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Phil Foglio

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Phil Foglio
Foglio at Gen Con Indy 2007 (Aaron Williams in the background)
Born (1956-05-01) May 1, 1956 (age 68)
EducationDePaul University
Occupation(s)Cartoonist, artist
SpouseKaja Foglio

Philip Peter Foglio (born May 1, 1956)[1] is an American cartoonist and comic book artist known for his humorous science fiction and fantasy art.

Early life and career

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Foglio was born on May 1, 1956, in Mount Vernon, New York, and moved with his family to Hartsdale, New York, where he lived until he was 17.[1] He attended the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts in Chicago, Illinois, and was a member of the university's science fiction club, art-directing and co-editing the group's fanzine, Effen Essef.[2] He was nominated for both the Hugo Award for Best Fan Artist and the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation in 1976,[3] and won Best Fan Artist in 1977[4] and 1978.[5] After living in the DePaul dorms for a few years, Phil moved to the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago and hosted weekly Thursday night meetings of Chicago-area science fiction fans. He drew the first known Unix daemons for a limited series of T-shirts in 1979.[6][7]

Beginning in 1980, Foglio wrote and illustrated the comic strip What's New with Phil & Dixie for Dragon Magazine from TSR Games, satirizing the world of role-playing games. The strip ran monthly for three years. In the early 1980s, after some time in Chicago attempting to find work doing science fiction magazine and book illustration, Foglio moved to New York City.[1] He formed the independent comic-book company "ffantasy ffactory" [no capitals] with science-fiction writer-artist Connor Freff Cochran (Freff) and science-fiction book editor Melissa Ann Singer.[2] Working with editorial input from Chris Claremont, Foglio and Freff wrote and drew a single issue of a science-fiction/historical title called D'Arc Tangent before ending their collaboration in 1984.[2]

He eventually returned to the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago and continued fantasy and science-fiction art.[citation needed] For publisher Donning/Starblaze, Foglio illustrated the MythAdventures series of fantasy novels by Robert Lynn Asprin, and he later adapted the first book, Another Fine Myth, into an eight-issue comic-book series from WaRP Graphics. The WaRP work eventually led to comic-book assignments from DC Comics (Angel and the Ape, Plastic Man and Stanley and His Monster miniseries), Marvel Comics, and First Comics (back-up stories in issues of Grimjack and scripting over Doug Rice's plots in Dynamo Joe). He also joined the Moebius theatre group, and he held regular meetings and poker parties for the local science fiction community.[citation needed]

Foglio initiated his long-running character Buck Godot for the publication Just Imagine, published by Denny Meisinger.[1] Basing the humorous science-fiction detective on a real-life friend, John Buckley, Foglio "did a couple of those in the black-and-whites and then Donning said they wanted Buck Godot graphic novels", two of which followed.

Later work

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The Foglios at Gen Con Indy 2007

In the 1990s, Foglio met and married his wife, Kaja. The two contributed art to the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering,[8] from Wizards of the Coast and resurrected the comic strip What's New with Phil & Dixie for that company's Duelist magazine. During this decade, Foglio co-founded Palliard Press and published additional comics, including a new Buck Godot series and the whimsical erotic series XXXenophile. The Foglios later founded Studio Foglio and began to produce the steampunk-fantasy series Girl Genius.

In April 2005, the Foglios abandoned publishing periodical-style comic books and began publishing Girl Genius online as a free webcomic, updated three times a week.[9] Foglio told an interviewer that as of November 2005, "[W]e've quadrupled our number of readers, and tripled our sales" of traditional comics and related merchandise.[10]

Awards

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In 1976, the slide show The Capture, which Robert Asprin wrote and Foglio illustrated, was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation; in the same year, he was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Fan Artist for the first time.[11] Foglio won the Fan Artist Hugo twice, in 1977 and 1978.[4][5] He was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Professional Artist in 2008.[12] He, his wife (Kaja Foglio), and their colorist (Cheyenne Wright) won the first graphic story Hugo for Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones in 2009.[13] The three again won the award for subsequent volumes in 2010[14][15] and 2011.[16] Having won the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story in all three of its first three years, Kaja, Phil, and Cheyenne announced that, in order to show that the category was a "viable award" (with quality competitors besides themselves), they were refusing nomination for the following year (2012).[17] Girl Genius was once again nominated for a Hugo in 2014, but did not win.[18]

In 1993, he was awarded the Inkpot Award.[19]

Foglio won a Reuben divisional award from the National Cartoonist Society for Best Online Comics: Long Form for 2022.[20][21]

Selected works

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d Stanley and His Monster. Vol. 2. March 1993. p. Autobiographical page.
  2. ^ a b c "Phil Foglio". The Comic Book Database. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  3. ^ "1976 Hugo Awards". July 26, 2007. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  4. ^ a b "1977 Hugo Awards". The Hugo Awards. July 26, 2007. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  5. ^ a b "1978 Hugo Awards". July 26, 2007. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  6. ^ Toomey, Warren (January 19, 1999). "Saving UNIX from /dev/null". Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  7. ^ McKusick, Marshall Kirk. "History of the BSD Daemon: USENIX". Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  8. ^ "List of Magic the Gathering cards illustrated by Foglio". Wizards of the Coast. Retrieved March 18, 2013.
  9. ^ GiantPanda (April 19, 2005). "Foglio's 'Girl Genius' Goes Online". ComixTalk. Archived from the original on June 11, 2008. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  10. ^ "Comixpedia's List of 25 People Of Webcomics for 2005". ComixTalk. December 2005. Archived from the original on June 11, 2008. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  11. ^ "List of Hugo nominees at Locus website". Archived from the original on September 20, 2011. Retrieved September 16, 2010.
  12. ^ "2008 Hugo Award Nominees". The Hugo Awards website. March 21, 2008. Retrieved December 4, 2008.
  13. ^ "2009 Hugo Award Nominations". thehugoawards.com. March 20, 2009. Retrieved March 20, 2009.
  14. ^ Cavna, Michael (September 5, 2010). "'GIRL GENIUS' wins Hugo Award for best graphic story". Comic Riffs. Washington Post. Archived from the original on February 5, 2013. Retrieved September 9, 2010.
  15. ^ "2010 Hugo Award Winners". September 5, 2010.
  16. ^ "2011 Hugo Award Winners". thehugoawards.com. August 21, 2011. Retrieved September 12, 2011.
  17. ^ "Hugo Acceptance Speech #3". Girl Genius Online Comics!. Airship Entertainment. August 31, 2011. Retrieved August 31, 2011.
  18. ^ "Hugo Awards 2014". April 18, 2014.
  19. ^ Inkpot Award
  20. ^ "Finalists announced for 2022 NCS Divisional Awards for the 77th Annual Reubens".
  21. ^ "Phil Foglio Among 2023 Reuben Award Winners". September 8, 2023.
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