At Lenape Elementary, a group of greasy-fingered nine and 10 year olds spent five weeks creating, drawing and laying out their first ever comic book. On Nov. 7, they got to see their work printed and bound at their launch party at Elting Memorial Library.
The Fresh Pizza Art Gang is a coalition of 11 elementary school students who signed up for a new after-school program founded by Jimbo Matison, a father of a student at Lenape.
Matison moved to New Paltz with his family around one year ago, after a lifetime of working in film, TV and children’s books. “I’ve always been an artist,” he said. “And I heard that the after-school art programs needed a little help.”
Matison, being a writer, director and producer, had never taught an art course before. “I was kind of just looking to get my feet wet, and I contacted [Lenape] and I was like, ‘What are you looking for?’ And they said, ‘What do you want to do?’ So they literally just let me come up with my own curriculum.”
Lenape Elementary offers a variety of after-school programs that students can choose from and sign up for. Matison created one in which he taught a series of workshops on story writing, character design and comic layout, with the goal of producing a real, collaborative, AI-free comic book that his club could hold in their hands, show to their friends and families and be proud of.
“All the sports kids get their day in the sun all the time. Every single basketball game, they’re out there on the court, the lights are shining on them. Every single baseball game, they’re out there and everybody’s cheering them on. But for the art kids, what do they get?” Matison said.
Almost every student in the Fresh Pizza Art Gang showed up on Saturday with their families for the launch party put together by Matison and Elting’s Children’s Librarian Megan Cockett. “I wanted the kids to be able to have a time in their life, of ‘Here’s what we did,’ and everybody gets to applaud,” said Matison. Pizza, of course, was served with cupcakes, juice and snacks before Matison gave personalized awards to each student and unboxed the comic books.
They flipped through their books together, autographing the pages they designed in each other’s copies.
“It’s been such a rewarding course, and [Andy’s] just thrilled,” said Jodie Conley, speaking on her son’s participation in the Fresh Pizza Art Gang. “[Lenape] had an art class, but he loves doodling and doing more cartoon characters. There wasn’t anything like this. For it to be made so accessible and so affordable was amazing and Jimbo’s expertise just made it all the better,” said Conley.
Other parents of the Art Gang students shared similar sentiments, recognizing that the club had an impact on their kids’ lives. “He has never been interested in art,” Betsy Smith said about her son, Danger. “Jimbo just encouraged his creative side, his weird side, and let them flourish in whatever kind of way they wanted to.”
Jayce, a member of the Art Gang, explained that he reads a lot of graphic novels at home, with his favorite being “Dogman.” Having only known a little bit about comic books before, he said he feels like he knows how to make one now.
