.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics.

David Malki's Wondermark takes preexisting Victorian-era public domain images and adds dialgue and multiple panels, thereby transforming 19th century illusations into into enjoyable  and funny modern-day webcomics.  The site is updated Tuesdays and Fridays.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics.

If you have the internet (you do, don't you?) then there is a good chance you've already run into Dinosaur Comics, the long running fixed-art strip staring a T-Rex and his two dinosaur friends.

Though now residing in Toronto, Dinosaur Comics creator Ryan North is an Ottawa native and a Carleton University graduate. (Take that University of Ottawa.)

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics

Hey Oscar Wilde!  It's Clobberin Time! is a collection of portraits by various artists interpreting their favourite literary figure, author, or character. If you are a comic book fan, chances are you'll find your favourite artist's work here. If you are a fan of literature, you'll see fascinating interpretations of some of your favourite characters and writers.

My all time fav artist David Mack draws William Burroughs.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics.

Basic Instructions is comedian Scott Meyer's "all purpose guide to a life well-lived". Want to know How to Recover from the Failure of Your Broken Phone or How to Tell if Someone is Dangerously Crazy or How to Put Up with some Idiot Telling You a Story He Clearly Just Made Up? Well, in just four simple panels, Basic Instructions is there to help you out.

Span-o (the small press action network - ottawa) presents: The Ottawa Small Press Book Fair spring 2009 edition this  Saturday, June 20, 2009 in room 203 of the Jack Purcell Community Centre (on Elgin, at 320 Jack Purcell Lane).

General info:
the ottawa small press book fair
noon to 5pm (opens at 11am for exhibitors)
admission free to the public.

$20 for exhibitors, full tables
$10 for half-tables
(payable to rob mclennan, c/o 858 Somerset St W, main floor, Ottawa Ontario K1R 6R7).

The fair usually contains exhibitors with poetry books, novels, cookbooks, posters, t-shirts, graphic novels, comic books, magazines, scraps of paper, gum-ball machines with poems, 2x4s with text, etc, including (at previous events) Bywords, Dusty Owl, Chaudiere Books, above/ground press, Room 302 Books, The Puritan, The Ottawa Arts Review, Buschek Books, The Grunge Papers, Broken Jaw Press, BookThug, Proper Tales Press, and others.

Book fair information:
http://smallpressbookfair.blogspot.com/2009/02/ottawa-small-press-book-fair-spring.html

Pre-fair reading information:
http://abovegroundpress.blogspot.com/2009/05/ottawa-small-press-book-fair-spring.html

I was reading Wired's "Top 10 Ways to Provoke a Geek Argument," and I was shocked (shocked) to discover that I might not be as big a geek as I suspected. Sure, there were some on there that made me roll my eyes, but nothing worth fighting about. After all, I'm not that big on Tolkien (I hate singing in books; it's a personal problem). Then we got to number 2 on the Top 10 countdown: "Joss Whedon is a hack!" Now that one got my blood boiling. Geek reputation? Safe.

Every Wednesday (Cult)ure shares with you one of the internet's best webcomics.

Exploding Dog has a simple concept: readers send in proposed titles (It's the Best I've Ever Eat, Life is Just Swell, Not Today, etc.), and artist Sam Brown produces a single panel comic based on that title. Sometimes funny, sometimes absurd, sometimes touching, Sam's images are always striking.

I'm mid-season five in my rewatching of the entire Star Trek: the Next Generation series. I viewed the show fairly often as a youngster, but there are still a massive number of episodes I haven't seen.

The other day I came across one of these never before seen gems. It was called "The Perfect Mate", and I was astonished to see it featured an extremely sexy guest star performance from Famke Janssen!

Yes, long before Jean Grey and Professor Xavier were sharing the big screen together, Janssen and Stewart were rocking the small screen on TNG. It's an excellent episode and its premise rests solely on Jansen's ability to play the "perfect" woman. Needless to say, she does a wonderful job. (Apparently the producers thought so too. When the TNG spin-off Deep Space Nine was in development, her character was meant to return as a main cast member. When Janssen turned down the role to work in movies, the character Jadzia Dax was recreated to replace her.)

All of which makes me wonder, why is there not more geek love out there for Janssen? I mean check out this resume: Star Trek, X-Men and James Bond!!!! What more could you want from an actress?