NORM of Meow Wolf and Andrew Moyes, VP of FAN EXPO joint press conference
On a brisk Thursday morning outside of Meow Wolf Denver, NORM, the intergalactic alien life form (think if Jim Henson and Basquiat collaborated to make a puppet) who travels between Meow Wolf’s quantum realms gave a press conference in the sci-fi, cyberpunk, trash-future aesthetic newsstand named Convergence Station. The newsstand is filled with space art postcards and comics (based on dreams of local Denverite writers) from artists around the world. NORM and Andrew Moyes, VP of FAN EXPO have good weird fun to celebrate their partnership for this weekend’s comic convention. Formally Denver Pop Culture Con and before that, and more simply named, Denver Comic Con, will now be going through its third transformation, and the first after the COVID pandemic shut everything down. Originally cancelled from it’s regular summer time event, FanExpo similar to New York Comic Con will be testing the waters under a post-vaccinated world of fandom.
Two of the comics available at the Meow Wolf booth at Fan Expo
Charlie LaGreca and others first conceived of Denver Comic Con eight years ago and brought a comic book convention to downtown Denver. The success of that first year was larger than anything expected and continued to grow with each passing year. The nerd force runs strong in Denver. The weight of the Con’s success also contributed to its behind the scenes implosion. A huge dispute broke out between LaGreca and the other founders. LaGreca would later create the independent comic convention, DINK while the remaining founders would continue the convention as Denver Pop Culture Con.
The aftermath left many of the local and independent comic creators feeling alienated and unwanted. There were constant grumblings of mismanagement of the convention, and seemingly abruptly before the pandemic, the announcement was that Fan Expo had taken over the reigns. So far, the word on the street has been favorable; actually paid interns and Pop Culture Classroom thriving since the new management. Oh, and they were able to book the likes of William Shatner fresh off his space trip. Like Meow Wolf, Fan Expo is looking to bridge both the big and small, the universal and esoteric. Time will tell if they are successful, but with the efforts of so many talented artists contributing to both endeavors there is more than ample reason to satiate one’s curiosity by checking out Fan Expo this weekend.
Fan Expo is happening October 29th-31st, 2021 at the Denver Convention Center Meow Wolf has been a Suspect Press sponsor in the past.
Jake Fairly oozed forth upon the Denver comics scene from the catacombs of the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design. Be it comics about Neil Armstrong’s corpse, or generally being metal AF, Jake is a guy with considerably hefty night moves. He’s had work published in periodicals such as Westword and the Denver Public Library’s comics newspaper, and has been labeled a “street artist” by Westword magazine.
Aguirre was born and raised in southern California and is currently living in Manitou Springs, Colorado. Artistic influence was established at a young age, after discovering “Surrealism” and “Baroque” painters from mother’s book shelf. Inspiration to him is taken from anything with a particular mood. Most of his paintings emanate somber themes of death, decay, mystery and melancholy, mostly for a visual outcome than any kind of social statement.
Scrape out the flesh with the back of your surgeon’s knife; keep the fat.
Render it over a fire of insurance denials & medical bills. Make votive candles for your mother. She will light them when she does not know how to worship the body you have chosen.
Blend some of it into hand balm for winter & lipstick for drag night.
Save enough to oil a gun for hunting the ones who are hunting us.
Take your old skin. Tan the hide in oak bark. Wash it in the salt you carried for the dead who never made it this far. Behold what was yours & what is possible under the right conditions. Supple & bloodless.
Sew the leather into coin purses. Pass them around at the next fundraiser.
Fashion them into a fanny pack which you wear over your shoulder, across your chest.
If anything is left, bury it. Feed it to generations of flies & roots. These are your children now. The ones who ate from you & grew stronger
When any part of what was you is amputated in a hospital, it becomes the legal property of the hospital. 90% of medical waste is incinerated.
