escape from dullsville

Fair warning: The current Small Press Spotlight on Andy Ristaino at the Cartoon Art Museum is really just three panels.  But they're totally awesome panels, including the original black-and-white ink drawing for the cover of Ristaino's graphic novel The Babysitter (pictured here).  Ristaino is exceptionally good at composition, at times cramming something into every conceivable inch of space in his comics and other times leaving the art plenty of room to breathe.  He also plays theremin for Assemble Head in Sunburst Sound, one of my favorite local bands, and has done a couple of gorgeous album covers for them as well.  So go to the museum to see those three panels and pick up a copy of The Babysitter in the bookstore, but while you're there peek in on the rest of the exhibits too, especially the Batman show that has a whole slew of the original pages that Paul Pope did for Batman: Year 100.  Those stopped me dead in my tracks but Pope's work always does, even here fifteen years after I first picked up a copy of THB #1 and it melted my brain.