Zob the Glob and the Pause That Refreshes

3561.

Or, to mix commercial metaphors and taglines, let's just say that Zob probably does this at 10, 2, and 4.

We are a Dr Pepper household after all.

Zob the Glob by The Wife™. Used with permission.

Zob loves him a little soda pop, but who doesn't?

Zob Loves The Library. Of Course.

3531A.

Where ever we go, that friendly little guy, Zob the Glob, tends to tag along.  And, like us, he adores the Multnomah County Library.

Zob's interested in everything. But he's easily distracted. He was keen on American history ...

... but then noticed we were interested in something ourselves.

... and he couldn't resist checking it out.

(NB: Zob is copyright my wife, who created him. Used with permission).

How To Draw By E.G. Lutz: The Man Who Enabled Disney

3522A.

Earlier tonight, at Powell's during Book Church, I stumbled on a couple of books by a man whose work was instrumental in giving us Disney via the public library.

Edwin George Lutz was a commercial artist and illustrator who authored several books on art and how to draw between 1913 and 1933. In 1913, the first of his books, What To Draw And How To Draw It, taught common-sense ways to render birds, houses, animals, people, and expressions in simple, cartoonish style. His 1921 work, Drawing Made Easy, showed the learner how to draw more realistic images of people and animals.

Latterly, facsimile editions of those books were produced by (respectively) LomArt and North Light Books and look like this:

The illustrations are charming, whimsical and very straightforward, clearly showing how, by breaking down natural shapes into shapes the beginner could draw, more complex forms could be built. This is a common concept that the beginning artist is introduced to; the genius of Lutz was his warm, accessable style.

The connection to Disney comes from a book published in 1920, Animated Cartoons: How They Are Made, Their Origin and Development. This particular volume passed into the hands of one Walt Disney, who was at the time making his living in the commercial art trade in Kansas City during the 1920s, under the aegis of the Kansas City Public Library. Legend has it that Disney learned his animation technique from this very book.

The result is a lesson in two things: that the chancest exposure to literature can lead to absolute wonder (what if Walt hadn't seen the book?), and the importance a public library can have in self-education at large (what if KC had an inadequate (or no) public library).

If you love Disney, thank the E.G. Lutz ... and the public library.

This article at Print magazine's website has more information on the Lutz/KC Public Library/Disney connection. 

[liff] Eustace Vladimirovich Tilley

3458.

Barry Blitt's brilliant satirical retro-look at a present through a crack'd New Yorker mascot darkly finally made it out here to the North West Frontier Provinces, courtesy of the Multnomah County Library:

I laughed out loud when I saw it online. The reality is stellar. Blitt's done something historic and it'll probably be remembered long after the Truth and Reconciliation commission gavels closed.

The New Yorker talks Blitt and Vlad and Tilley: http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/cover-story-2017-03-06

[art] Cartoonist, Caricaturist, Best Kept Open Secret: Dick Gautier

3438.

The actor and entertainer, Dick Gautier, who died last week aged 85, was, as is glibly bandied about, known for a few things. He incarnated, so to say, the robotic CONTROL secret agent and KAOS defector known simply as "Hymie" in Get Smart. He also memorably embodied Robin Hood is the far, far too-short (as in less than one season) Mel Brooks-created TV spoof When Things Were Rotten (a show which needs no introduction or explanation to people I know, which should clue one as to what sorts of friends I prefer to have). He also, through the 70s and 80s, appeared innumerable times as a TV guest star, either in a drama or comedy or as a guest on a talk show or a panelist on a game show. He was kind of everywhere for a while.

What was elided from the obituaries and not commonly known seems to be that he excelled, in his way, at caricature, and had more than a modicum of talent as a cartoonist. He also, from 1985 through the 1990s, produced a number of how-to-art books, starting with The Art of Caricature in 1985. I found two of his several how-to books at Powells last weekend. Here they are.

The Creative Cartoonist is a general approach to cartooning for pleasure and possibly for profession, and Drawing and Cartooning 1,001 Caricatures further expands his record of knowledge of that particular art.

