Artizans Syndicate Closes Shop

D. D. Degg Updated: December 11, 2024 at 12:31 pm EST 1 minute 4 comments

Malcolm Mayes has announced that he is closing the Canadian based Artizans Syndicate.

Edmonton Sun editorial cartoonist Malcolm Mayes informed his clients yesterday that he was pulling the plug on Artizans, the cartoon syndicate he created decades ago.

From Bado’s Blog:

Malcolm wrote:

As you may know we’ve been doing an extensive rebuild of the Artizans.com website, but that build has proven much more difficult than I first imagined. So after investing many tens of thousands of dollars, I’ve decided to pull the plug on the rebuild and pull the plug on the company. Artizans.com will be closing its doors and you are welcome to distribute your work to or through whomever you please.

We debated whether to continue the company and put a lot of effort into the new site, but with sales declining, newspapers and magazines failing and the emerging challenges of AI-generated images, I decided to wrap things up at the end of 2024. This expiring SSL certificate issue has unexpectedly moved that date up a few weeks.

Yes, the Artizans website is now down, though some of its past is available by way of The Wayback Machine.

Malcolm Mayes, after having experience self-syndicating his own cartoons via the Mayes Feature Service since 1986, took on a major project by creating the Artizans Syndicate for himself and other cartoonist in 1997.

As Guy notes a number of cartoonists will lose the syndicate services:

Artizans carried the works of mostly Canadian cartoonists but also counted on its’ roster the late American cartoonist Ed Hall as well as Cuba’s Alfredo Martirena.

Dale Cummings, Sue Dewar, Paul Fell, Jake Fuller, Graham Harrop, Marian Kamensky, Chuck Legge, Graeme Mackay, Bruce MacKinnon, Theo Moudakis, Dan Murphy, Adrian Raeside, Vance Rodewalt. Harley Schwadron and Wes Tyrell will now have to distribute their own work.

A few had already lost full-time positions in the past and relied on the syndicate for a modest income.

While self-syndication is an option will some choose to move to the like-minded Cagle Cartoons?

Or maybe be picked up by the Toronto Star Syndicate or major U. S. syndicates.

Comments ⁴

Paul Fell

I’m open to all ideas and proposals.

Mike Peterson (admin)

Or self-syndicate, which is a lot of work but you get 100% of whatever you sell. And it beats working with someone who just puts your stuff out there with everything else to see if anyone nibbles.

Chuck Legge

I’ve been with Artizans for over a decade. It’s like losing a family member

Ray Rappisi Jr

I remember when GoComics was going to upgrade their Comic Sherpa offshoot website and after some time pulled the plug. It was a place for amateurs to show their comic strips and get feedback from fans and others. I used to have my strip on the site and was disappointed when the announcement was made. I feel for all the creators affected.

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