Heather McAdams is Alive and Well

Well gang, Heather Mcadams is alive and well and still making art in Chicago.  I already knew that, but I didn’t quite know WHAT she was doing and man alive she’s doing A LOT.

Two of you were kind to do more sleuthing on your own and found an e-mail address in an odd corner of the internet for Heather and sent it to me (thank you Robyn & Rebecca!).  I was nervous as heck to write her because it wasn’t like she was advertising her e-mail anywhere and I didn’t want to come off as a crazy stalker.  I hesitated for about a second and then thought the magic words *What*the*Hell* and e-mailed her.  My intention was to see if she was still making comics and if there was anyway I could HELP her get more visibility.  In these comics loving times, when her contemporaries are being celebrated for their groundbreaking work, it genuinely seems odd to me that her name is not thrown around more.

I am so happy to say she wrote me back and sent me some examples of her more current work–and gave me permission to show it off.  She (sadly) is not doing comics anymore, but her current work feels so apiece with the comics that it doesn’t feel like that voice is lost.  As she says, she does CD covers, visiting artists gigs, and live shows.  Last year she made an Anything BUT Country Calendar, and created and performed a show for it.  She continues to make experimental films, both of her own work and from old 16mm films, and creates beautiful needlepoint portraits of country stars. Look at these babies:

She has a show coming up at the Sulzer Library in June.  I would love to see it–her world is something I dig very much.  I am DYING to see her on-line and am fighting back the urge to make a web site for her myself (not really kidding).  I asked my friend Chris if I was nuts to consider it and he told me I was doing God’s work in helping her get a larger audience.  Perhaps this is my mission!

I told Heather she was a cult hero and she asked if in that case she should be wearing a little cape.  I told her of course, or at the very least a badge to flash when the occasion arises.  Frankly, if you are a cult hero, the occasion ALWAYS arises.