Walpurgis

Continuing with the philosophy that only artists that did work for EC were any good, and of those artists, everything they did was a masterpiece, until 1955 when Kurtzman left MAD, comes this story. A lot of the stories from the comics my father took pages from as a kid were by Howard Nostrand for Harvey. He didn't do any work for EC, but my father thought he was Jack Davis. Their work does look a bit alike, but it's not as if Nostrand sat down and decided to imitate Davis and was hired for that reason. Or maybe it was. I can't ask him since he died at least 20 years ago. From WITCHES' TALES #19 around 1953 and because tonight is Walpurgisnacht, here's this comic.

another doodle

Now here's another doodle so there isn't so much text at the top of the page.

doodles on cardboard

I drew this on the back of a drawing pad I now use as a cutting board. Probably last summer because one of the drawings is lipstick on a pig. It was 14" X 17" so I had to scan it four times, hence the lines and it not quite matching up.

Now I'LL tell one

When I was 12, my father gave me a bunch of stories that he cut out of comics as a kid in the 50s. Partly because everything else in the comic was crap, and also to hide them from his mother (my grandmother) who believed much of the anti-comics hysteria at the time. Most of the stories were ECs which I sold on Ebay a long time ago. Much of them are now public domain so I'll be putting them up here every few days. One thing about them is that he cut a lot of the stories to the edge of the panels, cutting out margins and sometimes the content. I've had 27 years to look at various indexes to figure out where they came from.

First up is a story from MISTER MYSTERY #3 some time in 1953. It looks a bit like Harvey Kurtzman but the artist is actually Charles Stern. They were studio-mates at one time so it's likely one of them influenced the other.



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Obama Is Bad

Caricature's never been my strong suit. Even when I get something right it doesn't fit in my "universe". I was trying to draw Obama earlier today and my attempts looked like Emmanuel Lewis or Ernie or even Bush. Then it dawned on me for something as silly and apolitical as this (click on it to view it at a larger size), I can just use photographs. And I'm not trying to fool anyone with that fine line between theft and homage in that next to last panel.

more sketchbook drawings

My sketchbook pages get mixed reactions. Some say I shouldn't print them at all, some prefer them to my finished drawings. Putting them here sort of solves the problem in that nobody has to pay for them.

Seduction of the Innocent

How was your Saturday night? I spent mine drawing a piece for an anthology called Seduction of the Innocent, which will be a compilation of drawings by different cartoonists doing girls reading comics. It's supposed to be pinups of the Petty/Vargas/Elvgren variety, but that just isn't how I draw.

Well-Defined

Here's another book with illustrations by me, and nobody else this time. Like the last one, it's a few months old, but I thought I'd post it here anyway. It's poems about vocabulary words, like you'd find on SATs. Usually the writer has no say in who their illustrator is, but author Michael Salinger specifically sought me out. They also let me do the drawings whatever size I wanted, another rarity in publishing. It's from a subsidiary of Highlights, which puts all their contributors up and has a party for them every year. Time-Warner and Viacom don't do anything like that, but I guess that's why they stay so big.

I Saw You

This was a few months ago, but I did a page for I Saw You: Comics Inspired By Real-Life Connections. It's different cartoonists' takes on those missed connections ads on Craig's List. I only did one page, but it's a veritable who's who of the comics world. I wish they'd kept the typos as I took them from the ad, but I guess it was necessary so people wouldn't think they were my mistakes or theirs. I wish I'd done more pages after seeing how it turned out, but there will only be this one unless it's a runaway success, and only after editor Julia Wertz has made a name for herself with her own work. I'm not going to post my page, you'll have to buy it and check out everyone else's too.

Puke: A Graphic (and Periodically Accurate) History of Vomiting Through the Ages

A guy named Alan Goldsher, who's ghost written for many celebrities, is shopping around a book called Puke: A Graphic (and Periodically Accurate) History of Vomiting Through the Ages , some stories which are true, some aren't. It features stories about Babe Ruth, George H.W. Bush, and others. If it gets bought, I'll be illustrating a piece about Roman vomitoriums (or is the plural vomitoria?). I did this quick sketch which he's using for his proposal. I told him it would be a coup if he could get Al Jaffee to do the cover.

Scene But Not Heard

Here's the front cover for a collection of the strips I've been doing for Nickelodeon the past 16 years. Top Shelf will publish it and it's coming out sometime next year. Price as yet undetermined, but it will be full color.

So I finally gave in. All the kids are doing it so I decided to set up a blog as well. I plan to mention everything I eat and every time I go to the bathroom or maybe I'll just show what I'm working on or things I have. Since doing a comic yearly, not going to as many conventions, and not having my work promoted as much as I like has kept me out of the public eye so I've decided to do this. Salesmanship is my least favorite part of cartooning but it needs to be done. Maybe people will no longer think I don't exist or I'll stop thinking they think that or something like that. Maybe it'll motivate me to get off my ass and be as prolific as I once was. Maybe I'll be able to make a living from creative endeavors once again. Maybe the frustration I sometimes feel won't be self-perpetuating anymore. Maybe I'll be able to afford to move back to NYC once again. We'll see.