DCC 2018 Artist Preview: Monkey Minion Press
Monkey Minion Press is coming to Denver Comic Con (June 15-17) and bringing their ultra nerdy art and books! Star Wars, Star Trek, Mass Effect, NASA, and space art. They know that secretly you want recruitment posters for all your favorite fandoms. For the space nerd, they have detailed spacecraft and NASA art and their new book Beyond. They also have children’s books and fun magnets. Take my advice and shop for all future birthday gifts here. Your friends and family will thank you.
What do most people come to your booth to talk to you about?
Recently, it’s mostly about science and space (which is AWESOME). A lot of folks have favorite scientists or space craft and like to share that with us because of our books, “Eureka” and “Beyond”. And that’s great because then we get to share some of our favorites and it turns into a mini nerd fest inside of the giant convention nerd fest. Nerdception.
What new thing do you want everyone to know about?
Well, we’re bringing our newest book, “Beyond” to Denver! It’s an artbook about machines we (humans) have sent to space. We’ll also have a few new dinosaur prints. We debuted our first dinosaur print at Denver last year and want to do it again.
What person, panel, or event at DCC are you most excited for?
Honestly, we don’t get to leave our table much during the show, so we don’t tend to look at the programming or guests much, sadly.
What’s your most popular item at cons?
Individual item? Probably our “In the Face of Tyranny – REBEL” poster – at least recently. Collective item, our fridge magnets tend to do pretty well.
Most hilarious con story, please!
I’m not sure how ‘hilarious’ this is, but here goes: The first year we tabled at San Diego Comic-Con we had a friend who lived in town drop us off for load-in. Now, if you’ve never been to SDCC, the convention center is almost a mile long. The entire front of the convention center is blocked off, so you can’t unload and carry in from there and we didn’t know how to use the loading dock (we were wee, small babby exhibitors). So, our friend dropped us off at the end of the center near Hall H. “No problem,” we reasoned, “there are three of us and 4 pieces of luggage – we’ll just take turns lugging gear from outside.” Dane goes first. He grabs the 75 pound trunk and starts the walk, figuring that once he’s inside, he’ll be able to just drag it along on it’s wheels. Once he got it inside, however, the convention center staff person who kindly let him in (because he’d gone to a locked door) told him that he’d have to CARRY that 75 pound trunk to his table (in hall B a HALF A MILE away) because of regulations against small wheels on the floor. Being so young and impressionable, Dane attempted to comply. After about an hour, he’d made it halfway there when from behind him, he heard beeping. Now, on a convention floor during setup, you hear a lot of beeping of electric carts and forklifts running around. Not unusual. What was unusual however, were the shouts and giggles that accompanied the beeping. Dane set his trunk down, and turned around to see Ashlie and her friend Beth on an electric flatbed cart WITH THEIR PORTION of the gear. A very kind Freeman employee saw them dragging their stuff into the convention center and offered them help. Dane’s wrist twitched convulsively for the rest of the show.
What’s the most interesting commission you’ve done?
All of my commissions are interesting, because we have amazing fans that get our humor. Case in point: Last year at AwesomeCon I got a sketch request that was “Teddy Roosevelt punching a bear” Seems simple enough, right? The commissioner didn’t specify WHAT KIND of bear, tho, so I drew Teddy punching the cassette tapes out of a giant, angry Teddy Ruxpin. The commissioner loved it. Another favorite from a few years ago was when I was in Canada, I was asked to draw Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau as a My Little Pony. Because why not?
What can fans do to support your work beyond buying your cool stuff?
Spread the word! Tell your friends! Join us online at our FB page or Instagram! Or, if you’re not the social media type, we have a Ko-Fi account!
Where can we find you at Denver Comic Con?
We’ll be in Artist Valley at tables X14 & X16 all weekend! And always online at www.monkeyminionpress.com.