We chat with Barbra Dillon, the Co-Founder and President of Fanbase Press, about their latest Kickstarter endeavor.
Welcome to Creator Corner, our recurring interview series in which we chat with the coolest and most thought-provoking creators in the industry. In this entry, we're conversing with Barbra Dillon, co-founder and President of Fanbase Press, about Ripple Effects. Listen to the unedited audio HERE.
What gets you through the day? Witnessing the good work of others encourages us to get out of bed and make something of the time we have. Long before there was a Comic Book Couples Counseling, we greatly admired the passion and creativity of Barba Dillon and Bryant Dillon, the founders of Fanbase Press. Their excitement for stories and the power they wield is infectious, and we strive to reach their level of comics championship.
Over the last few years, our paths have crossed here and there, but we've never had a proper conversation on the record. Until now. Fanbase Press operates in two unique ways. 1) They're a media outlet covering anything and everything within pop culture. 2) They're a publisher, knocking out powerful, award-winning stories. Remarkably, Fanbase Press thrives in both, providing infinite inspiration for Comic Book Couples Counseling.
Ripple Effects, written and colored by Jordan Hart and illustrated by Bruno Chiroleu, is their latest endeavor. The comic is getting a new hardcover treatment with bonus frills, including forwards by Gail Simone and actor Todd Stashwick. It's a superhero narrative in which the invulnerable lead must also quietly battle an acute case of Type 1 diabetes. Inspired by Hart's own experience with thrombophilia, an incurable blood-clotting disease, Ripple Effects highlights the stress, fear, and strength of those living with invisible illnesses. It's a comic that also showcases Fanbase Press' mission statement, #StoriesMatter.
With thirteen days left on their Ripple Effects Kickstarter, we spoke with Barbra Dillon about Fanbase Press, what keeps them motivated so many years since their creation, how Ripple Effects represents the best of comics, and why we all have experience with Graphic Medicine.
This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.
Ripple Effects and the Power of Comics
Brad: What keeps you and Bryant going with Fanbase Press?
Barbra Dillon: Oh, well first thank you for having me. Yes, I love Comic Book Couples Counseling. I love everything that you and Lisa are doing, and you're just wonderful, supportive individuals in the industry. And I think, honestly, that's what fuels us. We love this industry. We love everyone who is a part of it, because I'm sure as you well know, comics is not an incredibly lucrative industry.
Brad: No.
Barbra Dillon: So, it's very much like theater, which is what I grew up in, and Bryant grew up in as well. You really do it because you love it and because you believe in the folks who are a part of it, because you believe in the storytelling and the impact of storytelling and narrative to all of us. That is what keeps us going.
If we can play some small part in being able to provide a platform for creators, and for stories in general, to find new audiences, to help folks feel represented, and then have those stories change people and really impact people and help them to grow or to process things or to connect with other people. My gosh, what an incredible opportunity and what an incredible life to lead to be able to participate in that process.
Brad: What has shaped the Fanbase Press mission?
Barbra Dillon: That's a really good question. Our mission is twofold because we have always had two arms for the company. We are both a media outlet as well as a publisher. Since our inception, folks have looked at us as kind of a strange bird. But for us, we don't view it as a competition. We really view it as, "There are so many stories to be told and let's support that. Rising tides supports all ships and raises all ships, so let's do that."
And so, for us, our mission has simply been to be able to highlight and spotlight all of those amazing people and all of the amazing stories. And I think what's really shaped that is, number one, the synergy, the amazing synergy between the two arms of the company. We've met so many wonderful individuals through the media side of things that we do. All of the interviews we do have led to us publishing some folks and vice versa. And if we can support that mission, that's all the greater for the industry as a whole, I think, and really beneficial to everyone involved.
Ripple Effects and Your Relationship with Graphic Medicine
Brad: I look at something like your Graphic Medicine series and I go, "This is an incredibly helpful platform", and it's something that you don't see too many publishers branching out into. What sparked it?
Barbra Dillon: So specifically, Ripple Effects, our series by Jordan Hart and Bruno Chiroleu, came to us from Jordan. Jordan, for those who may be unfamiliar, has an incurable blood clotting disease called thrombophilia, something that he takes medication for every day to survive. When he was initially hospitalized and this diagnosis was discovered, he wanted to create a story about it. He wanted to share his story with the world and the experiences that he had, the mental and emotional toll that it took on him. But it took him ten years to really be willing to share that story.
We've been friends with him for a number of years, and he approached us at another event that he was supporting. And when he shared the story with us we knew immediately that it was something we wanted to share. Because Ripple Effects is about exploring life as a superhero with an invisible illness, specifically type 1 diabetes. And after every chapter of the series, we have essays by different individuals who have everything from multiple sclerosis to diabetes and even paranoid schizophrenia, and they relate their lived experience to what happens in the series.
It was actually this series that made us aware of the field of graphic medicine, which really is simply the convergence of the entire field of medicine. So, like physical medicine, mental health, absolutely everything, and comics. It's just the combination of those two things. What's interesting, to your point, is that I've found since working with graphic medicine and Ripple Effects, I am now very honored to be a board member on the Graphic Medicine International Collective, which really guides and, I think, provides a hub of resources to folks all over the world who are doing graphic medicine.
But it's an emerging field, so I think it's really important to make folks aware of what it is, but also of the fact that many folks are doing it right now. Every graphic memoir that you've read is graphic medicine, because that's someone sharing their own experience, which might be an emotional impact, which might be a mental impact, sometimes physical if it's someone struggling with cancer or something like that. And that's so wonderful is this field is so new; it is still emerging, but I think what my goal with the board is to do is to make an awareness campaign of, "Hey, a lot of folks already know what graphic medicine is, but we haven't embraced it yet. We're not aware of the term. And so let's embrace it, let's be aware of what it is, and encourage everybody to get behind it".
Brad: Ripple Effects deals with this tension between concealing and revealing your illness. This story offers people who have not experienced invisible illness to consider that tension, that aspect of an invisible illness that never really even occurred to me until I was reading the book.
Barbra Dillon: Absolutely. Jordan wanted it to be for folks who might have invisible disabilities and illnesses but also for their families. Because that is an adventure that the family member goes on as well; they may not be experiencing it, but they grow empathy for the individual who is that they love, that they're related to, etc. But as you said, there are a lot of folks who can't directly relate to what the character in the story is experiencing, or in general, what folks with invisible disabilities and illnesses have if they don't have one themselves. So, the opportunity to build empathy and demonstrate the lived experience of someone else just speaks to the power of storytelling and exactly why we wanted to put this story out.
Brad: Right. Stories matter, one of your original missions. It's something that Lisa and I fully believe in. That's why I picked up a book as a kid. I wanted to go someplace else, I wanted to experience a different perspective. And I think sometimes, when we talk about stories, we fall into this idea of escapism rather than transportation.
Barbra Dillon: Absolutely.
Brad: And Ripple Effects does such a great job of transporting me to someone else.
Barbra Dillon: Well, thank you. Those who might have something that they're very directly dealing with; it might be too gargantuan and too much to take on personally. If we can have that level of separation from ourselves and experience it through a story, sometimes stories can even help us to process what is too much for us in the real world. So, almost that level of escapism still allows you to heal because it's not so close to you.
Make sure you visit the Ripple Effects Kickstarter Page.
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