Since 1986 Chicagoan Monte Beauchamp has been corralling eclectic groups of artists in Blab!, an anthology of deft illustration and discourse that recently received the comics industry’s most prestigious honor, the Harvey Award, named after the late Harvey Kurtzman, creator of Mad.
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The first Blab! was primarily a collection of essays on comix, with such influential artists as S. Clay Wilson, Bill Griffith, and Robert Williams discussing their methods and inspirations. “The response was amazing,” says Beauchamp, who works a day job as an art director at an ad agency. “I was getting fan mail from all over the world–the U.S., Japan, Europe. I figured I must be doing something right.” Beauchamp self-published another issue, with comics by Dan Clowes and XNO. It so impressed publisher Denis Kitchen that his Kitchen Sink Press offered to publish Blab! regularly.
“The way I work as an editor, I think, brings out the best in an artist,” he says. “Instead of dictating what I want and having them execute it, we work together on the concepts and throughout the whole production process.” Drew Friedman, an illustrator known for his pointillist drawings in Spy, has been a longtime contributor to Blab! “What I love about working on Blab! is the creative freedom,” Friedman says. “Monte is the dream editor, really the best editor I’ve ever worked for. The only problem is that he doesn’t have any money.”
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Randy Tunnell.
