Jewish Side of TCAF 2013

This weekend, readers, writers, artists, publishers and fans of comix will converge at the Toronto Reference Library to take part in the the FREE Toronto Comic Arts Festival.This yearmarks the 10th anniversary since the first TCAF was held (at a much smaller venue) in 2003.

Among the talented people who will be at TCAF this year are a small number of comix professionals who have done comic art using Jewish characters or themes.

* Jonathan Baylis (author of So ... Buttons mini-comic)

* Willow Dawson (illustrator of the anthology No Girls Allowed : Tales of Daring Women Dressed as Men for Love, Freedom and Adventure, written by Susan Hughes and published by Kids Can Press. The anthology includes the story of Esther Brandeau, the first Jewish person to immigrate to Canada.)

*  Sarah Glidden (author-illustrator of the autobiographical How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less!, which was nominated for the 2012 Great Graphic Novels for Teens list)

* Gilbert Hernandez  (author-illustrator of Love and Rockets X, which features the half-Jewish character Kris Nesnick)

* David Malki! (author of the Wondermark webcomic, which has been collected in trade paperback. Among the comics that have appeared on the site is one with the punch line "Hannukah bush", one about the Jewish New Year, one that uses the juice/Jews homonym joke and one about Hebephiles.)

* Dylan Meconis (author-illustrator of the webcomic Family Man, about a Jewish academic named Luther Levy, who was unable to defend his dissertation because he was not Christian ; volume 1 may be purchased in person at TCAF or ordered online)

* Rutu Modan (author-illustrator of the graphic novel Exit Wounds and the newly-published graphic novel The Property)

* Josh Neufeld (author-illustrator of A Few Perfect Hours)

* Paul Pope (author-illustrator of the story "Berlin Batman" in The Batman Chronicles #11 [reprinted in Batman : Year 100], in which Batman is a Jewish painter named Baruch Wane)

* Jon Rosenberg (author-illustrator of the webcomic Goats, which includes the Jewish character "Jon", as seen in the strip from Nov. 24, 2005)

* Art Spiegelman (author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning memoir Maus and one of the main characters in the online story "The Night I Met Art Spiegelman")