James Hartstein, digital media coordinator at the Alexander Library, co-founded a web comic with a broad audience
Stupid & Insane Defenders Against Chaos started to attract attention and acclaim from different sources such as the Geek Out! blog on CNN.com, which published an interview with the Hartsteins about the web comic in October 2011.
As sure as Archie loves Veronica (or Betty, depending on the day), and Superman will defeat Lex Luthor, the influence of comic books and graphic novels has grown markedly in the entertainment field and popular culture.
At Rutgers, a growing number of faculty members have devoted courses, in whole or in part, to the study of this literature form. For the upcoming academic year, courses include “Topics in Literature: Comics and Graphic Novels,” and “The Jewish Graphic Novel” offered jointly by the Art History, Comparative Literature, English, and Jewish Studies departments in New Brunswick.
Scholars and serious fans might be surprised to learn that a web comic creator with a broad audience, who (with a few others) runs an annual conference that attracts hundreds of attendees, is quietly hiding out in the Rutgers University Libraries.
James Hartstein, digital media coordinator in the Scholarly Communication Center of Alexander Library, is the co-creator, with his wife Karrie, of the Stupid & Insane Defenders Against Chaos web comic, which regularly attracts between 50,000 and 100,000 unique readers each month.
The couple also founded, organize and run with a small circle of friends, Intervention, a national conference held in Rockville, Maryland, designed to allow artists and performers of all sorts to learn from experts in the field, share ideas, and consider pursuing their passions in web comics or associated popular culture as serious hobbies or as vocations.
The 2013 convention, scheduled this year from August 23-25, will be the group's fourth. It is cosponsored by Warner Archive collection, 4imprint and Smith Micro Software.
When James and Karrie Hartstein were dating, they looked for a joint project that would allow her use her artistic abilities and him to use his IT skills, developed in part in a web design certification program at Rutgers which led to the 2003 launch of Stupid & Insane Defenders Against Chaos. The comic, featuring Japanese-style art, focuses on two characters, Onezumi and Harknell – loosely modeled after Karrie and James. The featured duo, along with a set of oddball friends and associates, are engaged in a running battle with evil counterparts of themselves in a parallel dimension.
Stupid & Insane Defenders Against Chaos slowly developed a following and helped James and Karrie refine their respective skills. The web comic also started to attract attention and acclaim from different sources such as the Geek Out! blog on CNN.com, which published an interview with the Hartsteins about the web comic in October 2011.
As part of the growth of Stupid & Insane Defenders Against Chaos, the creators were invited to speak or to host exhibit tables at different comic or popular culture oriented conventions. While they enjoyed the opportunity to network with people interested in similar pursuits, they noticed a serious shortcoming in all the existing conferences – there were few or no practical workshops and little active encouragement to help the talented but hesitant launch their own efforts.
Using their own funds and working with a coterie of friends they’d met at other conventions, they organized the Intervention convention in September 2010. The convention featured 49 guest speakers and panelists, as well as many well-known online comic artists, authors, and performers. It also offered workshops on Adobe Illustrator, Auto-Biographical Comics, Photoshop Techniques, Copyright for Artists, Webcomic Portfolio Reviews, Finding your Niche and other topics.
Despite the fact that the conference had never been held before and there was no guarantee it would be held again, more than 500 people turned out. The conference was widely seen as a success and, even though they did not recoup their initial funding the organizers decided to conduct the conference again the next year.
The 2011 Intervention attracted over 700 participants, a much larger organizing group, and a similarly impressive roster of speakers and workshops. The 2012 convention attracted more than 850 participants and was the first to generate a small profit, which James and Karrie have invested in this year’s 2013 conference.
James and Karrie are encouraged by the growth of Intervention and are particularly proud of the artists and performers who came to the first conference as moonlighters but now pursue their crafts full-time, making enough money to continue working at their artistic dreams.
For more information on Intervention, visit: http://interventioncon.com/