Both books are really quite delightful. Gautier has a casual, self-deprecating style of writing that wins over the reader by presenting the text as though it was being spoken by a very nice acquaintance who loves to draw, loves to talk about it, and likes to show other people. His style is very low-pressure: he wants you to draw but he wants you to draw at the level that'll make you happy. And though his directions are simple, they aren't simplistic. Gautier clearly was someone who loved to draw and loved to think about about drawing when he wasn't.

The book The Creative Cartoonist starts, as many of them do, with the head. He shows you simple ways to construct a face and how many shapes you can make one of …

… a simple yet broad catalogue of standard facial expressions …

… and basic instructions on how to make it realistic and how to make it cartoony. There is nothing complicated here but if you follow his directions and practice and have fun at it, he gets you started on a good foot.

There are people who draw for accuracy and realism, and people who just want to draw, have a little fun, and people who want to draw just to impress their friends. The Creative Cartoonist is a fine book for anyone who wants to start casual.

For those who want to kick it up to a certain level, Drawing and Cartooning 1,001 Caricatures has a lot to offer as well. Reading the text, I got the idea that Gautier had a certain sensitive spot about caricaturing; it is a lampooning of the subject and, as such, has to be handled with a soft touch. It can be a great and funny homage or jump a fine line and border on an insult with a touch of viciousness. Gauthier needn't have worried, though: these caricatures of actors Dennis Franz and Roy Scheider come through with a sense of affection for the subjects:

And, of course, what book of caricature is complete without Jay "Why the Long Face?" Leno?

All drawings were, of course, made by the author, which is why I like that back cover above so much. The portrait of Leno in the upper left, the realistic one, is outstandingly well-done, I thought. The distortions, while expected, bring a certain sense of style to the caricature … they show an artist who is confident in his materials. That's what I expecially love to see.

Gauthier's caricaturing system works by studying the face and deciding what are the most remarkable features (what he calls 'dominant') and the less remarkable features (what he calles 'subdominant') and working within that hierarchy. Accentuate the dominant features and have the subdominant work with them. The result is a caricatured face which, while looking little like the reality, has enough of the reality in it so that there's no mistaking the identity of the personality.

He also introduces us to three levels of caricature. The first, portrait charge, is clearly caricature but is only slightly distorted. These would make a good cartoon character version. The second is the straight-up caricature, and the third would be an impressionistic rendering, where the dominant features command and the subdominant all but fall away.

To show he's a good sport, he did himself: Here is Dick Gautier in portrait charge version:

… And here he is in caricature and in full-on impressionistic mode.

By his reasoning, his face is full of dominant features save the nose ("but I'm working on it", he mocks himself in the text), so in the impressionistic version, the nose utterly disappears.

Dick Gautier wasn't widely known for his art, and that's kind of a shame, because he has much to offer the beginner. His friendly style and accessible instruction are the perfect approach for someone who's afraid of doing their own art. He's no Andrew Loomis, but Loomis is the Holy Grail. Gauthier is a pal who you can hang around with … and who will take you into the art world gently, with no pretensions.

They're books I'd give any beginner.

[cartoon] How To Draw Donald Trump: Four Vanity Fair Artists Show Us

3407.

While it's not exactly an art lesson per se, it is highly instructive and a great illumination on why illustrators are such dead-fascinating people.

It's hard to do a good subjective caricature. The ones in Vanity Fair and The New Yorker, for examples of the genre, are the acme. Via Jack Ohman, a cartoonist and caricaturist of much estimation and ilk, we find four VF illustrators (Edward Sorel, Steve Brodner, Philip Burke, and Robert Risko) drawing and explaining and verbally illustrating the thoughts of the shapes they draw.

Mad respect for the fellahs who use the dip-pen and the Staedtler-Mars Lumograph pencils. I don't mean  to show disrespect for any illustrator who uses digital, after all these are much more skilful than my own amateur scractchings, but as someone who draws for pleasure I have some experience with the idea of something created with classic tools directly on classic media. It's a visceral feel, and it transfers to me whenever I so much as watch the thing.

[drawing] Art In The Land Of Christopher Hart

3384.

As the aspiring artist in any style knows, if you're on your own in learning the craft of art, you really have just one alternative if you have neither the time nor the money nor the connections to learn, at least to get started: the how-to-draw book.