You used to believe dysphoria was a furnace under your skin boiling every mirror you turned to. When your flesh joins the bags of old blood & ruined organs thank the fire for its mercy. It could have taken all of you.
In my favorite dreams I put my bed beside my sister.
As pieces fall from me, I offer them to her.
I say this came to me but it belongs to you. Please, let nothing here be waste.
M. McDonough is a queer trans poet from Denver Colorado, now residing in Phoenix. Their work often wrestles with questions of gender, grief, humor and tenderness. They grew up in the spoken word and poetry slam communities of Denver. M. worked as a coach for Denver Minor Disturbance for many years. Their work can be found in We Grow Anyway from Prickly Pear Press, Name and None, and Exposition Review. They miss Denver every day.around him.
Jaime Valderrama is a self-taught artist born and raised in Los Angeles. His work falls into the sci-fi/horror genre with a touch of surrealism. His inspiration is derived from life experiences, vintage science fiction, horror, and his surroundings. He incorporates 3D holographic art, geometric shapes and impossible objects into his artwork. His work has been featured in numerous publications. He makes Work that is beyond imagination.
Cori Redford was born several years ago, and still has not lost her faith in humanity. She still thinks dick jokes are funny, and dresses like a toddler. You can probably find stuff she’s done all over the internet with a quick search, and maybe you’ll want to buy one of her t-shirts or zines. She hangs out with a bunch of groovy art kids, who battle with drawings instead of guns or dance like regular gangs. She is cool.
It is the summer of all this and more: of sea-rising romance and heat-curdled revelry,
of humid, floral insomnia, of peaches, dripping in both hands, of parallel comets burning parallel skies, a fever’s dreamless destination.
Palm to forehead. Palm to cheek, both cheeks sunburnt, blushing, our pink thoughts flooding over. Each kiss: godless, inevitable. The high holy days have passed and we are earthbound now, grounded, wingless with solar ribbons around each wrist.
We plant marigolds in our collarbones and call every moon a bonfire. It is historical because there is no history, only myths that glow on our skin like a cinnamon marquee with the opening dates of the apocalypse.
Here, in the sand-rubbed shade, we sit too close together, like mangoes in a bowl. You tell me love is not possessive and I want to possess you wholly, to hide in the hollow of your hurricane, to gather all your shipwreck, your wind-bruised citrus your drifting caskets of wine and shoot them into the sky like a bouquet of orange blossoms and fireworks forming new, neon constellations above these rising waters.
Sarah Rodriguez is a poet, educator, stage-practiced liar, bubblegum enthusiast, wine-led wanderer, failed manic pixie dream girl, Atlantic Ocean runaway, and the editor-in-chief of Punch Drunk Press. She organizes, hosts, and performs at arts events all over the Front Range. Follow her on Instagram@sarahstarlight.
Nikoli Shaver is a professional illustrator and designer. He is a mixed media artist who pulls inspiration from beauty, editorial, modern life, and plants. Prints of his work are available online via INPRNT. Find him @56MINOR and www.nikolishaver.com.
[dropcap]A[/dropcap]s always, I’m screaming when I wake up. Above, my husband offers Ginger her breakfast, a glass of pink Moscato. She sips it, then chugs it, and I feel the syrupy sweetness coat my insides and push me further down. The bitch is enjoying it. Almost as much as I would enjoy getting out of here and ending all of this.
“Damn you!” I shout, but no one can hear me. Ginger’s lips don’t even move.
Not until my shithead husband leans in and kisses them. I feel the pressure from deep within, feel her tingle down below where he penetrated us last night, and I want to scream again, but I’m even further from the surface now.
“So,” says my husband while he gets dressed for work, “what do you have planned today? Should we put on Mildred to take care of Sean while I’m gone?”
“No,” says Ginger, using my lips. “We have lunch with David today.”
“Really? Fuck,” says my husband. “We’ll have to use Blair, then. Do you agree?”
Ginger nods my head.
