…Andrew MacLean
Hello everybody, today I’m with Andrew, founder of Brand New Nostalgia. How are you?
I’m great, thanks.
Can you introduce yourself to TICW readers?
I am Andrew MacLean (or Andrew Ross MacLean on websites where someone beat me to the screen-name!!!), I am a comic book artist/writer and founder of the Brand New Nostalgia blogs. I am also apart of the Out of Step Arts crew.
Did you study in any art school?
No, I didn’t. I’ve been drawing my whole life but when the time came to go to college I was more interested in music. So I went to school for songwriting. By the time I left I was back to drawing comics.
What is Brand New Nostalgia? When and how did it come up?
Brand New Nostalgia started as an art blog consisting of style-strong artists from all over the world.
Weekly themed art blogs, not unlike BNN, starting popping up everywhere about a year ago and I wanted to join in on the fun. I thought it would be great promotion as well as a great place and reason to share some fan art on a regular basis. It seemed silly to wait around in the hopes that I would be invited to one, so I spoke with a comic writer I had been working with who I knew was good with web design, Brandon Clarke. We partnered up and I started inviting some of my favorite artists (mostly from DeviantArt).
Brand New Nostalgia was born and we’ve been having fun since.
Do you think North Carolina is a suitable place for creatives like you?
Brandon actually lives in North Carolina, I can’t speak on it other than it’s the home of Heroes Con, which in my opinion, of the comic conventions I’ve attended, is hands down the best.
I have been living just outside of NYC in neighboring New Jersey for a year and a half and I’ve enjoyed the energy that town gives off. However, my wife and I are moving north of Boston at the end of the week.
When and how did you get passionate with comics?
I was a huge Spider-Man and X-Men fan as a kid. The comics, the cartoons, the toys, I just ate it all up. I remember being fairly certain that the X-Men jet would land outside my house at any moment; Cyclops would walk down the ramp and invite me to attend their academy.
Never happened… jerks…
But really, above all else I just loved comic art from a really young age for whatever reason. And it’s the art that’s kept me in love with comics all these years.
What has been your first experiences as founder of BNN?
We’ve tried not too take it too seriously at BNN. The point of it all was to have a little fun and hopefully share our fans with each other by way of a common meeting ground. So when we kicked the thing off, I really wanted it to stick around but I didn’t want to get my hopes up in case we disbanded within a few months time. Then when all the members were really excited to come on board, and everyone was turning in AMAZING work and were really excited to post up next to each other… it was exhilarating. It became the place I had hoped for. It was and his a place to take a break from the average day, create art FOR FUN and share it with friends.
What advices would you give to who want to found a collective of artists like you?
Simply do it. In this day there are so many resources that are FREE! Between Facebook, tumblr, twitter, DeviantArt, instagram, etc. There is no reason you can’t find talented people and hit a wide audience together.
I would however recommend you get a little help. There is NO WAY we would keep the ship afloat were it not for the efforts of Brandon Clarke and Ricardo Venancio. They really deserve all the credit for keeping the websites updated. Brandon built all the web infrastructure including the Kickstarter site and video.
Let’s talk about kaBOOMbox project. What is it?
kaBOOMbox Volume One, at 200 pages, is a comic anthology-art book hybrid. We originally planned on doing a standard art book containing content previously posted on the site. Then, at Heroes Con, Alexis Ziritt suggested we include comics, and it just seemed so obviously. There’s such a focus on creator-owned projects these days and BNN shares this excitement. We enjoy creating without constraints and kaBOOMbox embodies that very ideal.
Each artist contributing to kaBOOMbox Volume One gets a chunk of pages in the book to fill in a way that will represent them the way they want to be represented. If they want their pages to be a comic, so be it. If they want to do stand alone pieces of art, that’s cool too. Considering we are all comic artists, most of us have stories we want to tell, but each artist has the freedom to do whatever they want. Some will do both.
What artists will be included in?
From Out of Step Arts:
Ming Doyle
Paul Maybury
Greg Ruth
Toby Cypress
From Brand New Nostalgia:
Tradd Moore
Ricardo Venancio
Mateus Santolouco
Joseph Querio
Joseph DellaGatta
Jorge Coelho
Joao Vieira
Giannis Milonogiannis
Felipe Andrade
Brian Churilla
Alessandro Micelli
And from both camps:
Alexis Ziritt
Logan Faerber
Andrew MacLean
What are your expections about it?
Risking sounding grandiose about my own project, I think it will be a really special book. These guys (and girl) are fantastic talents, and while they create amazing work everyday, we’re taking all the handcuffs off here. They have complete freedom. What could inspire more passion than freedom? As a fan myself of all their works, I am dying to read it in completed form.
Beyond that I have no real expectations, but we’re willing and excited to cross any bridge we come upon.
What are you working on these days?
A sneak peek of my creator-owned project entitled SNIP SNIP will be in Dark Horse Presents sometime next spring. I’m also drawing issue two of Colonial Souls by Nolan T Jones as we speak. Issue One not yet available.
Recently made available:
Department O (with Jamie Gambell)
MEATSPACE (with Josh Gorfain)
What about your plans for the future?
Above I mentioned SNIP SNIP, I hope to be working on that for some time. I’ll continue drawing the sequels to the books above as well. I also have a couple other projects lined up for 2013 but they are still in their infancy at this point.
In terms of Brand New Nostalgia, we are hoping to expand into other areas in the coming months. IF all goes according to plan, Brandon will be spearheading a BNN branch for comic writers and I will be starting a BNN podcast.
Thank you Andrew! Is there anything else would you like to say to our readers?
Please check out the Kickstarter. These artists are going to put on a GREAT show that shouldn’t be missed by any comic fan. And please check out my own books and websites. Thanks so much!
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kickstarter.com/projects/bnn/kaboombox-volume-one
andrew-ross-maclean.deviantart.com
@Andrew_MacLean
