Happy New Year from Eye Trauma!

Ah, the New Year. When we pretend that dropping ball hits a reset button and things start afresh. Out with the old, in with the new. A creaky old man with a “2008″ sash catching a kick in the kiester from some punk kid rocking the latest ‘09 fashions. May old acquaintance be forgot. The resolutions to change your weight or your habits or your bad fucking language. And so forth and so on.

Well, not here. Here at the ET HQ, we’re bringing the old acquaintances with us into the new 365 days, as our 2 big projects from 2008 pick up steam in the opening salvo of the Double-Oh-Nine.

1. Out of Sequence: Underrepresented Voices in American Comics.
An explosion of comics art set off in the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Krannert Art Museum from October 24, 2008 to January 4, 2009. A second blast of Out of Sequence will be blowing the roof off The Lab at Belmar in Lakewood, CO from January 24-May 12. Co-curators Damian Duffy and John Jennings will be appearing at The Lab to talk about, yes, you guessed it: Comics on February 5. Colorado: Begin preparing yourself now.

See photos of the exhibition!
Watch a video about the exhibition!
Hear a radio interview with the curators!
Experience a Bad at Sports podcast discussion with exhibition comics master Mark Staff Brandl!

2. The Hole: Consumer Culture, v. 1- “Open”
The graphic novel, published for the book store market by the fine folks at Front Forty Press, is available for order through comic shops in January 2009. Eye Trauma has an entry for The Hole in the January edition of the Diamond Comic Distributors Previews Catalog, that through which pretty much all comics shop orders are made. However, Diamond decided at the last minute to stick us (no pun intended) in Previews Adult (okay, maybe a bit of a pun intended).
To be honest, the authors were a bit wary of having their graphic novel horror science fiction satire on race and gender in the pornography catalog. Nothing against the porn, of course. We just thought, if someone was ordering a book called “The Hole” out of the adult catalog, they might have some false expectations.

But, White Peter, the Spirit of Capitalism, a major character in The Hole set us straight:

(Click image for larger view)

In any event, hello 2009, which is of course, the year of Eye Trauma, in the decade of Eye Trauma, in the age of Aquarius… and by “Aquarius,” of course I mean, Eye Trauma.