I went to The Center for Fiction event on February 19, 2020, for free from Professor Woolley. The speakers at the event are Vita Ayala, Robin Ha, Khary Randolph, and Joseph Illidge. This event helps me to understand the comic book industry and knowing about these artists’ challenges of doing comics.
Robin Ha is an author and illustrator for Cook Korean!: A Comic book with Recipes and Almost American Girl. She talked about her process and her achievements before she started doing comics. She also explains her life of being an immigrant experience from Seoul and the reason why she started illustrating her memoir graphic novel.
Khary Randolph is a comic and animation artist who works for DC Comics, Marvel, etc. I remember him from our school art gallery from last semester. He talked about working in the comic industry.
Vita Ayala is a writer for The Wilds. Vita and the rest of the speakers talk about the diversity in comics and explains how other people feel having people of color in comics.
After the talk, people ask some questions that they want to understand more about their process. Then, we had a book signing from the 3 artists. I didn’t have a book for them to sign, but I wanted to ask them questions and try to network with them. I asked Khary Randolph about the challenges that he had of doing comics. After that, I asked all both Khary and Robin if they have business cards. They didn’t, but then I asked them if they have an Instagram or LinkedIn so I can follow them. Finally, we had a group photo with the speakers. Before I have to go home, I gave them my business cards and stickers for saying thank you for answering my questions.
