Koyama Press has been helping artists get their awesomeness to market since 2007.
The Toronto-based venture sponsors the production of comics, books, prints, T-shirts and more by an amazing range of emerging artists, with an emphasis on Canadian talent. Even if you’re not into mainstream comics, you will be amazed at the variety and quality of art in compilations like Root Rot, which debuted at the recent Toronto Comic Arts Festival (TCAF) and features artists including Londoner Jesse Jacobs.
Another standout is Spotting Deer, which won a Doug Wright Award for its creator Michael DeForge:
Visually, Spotting Deer is a delight, a virtuoso display of stylistic variety. The colours are startlingly unnatural as are the appropriations of different art styles, ranging from newspaper comics to video games to record cover art. It belongs to the line of artists like Richard McGuire and Gary Panter, who possess the ability to seep into your eyeballs and rearrange the wiring in your brain. You see the world differently, with sharper eyes, after reading DeForge’s comics.
A huge thanks to Diana Tamblyn, who was good enough to bring back a treasure trove of Koyama product from TCAF for the store, and this weekend is your first chance to get a look. Bookmarks, buttons, prints, photobooks and more.
