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Avy Jetter (born December 11, 1968) is an American writer, artist, and activist who is best known for her self-published comic series Nuthin' Good Ever Happens at 4 a.m. [1] Jetter also works as a Special Programs & International Affiliates Coordinator at University of California, Berkeley. [2]
Jetter began her postsecondary education at the California College of Arts, but after a short time transferred to Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. After two semesters, Jetter returned to CCA where she completed her Bachelor of Fine Arts in painting in 1994. [3] Jetter began her comic career in early 2012 as a response to seeing her friend's webcomic. Her artistic creativity was inspired by the comics her four older brothers created when she was a child, as well as Mildred D. Tayler, Walter Dean Myers, and Morrie Turner. [4] Currently, Jetter is independently published because she enjoys the creative freedom producing work outside of the traditional publishing realm allows and prioritizes the face to face experience of meeting those that support her comics and zines. [5]
Jetter began work on her self-published comic series, Nuthin' Good Ever Happens at 4 a.m., in early 2012. The comic follows the lives of four friends, Chan, Dee Jay, Dray, and Zee, throughout a zombie apocalypse that breaks out in Oakland, California. Determined to present it at the San Francisco Zine Fest, she finished the first issue of the series in under five months. [5] The series is categorized by its horror and gore, and the majority of it is stylized in black and white. Jetter exclusively uses people of color as her characters. [6] Nuthin' Good Ever Happens at 4 a.m. is currently in production of its fifth issue.
In 2015, Jetter wrote and illustrated a submission titled "Pull It Up From the Roots" for APB: Artists Against Police Brutality: A Comic Book Anthology. The anthology focuses on police brutality, the justice system, and civil rights. All of the proceeds are donated to the Innocence Project. [7]
In September 2017, it was announced that Jetter had been chosen to take part in a ten-issue production of the supernatural horror comic Box of Bones. The comic follows the life of an African American graduate student who is taken on a journey through the most violent times in African history by a mysterious box. [8]
Jetter also provided illustrations for Johary Ravelson's story “Water in the Rice Fields Up to My Knees," which will be featured in Sunspot Jungle: The Ever Expanding Universe of Fantasy and Science Fiction. The anthology of science fiction stories will be released in January 2019. [9]
In addition to her published comics, Jetter also creates zines about her life as an African American woman. She shifts her focus from fantasy to non-fiction storytelling as she depicts a large range of topics including racism and the personal politics of Black hair. She continues to be an active member in the West Coast zine community. [10]
Trained in traditional mediums at CCA, Jetter creates and sells hand-drawn portraits. [10] Some of her portrait subjects include Barack Obama, Martin Luther King Jr., and variant comic sketch covers of characters from The Walking Dead.
Jetter's artistry frequently incorporates themes of social injustice, micro-aggressions, and Black History. She has repeatedly discussed what it means to be an ally in social movements. She uses zines as a medium to express the impact of the racism and disenfranchisement of people of color and the rise of racial tension in her community. [11] Jetter further supports marginalized populations by curating art shows that center around artists from underrepresented communities. The University of California, Davis has hosted her as a guest speaker to discuss the importance of decolonizing comics. [12]
Jetter currently lives in Oakland, CA. [13]
A zine is a small-circulation self-published work of original or appropriated texts and images, usually reproduced via photocopier. Zines are the product of either a single person or of a very small group, and are popularly photocopied into physical prints for circulation. A fanzine is a non-professional and non-official publication produced by enthusiasts of a particular cultural phenomenon for the pleasure of others who share their interest. The term was coined in an October 1940 science fiction fanzine by Russ Chauvenet and popularized within science fiction fandom, not entering the Oxford English Dictionary in 1949.
Melinda Gebbie is an American comics artist and writer, known for her participation in the underground comix movement. She is also known for creating the controversial work Fresca Zizis and her contributions to Wimmen's Comix, as well as her work with her husband Alan Moore on the three-volume graphic novel Lost Girls and the Tomorrow Stories anthology series.
Sheena, Queen of the Jungle is a fictional American comic book jungle girl heroine, originally published primarily by Fiction House during the Golden Age of Comic Books. She was the first female comic book character with her own title, with her 1937 premiere preceding Wonder Woman #1. Sheena inspired a wealth of similar comic book jungle queens. She was predated in literature by Rima, the Jungle Girl, introduced in the 1904 William Henry Hudson novel Green Mansions.
Clarence Matthew Baker was an American comic book artist and illustrator, best known for drawing early comics heroines such as the costumed crimefighter Phantom Lady, and romance comics. Active in the 1940s and 1950s Golden Age of comic books, he is the first known African-American artist to find success in the comic-book industry. He also penciled St. John Publications' digest-sized "picture novel" It Rhymes with Lust (1950).