In these days we are faced with an embarrassment of riches of all levels of quality and price. Go to your nearest Barnes & Noble, and you'll see what I mean. The number of art instruction manuals and how-to-do-it guides march up into the realm of the innumerable. Manga? No problem. Cartooning? What style do you prefer? Super-hero? Comic-strip? You wanna do 'em in pencil? Ink? Pastel? Crayola™ crayon?

You can even learn sumi-e (and finally put to use that imported Chinese brush and ink set that you got as a gift several years ago).

As you shop, you will run into a scad of books under the brand/author name Christopher Hart. This is not a chances-are sort of thing; it is a certainty, a destiny, a verity. YOU WILL MEET CHRISTOPHER HART SOMEWHERE ALONG YOUR AUTODIDACTING PATH. And it's not hard to see why: on his bookstore page at his site (http://christopherhartbooks.com/drawing-bookstore/) I count no less than thirty books with his byline (which has moved from a simple Christopher Hart or Chris Hart to the more brand-centric Drawing with Christopher Hart). Fully a third of that concerns instruction in manga styles, specialized into kawaii, chibi, shoujo, shonen, manga fashion, and a few more.

I think it's a fair question to ask ones' self, when deciding how to spend ones time self-learning art (and the attendant outlay of money to acquire the codexes of knowledge), does the method have any validity? Is it valid? Will it not only get me started but also get me going in the direction I want to go in. The size of Hart's oeuvre, which seems to be all over the place (but in a good way), to me, not only begs the question, it fairly well demands it. I own a few of the Chris Hart line, and have had the opportunity through browsing at Powell's City of Books and the Multnomah County Library to see others. and, bearing firmly in mind that I am neither here to bury Hart's books nor praise them but to be respectfully honest about them, I can tell you how I found them.

I have beside me two of his how-to-cartoon books, Figure It Out!, The Beginner's Guide To Drawing People, and Drawing Cutting Edge Comics. The constituencies of both books are obvious by the titles, and once you get a little way into Figure It Out!, you realize pretty quickly that the absolute beginner, likely to be intimidated by the idea of mastering figure-drawing by learning about muscle groups and skeletal structure, will hardly be intimidated by this. It's easy, quick to pick-up, enlivened by illustrations that are incredibly clear and self explanatory; the head is explained as an egg shape, and while the lines for positioning features are placed upon they are not explained as to why they're there; the clear illustrations make explaining that to the beginner rather unnecessary. If you're sufficiently movtivated, after about an hour with this book, you will be drawing the beginnings of a credible realistic-cartoon head. Figure It Out! moves on to the rest of the body by teaching general manikin princples, where the bits of the body are rendered into simple shapes and you draw the poses by arranging them just-so. There is also basic figure diagrams to give the idea of running and how to stand.

The other book, Drawing Cutting Edge Comics, also works very hard to deliver the knowledge in its title. The book follows a logical progression from basics (the head, again … another thing you'll find in aspiring artist-instruction-books, at least as far as my experience goes, that they usually start with the head and world their way down), with plenty of illustrations for you to follow along and try out in a step-by-step way. Hart prefers to lead by example, and the illustrations here, as in the previous volume mentioned, are great examples for the visual learner. Everything makes sense based on the way it's visually presented, and there are innumerable examples for the learner to practice on. This is a book on creating comics for the artist who wants to get started right now, and that's how quickly you'll get the upshot on these visual techniques.

Drawing Cutting Edge Comics takes it further in the second half of the book by exploring how the learner might create their own personal style, first by sharing some thoughts of some working artists from Top Cow Productions then delving deeper into the technical aspects of perspective, inking for an edgy look, foreshortening and page design, and a few other design aspects, and goes out with an interview with an agent (Studio 3's Doug Miers) and a very quick overview of the industry at the time of the book's publication (2001) with Chaos! Comics' supremo Brian Pulido.

Its 144 pages promise to pack a ton of information for the budding artist.

