It’s no secret we’re big fans of The Little Red Fish, the indie comic created by local artist Bizhan Khodabandeh and writer James Moffitt and published by the local company Sink/Swim Press. Well it turns out the folks who digitally publish the comic, Rosarium Publishing, are looking for some help and if things work out we’ll see a print version of Khodabandeh’s new pet project, The Little Black Fish.
It’s no secret we’re big fans of The Little Red Fish, the indie comic created by local artist Bizhan Khodabandeh and writer James Moffitt and published by the local company Sink/Swim Press. Well it turns out the folks who digitally publish the comic, Rosarium Publishing, are looking for some help and if things work out we’ll see a print version of Khodabandeh’s new pet project, The Little Black Fish.
“What if everybody got to tell their own story?” asks Bill Campbell, founder of Rosarium Publishing in the hopes of inspiring you to open your mind, heart and wallet. “We don’t believe that time has a specific race, ethnicity, nationality. And it doesn’t belong to any one people, gender or sexual preference?… Why not let people tell their own stories, and let people use comics to do it.”
Campbell’s philosophy has worked on a small scale so far, and he’s gathered a number of artists and awards over the last two years to prove it. His small, independent publishing company started as a home project funded by his day job and the occasional crowd funding campaign. Now he wants to increase the scale of printing and move away from costly individual print piece, known as print-on-demand.
“While we’re no where near printing 100,000 copies of any of our books (yet), we’re definitely experiencing the downside of print-on-demand,” he said. “That’s what this campaign is for – to get to the next level.”
Campbell’s lofty goals include increasing printing of current and new books and hiring a publicist to help those books reach a bigger audience. And among those books is The Little Black Fish.
Continuing the trend of sharing Iranian political allegory through a child’s folk tale, Khodabandeh said The Little Black Fish is an adaptation of a story by the Iranian teacher and writer Samad Behrangi. At it’s heart the story is about questioning authority.
“I had my uncle translate the story and did a comic adaptation that was originally written in prose with a couple accompanying illustrations,” Khodabandeh said. “This was to bring it to a western Audience.”
Khodabandeh met Campell through his work with Sink/Swim press which does the physical publishing of Little Red Fish. The two were both tabling at Sink/Swim Press’s Comic Creators expo and it was there that he sold him on digitally publishing The Little Red Fish.
“Rosarium is one a few publishers that are focused on representing a world that reflects the diverse world we live in,” said Khodabandeh about his hopes for the project and his faith in Campbell. “For many of us, we aren’t going to be given a seat at the metaphorical table. This is about carving our own space out on our terms.”
The indigogo has hit just about 20K and has only a few days left to get donations from fans and folks interested in seeing projects like The Little Black Fish come to light as a print piece. But don’t fear, Rick Riordan, author of the Percy Jackson series, has said he will match pledges up to $10,000 up until the end of the campaign so they only need a few grand more to reach their goal!
And (lucky for you) a digital copy of Khodabandeh and Moffit’s Little Red Fish #1 is among the rewards at the reasonable donation level of only $10 – so get in there and spare what you can folks!