“Can Blair handle Sean for that long out on the town?”
I groan deep within.
Ginger hears me and says, “With enough wine, yes.”
“Good,” says my husband, “then she’ll be using an Uber.”
Once dressed, he and Ginger sneak by Sean’s nursery and into the wig room. There are the others on their stands. Mildred’s putrid gray. Blair’s buoyant blonde. Ginger places our ass in the iron chair which is bolted to the floor.
“Can I have one more sip?” she asks, and my husband feeds her more pink Moscato before kissing her goodbye. The wine pushes me further down while my husband straps my arms and legs into the chair. It’s almost time. Last time I got close to escaping, but I feel that last sip of Moscato coating my insides. Then my husband does it, he slides Ginger’s blinding red wig off my head, and I’m free.
“Let me out of this chair, you bastard! I’m going to fucking kill you!”
His hands fumble to grab the blonde wig that is Blair. My screams wake Sean, and his screams join mine.
My husband holds my writhing neck and places Blair on my head while saying, “It’s for your own good, for Sean’s own good.”
“More like for your own good!”
But Blair is in place now, and she smiles into the mirror at my husband and says, “Hello, darling, may I have some chardonnay? The witch is rather loud today.”
“Of course, dear.” He offers her a glass of Kendall Jackson. “I hear you’re having lunch with David today. . .”
“Yes,” says Blair with a tone of excitement. Then it shifts and I feel her scowl before saying, “you’ll be watching Sean?”
“No,” says my husband with a worried frown, “you’ll have to bring him with you.”
Blair sighs dramatically and shakes her head. My husband unstraps her from the chair. Rubbing my wrists, she stands and almost spits before falling into compliance. “If I must.”
About ten minutes later my husband is putting Blair and Sean into an Uber. He looks at her before closing the door and heading to his car. “Call me at work if you need me.”
“Of course, darling.” She uses my disgusted lips to kiss his cheek.
At the restaurant, my brother David, the only person in my family who did not disown me when I got pregnant out of wedlock, waves Blair over to his table. Blair, looking and acting exactly like my old self, saunters over, Sean bubbling spit on her shoulder.
“Helloooo,” she says, exasperation in our vocal chords.
“Hey,” says David, “how’s the little guy today?”
“Annoying, as always,” she says, and I must agree.
Blair puts Sean in a highchair then looks at David exactly how I used to. “Trust me, he is, I’ve got the stretch marks to prove it.”
David gags, I giggle, and Sean beats his ugly baby fists on the table. Blair sits down and orders herself a glass of chardonnay.
“Listen,” says David, “Mom and I were talking last night and she thinks she might be ready to reconcile.”
I surge upwards, feeling Blair’s wig tremble on my head. She grabs it and shakily sips more wine. Sean stares at us and I’m almost convinced he can see me.
Blair clears her throat and spits out the words my husband planted inside her when she first wore the wig. “No thanks, we’re good.”
It sounds just as fake and I feel just as dissonant as I did when he first taught her. I can’t help it, like always, I have to scream where I exist, on the inside. We’re not good, you bitch!
Blair, hearing me, chugs the rest of her chardonnay. Sean sits peacefully beside her.
“What do you mean you’re good?” asks David. “All you talked about during your pregnancy was earning Mom’s forgiveness.”
Blair doesn’t remember that. She wasn’t around yet because I wasn’t married yet.
And maybe that’s why, struggling to handle her wine, Blair stands from the table and pulls Sean out of his highchair. “I think we should get going.”
David steps towards Blair, holding his hands out in a pacifying gesture. “Are you sure? I don’t think you should drive. . .”
“Don’t worry,” Blair burps, “Uber.” She clumsily orders one. “Two minutes,” she slurs.
Meanwhile, Sean gazes into Blair’s eyes. He sees me. He knows I’m in here. “Come on, little guy, you can do it. I’m sorry for calling you a brat. I’m sorry that I didn’t want you once you came. Don’t you remember when you were in my belly? How I loved you? How I cared for you? If you let me out, I’ll care for you again. I’ll love you again. I promise.”