So, are they any good? Are they worth laying down your money on? My impression, after looking the books over is, that they certainly are a good place to start. Hart performs an authentic service to hopeful artists by making everything extremely accessible. His style is light, yet informative, and the thing that's always beguiled me about his books is that you look at the way he lays it all out and he does it in a way that, after a few minutes, you're saying to yourself that's something I can do, and after a few more minutes you're looking for pencil and paper to try it, and as I can tell you, just gettng over yourself and getting started are about 98% of the battle. The techniques are clear, do-able almost no-matter what level of artistic skill you think you have, and friendly.

How friendly? Well, as it happens, Chris Hart has a YouTube channel where he posts how-to-draw demos for instruction and inspiration. I was quite impressed with his aplomb and his obvious confidence with his materials. He every bit the pro, and it shows:



Et voila, a pretty girl character in under two minutes. The man knows his stuff. It's obvious he loves drawing, and enthusiastic artists make the best teachers.

Thing about being a mile wide, though, is that sometimes it feels an inch deep. This is palpable at times in the manga titles, to me; when I did a few faces out of The Master Guide To Drawing Anime (which wears the rubric a bit awkwardly as it's about creating characters from standard archetypes for anime and not actually animating anything) I found it, again, easy, accessable and fun and I got good results, but I felt as though it didn't go deep enough for me; at one point it mentions to use the 'standard eye template' but that template was not defined.

This light coverage gets under the skin of independent online creators who, I'm sorry to say, have not been terribly kind to him. Participants on this thread at ConceptArt.org get quite blunt at times, and this essay by a Deviant Art member  can perhaps be summarized best in two words, those words being run and away. And this tumblr blogger actually invokes the name of Rob Liefeld at one place to make his point.

I think the opprobrium is rather unfair, though somewhat illuminative. But then, the world of manga is a complex thing: you don't simply learn to draw 'manga style' because as we all know, manga art is a style first, then a state of mind, then a culture unto itself. Teaching tool-kit techniques in order to begin to master this world-beating style must seem more than a little like a local culture enduring a documentarist intoning they are a simple people yet with a culture all their own. In my experience, anyone commenting or touring manga culture and wanting to produce a respectful and respected critique had better be ready to go deep as well as wide.

So, you wanna learn cartooning. Grand. You got yourself a Chris Hart book or two and you're going to learn it. Absolutely. And if you manage to continue drawing and get the hang of it, more power to you; Hart's style will open the door and get the pencil in your hand. And, if you're drawing for pleasure, he'll introduce you to a whole new world you never knew existed and you'll be wowing yourself and your friends with drawings you never knew you could do.

But you'll need to remember; go in with your eyes open. Beginner's techniques get you drawing but they also sometimes teach the habits that will not sustain you. You'll know when you feel it; you'll be wondering is there more? Is this all there is? What new things can I grasp with the talent I've developed now? 

Then it'll be time to move on, grateful to Hart for the start he gave you, into a big wide world of artistic self-expression. Naturally, the best artist never stop learning and when the student is ready, the new teacher will appear.

But I'll bet you knew that … didn't you?

If you want to know more about Christopher Hart and is art, his website is http://www.christopherhartbooks.com, and he has a YouTube channel where all his affable demo videos can be found. 

If you reached the end of this article, I'm thrilled. I would be sincerely interested in finding out what others, triers and doers, have to say about Hart's instruction. Did you find it interesting? Did it open you up or limit you? PLEASE COMMENT!

[cartoonists] Why Was Morrie Turner Important?

3371.

Yesterday a dear friend shared with me a personal treasure, they'll let me publish it here. It was a  delightful thing, something that made my heart sing with joy a little; I want her to add her memory in her words which will make a finished piece of the thing.

Until then, I need to set the table for it. For those of us who still might not know.

Chances are about even, my gut tells me, my faithful interlocutor has only heard of Morrie Turner on his death in 2014 at the age of 90. You heard he was a pioneering black cartoonist who created a strip called Wee Pals, and you heard that he was the first national cartoonist to have a strip with such a integrated (what we said when we mean 'diverse' back in the 70s) cast.

Oliver steps up; Nipper shows him
where he stepped in it.
Shades of Milo Bloom here?
Aspirational, book-smart,
bespectacled, good-
natured and stocky, Oliver
was my dude.

