By Autumn Daughetee
When I think of comic books I imagine a comic book store that looks a lot like the one on Big Bang Theory. When a woman walks in the door everyone freezes and stares. Since their inception, comic books have been the province of men. The ladies of Kymera Press are going to change that.
Kymera Press founders Debbie Lynn Smith and Maggie Field are kicking down the doors to the boys club and making a place for women in comics. “Our mission is to give women creators and artists of comic books an outlet where they can create women-friendly comics. Our secondary mission is to encourage more women to read and enjoy comics,” said Debbie.
The founders of Kymera Press first met when Maggie was working as a film and television literary agent and she took on Debbie as a client. When Maggie closed her agency in 2006, the two remained friends and occasionally worked on projects together.
The seeds for Kymera Press were sown when Maggie suggested that Debbie turn her television pilot script, Gates of Midnight into a comic book. This lead Debbie to spend the next year and half researching comics, taking seminars and talking to people in the comic industry. “When Maggie suggested I turn it into a comic book, I was skeptical. I hadn’t read comics since the Archie Comics when I was a kid. Imagine my surprise as I started reading the independent comics like Saga, The Last Man, Voice in the Dark, Fatale, Ghosted, Afterlife with Archie … I could go on and on. I turned into a total fan and have spent lots of money catching up on what I’ve been missing all these years.”
In the course of their research Debbie and Maggie attended ImageCon. “Debbie and I were in research mode when we attended ImageCon in San Francisco in July of 2013. It was a one-day event, and as the day progressed we noticed that everyone on the stage, everyone on every panel was male,” said Maggie.
“In the hotel room late that afternoon, we had a long conversation about how what we wanted to do went far beyond just putting out my comic Gates of Midnight. We decided then and there to use all women in the development of Gates,” said Debbie. “And we decided that we wanted to provide an outlet for the incredibly talented women currently working or trying to break into the comic world.”
Kymera Press was born that night in a San Francisco hotel room. “I know that’s when I made the commitment to become a business owner rather than just a writer. I prefer to be just a writer, but this needed to be done.”
Maggie said, “As Debbie set to work on writing the first four issues of Gates of Midnight, I began to research women artists. I was overwhelmed by the number of seriously talented women who had not achieved either the fame and recognition or the opportunity to create and publish their own works that men in comics had. As Debbie’s and my enthusiasm for the work of women grew exponentially, we both agreed that we had to look beyond Gates to create a platform dedicated to these women.”
Maggie and Debbie are already looking beyond the publication of Gates of Midnight. Maggie said, “We currently have more than half a dozen projects that we’d like to pursue. You can check them out on our website and on Kickstarter page.”
Leave a Reply