For S.F. comic book artist, all’s not in a name
By: Virginia Pelley
Special to the Examiner
June 18, 2009
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| Reality show Cartoonist Julia Wertz chronicles her own life in “Fart Party Vol. 2.” (Courtesy photo) |
Those who visit comics artist Julia Wertz’s Fartparty.org looking for farts are in for a let-down.
“People who follow the URL expecting juvenile fart jokes are disappointed to find less-fecal-oriented content,” says Wertz, who celebrates the release of her third book, “Fart Party Vol. 2,” at Needles + Pens gallery in The City on Friday.
“However, I’ve also had a number of people tell me that they resisted looking at my comics because they hate the word ‘fart,’ but when they finally did, were happy to find that my work contains very few references to them.”
What Fartparty.org visitors do find are simple, candid and very funny four-panel comics in which Wertz lampoons her own life. The artist, a former San Francisco resident now living in Brooklyn, first drew her autobiographical Web comic just to entertain friends and named it on the spur of the moment.
“It really is an unfortunate title though. I had no idea it’d stick when I made it, it was a split-second decision. Had I waited another minute, I might have an entirely different career,” she says.
Once the Fart Party started to take off, Wertz took some tips on “shameless self-promotion” from fellow artist Alec Longsreth (“Phase 7”) and began making friends and contacts in the underground comics world.
Her first collection, “Fart Party
Vol. 1” was published by Atomic Books in 2007. In February, Three Rivers Press published a well-received collection of Craigslist-inspired comics that Wertz edited, “I Saw You ... Comics Inspired by Real-Life Missed Connections,” featuring a who’s who of the graphic arts world, including Peter Bagge, Gabrielle Bell, Ken Dahl, Keith Knight and Janelle Hessig.
Whether chronicling a painful breakup or being laughed at in RadioShack for wanting a new charger for an ancient cell phone, Wertz’s work typifies the confessional, unapologetic but also unpretentious style of autobiographical mini-comics artists.
The style creates an intimacy with the reader that, naturally, has its drawbacks.
“People tend to know things about me that I would never have brought up in real-life conversation, but since I’ve gone and made a comic about it, the info is out there and I can’t take it back,” she says.
“I understand that’s my fault for working with auto-bio material,” she admits, “but I don’t really mind. I guess it saves me time having to make excuses for my personality.”
IF YOU GO
Julia Wertz
Where: Needles & Pens, 3253 16th St., San Francisco
When: 7 to 9:30 p.m. Friday
Admission: Free
Contact: (415) 255-1534; www.needles-pens.com