The little bugger, my little pipsqueak, he blesses my heart by reaching up and pulling Blair’s wig right off my head.
And I’m free! I feel Sean in my arms. Now that he’s freed me I don’t need him anymore. I can’t believe he actually believes that I would care for him again. I throw him from my arms.
David dives to catch him, and I don’t care because I’m running out of the restaurant. Outside where the sun is bright, oh so bright, and I’m running away, down the street. I can’t help it. I’m dreaming of that place, somewhere far away, where none of this is real, none of this was real, where I can drink the wine I want and be the woman I want, away from him, away from both of them, and away from all the rest. I see it in the sunshine and feel it on my scalp.
But Blair’s heels, they are too tall, and I haven’t run in heels in forever. They catch an edge and my ankles crumble. The sidewalk smacks my elbow and my chin grazes brick and I’m down, I can’t move, not fast enough.
Because David is standing over me. He holds Sean, who giggles like a little fucking maniac. And I don’t want him. I don’t want any of this. But David puts a steady hand on my shoulder and Sean, that little bastard, places Blair’s wig sideways on my head while saliva slides across his grinning, toothless gums.
David straightens it. “Wow,” he says, “I like this one, but you might want to secure it a little better next time.”
“Thanks,” says Blair, “will you help me find my Uber?”
David obliges and asks, “Did you start drinking early today?”
“Why?” Blair asks.
“Usually you don’t freak out until a little later in the day, you know, after the fifth or sixth glass of wine.” He is smiling. Blair is smirking and fixing the back of her wig, fluffing the bob into place. I am scowling inside, hating David’s fucking guts.
Then he locates the car and for the second time today, I’m funneled into an Uber by a man that is supposed to love me.
Once home, Blair calls my husband. “The fucking bitch escaped in broad daylight. Your little brat ripped me right off her head.”
He comes home with something new: wig adhesive strips. Blair gets one last glass of chardonnay before he straps her into the chair and switches over to Mildred for the evening. I remain still, I don’t even try to fight him this time; there’s no point. I had my chance when the brat took Blair off my head and I blew it. Mildred’s gray wig sticks to my skull and I see the infinite future stretch out in front of me: Mildred will do the dishes, change the brat’s diapers, make my fuckhead husband dinner. Then, once Sean is asleep, Mildred will sip aged merlot until my husband switches her back to Ginger. Because my husband is hungry for more than just food. And Ginger will give it to him, and I’ll feel it, yes, I’ll feel it. And then she’ll sleep. And then she’ll wake up, and I’ll be screaming again, forever screaming, while my husband offers Ginger her daily breakfast: a tall, sparkling glass of pink Moscato.
Ian Cumings is a writer and artist who enjoys exposing the dark side of internal life. When he’s not writing, he’s either crying or looking longingly out a window. This story, like all his art, is definitely absolutely not a cry for help. He can be reached at iancumings5@gmail.com.
Kaitlin Ziesmer is a fine art painter and illustrator working out of Denver who’s been featured in numerous exhibits across Denver and throughout the country. With a light-hearted sense of humor, she approaches art with an “it’s for fun” attitude, focusing on recognizable characters from popular culture. Repurposing them into a new, often female body, is her way of injecting herself into it all. Contact: kaitlin.ziesmer@gmail.com
Daniel Semanas is a director and animator who’s developed projects for clients such as Lollapalooza, Absolut, Nike, Mercedes, Youtube, and Google. He’s also directed and animated IDs for Mtv Brazil. In 2012 he won his first international award at the Cannes Film Festival, and in 2013 he won the Best Newcomer Director Award at the São Paulo Short Film Festival. In 2018 he released his first graphic novel Roly Poly, making him the first Brazilian solo artist to be published by Fantagraphics.