All of which are true. Wee Pals, which ran from February of 1965 (and is still online at Creators' Syndicate) had an armful of characters which represented just about every outlook you could expect to find. The Rainbow Gang included several black kids, a Latino boy, an east Asian boy, a native American, a few young ladies of more than one color who dealt in 'Girls' Lib', and a bookish bespectacled know-it-all white kid named Oliver who, for me as a reader, was my avatar there. There was even a bigoted white kid. The kids lived life, played together, planned and schemed together, and occiasionally smash-talked each other.

It was, in other words, like life with real people.

Morrie Turner in 2005
(via Wikipedia)

Morrie Turner came up from Oakland where he was raised by a Pullman porter father and a housewife mother; learned cartooning via Art Instruction Schools, served as a mechanic for the Tuskeegee Airmen and had art published in Stars and Stripes, was a member of the Oakland Police Dept, and was inspired down the road to create Wee Pals when, the legend has it, he noticed there were basically no minorities in popular comics at the time and his mentor, Charles Schulz, suggested perhaps he should create one. The strip was eventually carried in more than 100 dailies, and in 1972, moved to TV under the Rankin-Bass aegis as a 17-episode season of animation called Kid Power, which was where I came in on it



This was where I came in. I ate it up like I ate up every other Saturday morning 'toon.

And I told you all that to tell you this: there is a moment that sticks with me, and I don't know if it's where something started with me or not, but it must mean something, because at one point, the gang was trying to resolve some situation or other, and Oliver, in his good-natured, smarts-proud, well intentioned way, boasts "We'll find the chink in the armor".

At which point his friend of Chinese descent, George, points out that he should perhaps watch how he throws that word chink around.

Life is a series of beginnings, and in 1972, in whiter-than-white Silverton, Oregon, someone had one of the many necessary beginnings toward the realization that other people of differently-colored skin are people, too; that words matter; that the best intentions don't mean that arrogance still doesn't hurt, and to learn from those casual mistakes. George didn't hate Oliver for it, they came to understand what that meant, and Oliver grew from the experience. It wasn't just that one moment, of course, but it probably is a single thing from which can come much humanity.

Turner did this all while we thought he was just making us laugh with sassy kids. That's why he's important and why is legacy still matters.

Stay tuned to this channel for a splended Morrie Turner memory from a dear friend's past coming up very soon.

[art] Fun With A Pencil: Andrew Loomis' Foundational Drawing Text

3358.

Though I prefix-tagged the title with the word art, a modest handful of tags would have done as well: cartooning, art, artist, comic art … Andrew Loomis' book for beginners at both artists both casual and aspiring to serious craft has a great, great deal to offer.

As mentioned in the previous article, up until recently, Andrew Loomis' works were much beloved and, since they had been out of print for a very long time, highly sought after. A quick online search reveals that used vintage copies of his classic works from reliable sellers ask $60-$80 a copy. But it doesn't take much looking thorough Fun With A Pencil, that beginner's book, to convince one that this is something that in a fairer world would be of much benefit if it were more widely available.

Well, my friends, your Loomis famine is pretty much over. Starting in 2013, Titan Books has re-released these classic books for a more accessible price, unleashing them upon the world to inspire the next generation of motivated illustrators. The quarto-sized hardcovers are just as one might have bought them in the 1930s-1950s … not one illustration missing or out of place, in the volumes I've seen, each of a quality befitting the publisher and the legacy of the author. They'd look stunning on any shelf, not only for fans of drawing and learning to draw but anyone who adores and remembers the graphic style of books published during those days.

Titan may have been out to publicize the work of a foundational American illustrator, but they worked it out on one level by just making them lovely productions of book design on its own terms. The design look is very much that of of the 2nd quarter of the 20th Century in American graphic design.

Professor Blook, our
author's alter-ego, is
our companion along
the educational journey

But, of course, it's not just the book and its cover that are so pleasing. The inside is a pure revelation, as Loomis, one of the most popular and in-demand commercial artists of his day, takes the auto-didact though his poetically powerful and accessible drawing technique. The accent is on warmth, friendliness and lightheartedness as he enouragingly beckons the reader forward to learn to create art on what eventually becomes the burgeoning artist's own terms. Taking a the simple idea of a circle we move in one deft idea to the ball and how to take this easy-to-draw (even if your circle is a wobbly oval, he swiftly shows us that that's no problem either) figure to create the heads of cartoon figures. After several pages of practice suggestions, all clearly laid out, we get some technical tips and then its on into bodies. From bodies we move into clothing them, and from there we are encouraged to construct a world for them.