The term adult comics typically denotes comic books, comic magazines, comic strips or graphic novels with content of an erotic, violent, or sophisticated nature marketed by publishers toward adult readers. They are sometimes restricted to purchase by legal adults, especially erotic comics which include sexually explicit material.
British small press comics, once known as stripzines, are comic books self-published by amateur cartoonists and comic book creators, usually in short print runs, in the UK. They're comparable to similar movements internationally, such as American minicomics and Japanese doujinshi. A "small press comic" is essentially a zine composed predominantly of comic strips. The term emerged in the early 1980s to distinguish them from zines about comics. Notable artists who have had their start in British small press comics include Eddie Campbell, Paul Grist, Rian Hughes, Jamie Hewlett, Alan Martin, Philip Bond and Andi Watson.
Trina Robbins is an American cartoonist. She was an early and influential participant in the underground comix movement, and one of the first few female artists in that movement. Both as a cartoonist and historian, Robbins has long been involved in creating outlets for and promoting female comics artists. In the 1980s, Robbins became the first woman to draw Wonder Woman comics. She is a member of the Will Eisner Hall of Fame.
Robert Kirby is an American cartoonist, known for his long-running syndicated comic Curbside – which ran in the gay and alternative presses from 1991 to 2008 – and other works focusing on queer characters and community, including Strange Looking Exile, Boy Trouble, THREE, and QU33R.
Sarah Dyer is an American comic book writer and artist with roots in the zine movement of the late 1980s and early 1990s.
A jungle girl is an archetype or stock character, often used in popular fiction, of a female adventurer, superhero or even a damsel in distress living in a jungle or rainforest setting. An alternate depiction is a cave girl.
Jimmie Robinson is an American comic book creator, known for writing and drawing the comic book series Bomb Queen, and for other works, including Amanda and Gunn, Avigon, Code Blue, Evil & Malice, Five Weapons, The Empty, and Power Lines, most of which have been published by Image Comics.
The portrayal of Women inAmerican comic books has often been the subject of controversy since the medium's beginning. Critics have noted the roles of women as both supporting characters and lead characters are substantially more subjected to gender stereotypes, with femininity and or sexual characteristics having a larger presence in their overall character.
Willow Dawson is a Canadian cartoonist and illustrator, whose works include The Big Green Book of the Big Blue Sea with author Helaine Becker, Hyena in Petticoats: The Story of Suffragette Nellie McClung, Lila and Ecco's Do-It-Yourself Comics Club, 100 Mile House, the graphic novel No Girls Allowed, with author Susan Hughes, and Violet Miranda: Girl Pirate, with author Emily Pohl-Weary. Her works have been supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council and the Toronto Arts Council.
Her black and white comics art style is wonderful: bold and full of thought. Dawson also creates painted stand alone illustrations which she turns into prints and sells on her Society6 site. The original art is created using acrylic ink and paint on recycled cardboard. Her illustrations convey a mood of whimsy and playful-uncanny. Her work typically exhibits flowing linework and favours a 50's colour palette.
She is a member of The RAID Studio, The Writers' Union of Canada, Illustration Mundo, and JacketFlap.
Dawson was born in 1975 and grew up in Vancouver, BC. She currently lives in a creaky-old-house-turned-music-school in downtown Toronto.
Emma Ríos Maneiro is a Spanish comics artist, writer, and editor with an international presence in the comics industry. She has worked for some of the largest American comics publishers, including Marvel, Image, and Boom! Studios.
Nia King is a mixed-race of Black/Lebanese/Hungarian descent, queer, art activist, multimedia journalist, podcaster, public speaker, and zine maker. She lives in Oakland, California. Within her podcast, "We Want the Airwaves," Nia interviews queer and trans artists about their lives and about their work. The title of her podcast was inspired from a Ramones song and played as a demand for media access and an insistence on the right for marginalized people to take up space.
Katherine "Kat" Fajardo is a Latina freelance comic artist, illustrator, and editor based in New York City, New York. Her illustrations focus on Latinx culture and self-acceptance.
Jumbo Comics was an adventure anthology comic book published by Fiction House from 1938–1953. Jumbo Comics was Fiction House's first comics title; beforehand the publisher had specialized in pulp magazines. The lead feature for Jumbo Comics' entire run was Sheena, Queen of the Jungle.
Ajuan Maria Mance is an American visual artist, author, editor, and a Professor of English at Mills College in Oakland, California. She created the portrait series 1001 Black Men.
Ashley A. Woods is a comic book artist from Chicago, Illinois, known for her work on the Tomb Raider, Niobe, and Ladycastle series.
Ann Brewster was an American cartoonist and illustrator during the Golden Age of comics. She provided art for many different publishers, including Ace Magazines, Fiction House, and Atlas Comics. Brewster is most notable for illustrating romance comics. After a career as penciller and inker for comics, she transitioned to illustrating novels and children's magazines before retiring in 1980.