Tuesday, February 20, 2007

"Ahh, yes! Something new has been added!"

[ed. note: we apologize for not completing this post sooner...
We also goofed by not enabling the comments!]

A few folks might know that my father would have loved
to be on the starting lineup of the New York Yankees.

Others know him as a devoted husband, father, and now,
grandfather...

But... did you also know that my father was a cartoonist?!


Yes, it's true.
Sorta.

My Dad has allowed me to post the following gag cartoons
he copied from leading magazines and newspapers of the day.

We'll start with an easy one...






(Hint: He cites The Washington Daily News as one of his key sources.)


It would please me, and my Dad, too, to locate the original work of the cartoonists
who first drew these magazine cartoons, and others he paid homage to as a kid.
Anyone willing to help out?

Monday, February 19, 2007

Coffee Break



Some Mondays start out so slow.
It's good that there's several more days this week to make a difference.

Friday, February 16, 2007

Lovelife Book Five: The Rest of It

This project was one of my quickest ever turnarounds, as I recall...
from start to finish, something like a week and a half.
I had figured out a way to stick to a decent-enough format
without losing all spontaneity. Even so, I knew I wouldn't cover
nearly everything I had to say on a topic as broad as love,
so I wrote in my notes that the fifth and final book would be
deliberately open-ended and unfinished.







The truth is that giving myself a 'heart attack' was a very last minute idea!!
This worked a lot better in the book... I liked all the blank blue pages at the end.
The digital version doesn't seem to translate quite as good.
Ah well.

(Don't worry about me, by the way... I had a full recovery.) :)

Lovelife Book Four: Kommunication
ist die taste





Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Lovelife Book Three: nobody loves you.

Book Three is embarrassing to me.
I should explain.

I have never been a hip person. I don't understand how to do so.
I like what I like, and will most likely like the same things ten
and twenty years from now that I do today. I don't go out of my way
to keep up with new things. If some new song or 'look' debuts and I
take an interest in it, it's most likely that this is because it reminds me
of better times and styles I'm already very well acquainted with.

For a while I inhabited what had become a very trendy
part of Chicago. If you walked down a certain street during a
certain time of day, it was a bit like living in a Susie Vlçek music video.
The girls were all cute and in indie bands.
They wore unbuttoned square dance shirts
or tight old lady dresses.
They all had bangs and hornrimmed glasses.
They made sure you noticed them as they walked past.
The boys wore deliberately torn undershits and
rolled their smokes up in their sleeves and were never cleanshaven, ever.
And they made sure you noticed them as you walked past!
Somehow it was always easier to forgive the girls!!

Clearly I'm shabbily masking some kind of deep-rooted resentment in the
strip below. I wanna be cool, too; who doesn't?
In recent years, I've never been less cool.
I've even stooped to pawning my more catty lines to my other characters
to disguise the fact, even though they're things I myself would sooner say.

Besides, who can compete with champion pouter and social cynic
DAVID GEMMILL?
I've never met him,
but he's got this kind of thing down to a refined science.
If he's not featured in a future issue of
Animation Blast, I'll eat my afro pick.

Anyway, okay, enough.





Monday, February 12, 2007

Your Lovelife Diagnosed in Five Minicomics
(or less)




All this week I'll be posting five tiny comic books I did for a 2004
group show that took place in Chicago called "My Secret Valentine."

As I understood it, the idea was to create work in any media imaginable,
intended for an anonymous individual, either man or woman.
The show ran only one night, at which point these 'gifts'
were given out to its participants,
i.e., every artist went home with someone else's 'valentine.'

Please note that 'Onslaught of Buffoonery' is never
nor has ever been intended for wee kin or small fry,
and that this week is certainly no exception.


Anyway, the first two chapters and more on this project tomorrow.

Friday, February 09, 2007