The 67th NCS Reuben Award Weekend

Photo by Jason Chatfield, courtesy of the NCS Website

I am semi-back in action after hosting the 67th Annual NCS Reuben Award Weekend in Pittsburgh, PA this weekend. Things went great, everyone had fun, people won awards, it was cool.

Speaking of awards, here is the list of this year’s winners:

THE REUBEN AWARD for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year:

• Brian Crane and Rick Kirkman (tie)
  

TELEVISION ANIMATION

• Rich Webber, Director, Aardman Animation Studios, “DC Nation”

FEATURE ANIMATION

• Joann Sfar, Director, “The Rabbi’s Cat”

NEWSPAPER ILLUSTRATION

• Dave Whamond

GAG CARTOONS

• Roz Chast

GREETING CARDS

• Jem Sullivan

NEWSPAPER PANEL CARTOONS

• Hilary Price “Rhymes with Orange”

MAGAZINE FEATURE/MAGAZINE ILLUSTRATION

• Anton Emdin

BOOK ILLUSTRATION

• John Manders

ADVERTISING and PRODUCT ILLUSTRATION

• Ed Steckley

COMIC BOOKS

• Bernie Wrightson “Frankenstein Alive, Alive!”

GRAPHIC NOVELS

• Chris Ware– “Building Stories”

ON-LINE COMICS – SHORT FORM

• Graham Harrop “Ten Cats“

ON-LINE COMICS – LONG FORM

• Vince Dorse “Untold Tales of Bigfoot”

EDITORIAL CARTOONS

• Jen Sorenson

NEWSPAPER COMIC STRIPS

• Brian Basset “Red and Rover”

The big surprise of the night was the Reuben Award for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year being a tie between Brian Crane (Pickles) and Rick Kirkman (Baby Blues). This is not without precedent. In 1968 Johnny Hart and Pat Oliphant tied for the Reuben. A tie is a tie . . . the membership votes and the person with the most votes wins the Reuben. Two of them had the most votes. The NCS membership gave the award to both Rick and Brian. The only bad part about that is my friend Stephen Pastis didn’t also win, and after five nominations he is long overdue. Both Rick and Brian are beyond deserving of the award, but so is Stephen. Hopefully with an all-new slate of other nominees next year he’ll have his moment… but that’s up to the membership of course.

I’m also very happy my good friend Ed Steckley won for Advertising and Product Illustration. He is a talented guy and has really become a top pro in advertising work, especially story boarding for major commercials. Congrats again, Ed! I’m proud of you!

Congratulations to all the winners, and all the nominees again, it’s a great honor all around. I’ll try to blog more about the weekend tomorrow… I’m still doing a lot of last minute wrapping up today.