NINE YEARS OF COMIC CON
getting ready for SAN DIEGO COMIC CON this morning and feeling so beautifully nostalgic and just overwhelmed with gratitude. my first CHUCK TRIP to comic con was NINE YEARS AGO and dang things have changed
first SDCC journey was thanks to my buckaroos at TROMA, who are known for the toxic avenger but also for MAKING STRANGE THINGS ON THEIR OWN so it was such a nice fit when they asked me to come and just BE THERE. endlessly grateful for my troma buds (and i will return to their panel this year)
what did i actually DO at comic con? well, not many folks knew who i was at the time, so i would just pay for my manager and me to get to san diego and stay at an price gauging hotel on the edge of town and then id go and id just EXIST in the chaos of comic con. to me THAT was the art
as ive said before, i have been known in other ways outside of my mask, but from day one i said there would be NO crossover and i would use ZERO connections from my other world. 100 percent pure. i would let my existence as chuck be a separate artistic statement on its own merit. this is still true
in case of comic con that meant going every year with no panels, no meetings, and ONE SPONSOR getting me in (thank you troma). so thankful i had audy kaufman and david byrne as artistic guides. id WATCH videos of them every morning in the hotel parking lot before heading to the convention center
this is something i do a lot in my other artistic life. you end up in cities across the world and put in headphones and TROT and try to connect with the infinite. ive seen scotland that way. ive seen tokyo that way. ive seen new york and LA and atlanta and vancouver that way. now ive seen san diego
and DANG there was beauty in those early days of nobody knowing who the heck i was. every passing year a few buckaroos more would recognize me. me and manager or a bud would talk LATE NIGHT at some diner after goin wow this weekend was wild, ONE person shouted out 'CHUCK TINGLE' while i walked by.
the biggest WHOA MOMENT was a few years in, when someone asked for a photo and then said 'great cosplay you look just like chuck tingle.' when i said that i was, he LAUGHED. THESE DAYS i run into ACTUAL chuck tingle cosplays and get mobbed on the way to a full schedule of panels and signings
so what is the point of all this? i dont know and that is okay. just feeling my feelings and having gratitude for how far this trot has come. i listened to a lot of STOP MAKING SENSE before those early appearances, and maybe after all these years that IN ITSELF is the best lesson on EXISTING as art
maybe sometimes we prove love just by showing up and watching the timeline change around us. maybe it doesnt have to make sense
