{"id":35591,"date":"2026-05-26T17:34:41","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T17:34:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=35591"},"modified":"2026-05-26T17:34:41","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T17:34:41","slug":"little-paintings-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2026\/05\/26\/little-paintings-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Little Paintings"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\" \"\"
\nBy James Kochalka <\/strong>(Top Shelf Productions)
\nISBN: 978-1-60309-017-9 (HB\/Digital edition)<\/p>\n

James Kochalka is a prolific and always entertaining giant of comics creation, whose vast, sublimely surreal, enticing works range from kid-friendly romps such as the Glorkian Warrior<\/strong> and Johnny Boo<\/strong>\u00a0series, to excoriatingly honest self-examining daily journal strip American Elf <\/strong>and the indescribably fun SuperF**kers<\/strong> – and that\u2019s my censorious edit there, not his…
\n\"\"
\nThe author, artist, animator. educator and rock musician is utterly wedded to the energies of creativity and this tantalizing tome gathers hundreds of mini-paintings he knocked up to sell at various conventions between 2001 and 2007. All his old familiar faces are there: cats, ghosts, robots, monsters, aliens, cats, bathrooms, birds, chicks and dudes, mushrooms, animals, landscapes and weather, cats, machines and random images, all apparently arranged in no particularly order and inviting your response. Did I mention, there are some cats?
\n\"\"
\nThere is a narrative here, but it\u2019s completely generated by the viewer who can\u2019t help but create a story around the hundreds of thumbnail paintings of gloriously hued things and folks and stuff, and a lot to read in if you\u2019re willing to take some time. This is one of my absolute favourite go-to books whenever I need a little pictorial pick-me-up and you should share the joy.
\n\"\"
\nGo on, you know you want to…
\n\u00a9 James Kochalka 2011. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n

Today in 1939 artist and storyteller Herb Trimpe<\/strong> was born (Hulk<\/strong>, Iron Man<\/strong>, Godzilla<\/strong>, GI Joe<\/strong>) as was Tom Mandrake<\/strong> (The Spectre<\/strong>, Grimjack<\/strong>, Martian Manhunter<\/strong>) in 1956. In 1967 VIP creator and future Cartoonist Laureate of Vermont James Kolchaka<\/strong> (American Elf<\/strong>, Sketchbook Diaries<\/strong>) joined the party.<\/p>\n

On this date in 1872, Punch <\/strong>artist & illustrator Alfred Henry Forrester<\/strong> died, as did prolific and multi-pseudonymous French comics creator Robert Dansler<\/strong>\/\u201cBob Dan<\/em><\/strong>\u201d (Bill Tornade<\/em>, Jack Sport<\/em>, La Jonque en Flammes<\/em>) in 1972, and Canadian strip cartoonist Jim Unger<\/strong> (Herman<\/strong>) in 2012.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By James Kochalka (Top Shelf Productions) ISBN: 978-1-60309-017-9 (HB\/Digital edition) James Kochalka is a prolific and always entertaining giant of comics creation, whose vast, sublimely surreal, enticing works range from kid-friendly romps such as the Glorkian Warrior and Johnny Boo\u00a0series, to excoriatingly honest self-examining daily journal strip American Elf and the indescribably fun SuperF**kers – … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Little Paintings”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[280,81,102,125,105,396,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-animal-antics","category-art-books","category-fantasy","category-humour","category-mature-reading","category-monsters","category-star-trek"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-9g3","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35591"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35597,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35591\/revisions\/35597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}