CowboyOrange

I know I promised to come kickin’ around my virtual clubhouse more, and give folks more reasons to join me. I haven’t been doing that lately. I kinda got kicked in the teeth by some kinda nasty disease that laid me out for a week. Fever, chills, nausea, a killer cough, and complete exhaustion. Not only was I too mentally tired to draw, I was too tired to watch TV. That’s right - I was too dumb to do the dumbest thing a man can do. Pretty lame, I know.

So, to catch up, I’m giving you a pair of recent comics pages, which I drew for my friend Joe Lambert’s birthday. He’s kind of a genius, so I felt a little dumb giving this to him; but what was I gonna do, spend money? Anyway, I don’t think it’s too bad for drawing it in one night.

A little explanation: during the summer, we play a lot of four-square up here at James Sturm’s School for Cartoonists in Butt-Fuck Nowhere. “Dodgeball” is one of the rules variants, wherein if one catches the ball before the bounce and yells “Dodgeball!” one can throw the ball at an opponent and knock them “out.” Joe is a particularly competitive player.

One other thing occurs to me about this story that I’d like to throw out there: I’m curious about the relationship between style and content. I’ve recently begun taking a more conventional animation/action-cartoon style in my work, and because I have literary pretensions and aspirations, this makes me nervous. I’ve never seen solid literary work pulled off in a conventional visual style; I worry about whether it’s even possible. Part of it, I suppose, is that “style” is to cartooning as “voice” is to writing, and that no literary “voice” characterized by cliché or formal conventionalism has ever been recognized as particularly worthy of critical attention. At the same time, though, I’ve read a lot of strongly literary books - masterpieces, I think - which aren’t deeply experimental in their approach to form, so I’m not convinced that the successful use of convention is a failing.

Anyway, I welcome your thoughts on the subject, or on the piece that prompted it. And I promise, more soon, including that pic of Penina!

My organization techniques are abysmal. I keep carefully balanced piles of papers on my desk, and my “files” consist of similarly chaotic boxes full of paper. It makes Colleen cry.

So, I was digging through these boxes the other day, looking for a missing page on my Ota Benga project, when I came across a bunch of old comics that I’ve never published, like the silent one I posted last week. I figure, “Heck, they’re shamefully bad, but folks can see my good stuff easily enough. It might be fun to put these up.”

I drew the comic below almost two years ago, during my first year at CCS. The class took a trip to the Montshire Museum, and the point was to use what one found there as the subject of a comic in which one would experiment with scale, making the protagonist either very large or very small. I chose the latter.

I chose not to color this comic for two reasons: 1) During the assignment, I was experimenting with black and white composition, and I think color would distract from that; and 2) it really isn’t good enough to merit the extra effort. So, with that said, here it is!

Enjoy!

You know, not in that icky way. In a good way.

Anyhoo.

A few years back, I did this for The Danger Room, a comic book store in Olympia, Washington, owned & operated by my dear friend Patrick Mapp. Every year, they circulate a secret ballot among their customers (who generally have excellent taste) to choose the best comics of the year; usually, they have a few fun questions as well. In 2005, I drew this strip so their customers could write the dialogue between then-manager Frank Hussey (on the left) and Pat. It went over well enough, though not so well that they’ve asked me to do another. I colored it just for you all.

What? You want something new? Like I’ve nothing better to do all day than make funny pictures of marine life hybrids for you? Whatever. I’m not your sea monkey. Well, maybe I am, but I don’t have anything like that today. Talk to me later.

As I may have mentioned before, I’m trying to update the blog more regularly, in the hopes that folks will come around more regularly. So, to that end (and to prove I’m actually working on stuff), I’ll be posting sketches and things as I’m able. This is a panel of my pencils from Ota Benga was Put in a Cage in the Bronx Zoo with an Orangutan.

The pace at which I work has become a terrible embarrassment to me: the first 13 pages of this story have taken me more than a year, and I still have 19 pages to go in the first chapter! The next bits are set in the jungle, though, which means fewer perspective drawings, which hopefully means I’ll be able to draw them a bit faster. Also, I get to draw an elephant getting in a fight. I like drawing elephants.

Next time: Cephalopodalocephalism!

So, about a month and a half ago, we had a game of Assassin here, to mourn the departure of genius-cartoonist, Ken “Gabby” Dahl. Much imaginary blood was shed and Gabby fought a good fight, but in the end he was defeated by fellow cartoonist Penina Gal, a stone-cold killer if there ever was one. Seriously. She, like, uses live kitten innards for salsa. She’s, y’know: hard-core.

Anyway, Gabby seemed to love the game. While normally a taciturn and reticent fellow, he was excited, laughing and carrying on like I’ve rarely seen. So, when it came time for Gabby’s going away party (the first of three spread out over a week), I presented him with this:

He got the original art, which wasn’t as colorful but did have the marvelous texture that only comes from a combination of a firm nib and thick, goopy ink.

Over the next few months, to encourage folks around here to participate in the next game, I’ll be posting sketches of several players, portraying them with their signature weapon/technique of assassination. Next up: Penina Gal, Master Assassin 2007.