The result after all this is a beginning artist with enough skill to either please themselves and friends by drawing for the sheer pleasure or, if they want, take it farther. The book originally came out in 1939, and Loomis and his contemporaries could scarcely have seen the rise of computers and digital art, but as a foundation, the ideas and techniques presented in this book are timeless and are as fresh and necessary today as they were nearly 80 years ago, when the book was introduced. The illustrator of 2016 might have the most amazing electronic tools to use, but without the building blocks of drawing technique, it's all just a powerful scratch pad.

This is the sort of book were you take your time, have fun with it, and make it yours. Like John Hendrix, Andrew Loomis must have been the kind of teacher who wanted everyone to at least try, and noticed that a lot of people wanted to. That encouragement animates the entire text and causes you to understand, in a gut-level way, why drawing, even casual, can be a lifesaver.

In the next article, I'll take a more critical look at the Loomis method. You'll be pleasantly surprised at how essentially easy and potentially powerful it is.

Publisher: Titan Books, http://www.titanbooks.com
ISBN: 9780857687609
Retail: $39.95/$46.00 CDN/GBP 29.99

[cartoonists] A Couple of Andrew Loomis Links For Your Delectation

3356.

Forgot a couple of sites that I should link you to in the last article, so here's a nifty little list:

1. JVJ Publishing's one-page bio on Loomis. Rich in good illustrations: http://www.bpib.com/illustrat/loomis.htm
2. A single page with several Loomis illos can be found at http://www.oklahoma.net/~silvrdal/loomis2.html
3. Art blogger Armand Cabrera has a short article at his Art and Influence blog here at http://www.artandinfluence.com/2010/08/william-andrew-loomis.html
4. The page Save The Books has links to help you acquire Loomis works: http://www.saveloomis.org/
5. Here's an Ebay page selling Andrew Loomis: http://www.ebay.com/bhp/andrew-loomis
6. And, of course, Titan Books' page where you can get them new and direct: http://titanbooks.com/creators/andrew-loomis/
7. Lastly, a preloaded Google Image search so you can go right to the experiential goods, because I am the nice one. 

[liff] The ZKT Mailroom: What Jim Horwitz Sent Me

3237.

This is another thing I've been holding back for a while, and once again I am remiss; I think a public thank you is in order for this man.

Jim Horwitz draws Watson, a comic which is has fierce fans, of which I am one. Sometimes it seems that Jim is as much of a fan of his fans as his fans are of him. I've come to know him as a correspondent with an incredibly generous heart.

Last year, he sent me a book that was important to him, and I've grown to love it too. It's this:

It's Helen DeWitt's The Last Samurai.  It tells of the journey of a young, preternaturally intelligent boy being raised by a single mom and in search of his father. It speaks to genius, the creative process, the restorative power of art. It's also a fiercely-good piece of fiction, provided to me at a time when I was growing out of being just a genre reader and falling in love with the idea of literature at large, its power to create little words that are very very real as we need them.

I'll be reading this again soon, between books on writing and creativity and Pynchon and Proust, because I have a feeling that it hasn't delivered its full message to me. A great novel, I've found, is that way, just like a favorite movie, it's a flower that opens a little more with each reading.

Jim wrote a personal message to me on one of the pages. I won't share it now; it's that personal to me, but I never took the opportunity to thank him for sending it my way, just the right thing at just the right time … how he knew it, I don't know.

But he knew.

I won't share the message, but I keep this post-it on the page facing:

Watson should be a guide to everyone trying to find their way … as I still am.

[liff] The ZKT Mailroom: Paint By Numbers From Donna Barr

3236.

We get sent stuff occasionally from cartoonists. This is a delicious awesome hazard which comes from being acquainted with people with ebullient and generous spirits.

Today, we got this in the mail from Donna Barr:

Now, this is ever appropriate since I've blogged about PBN here, and Donna is famous for doing drawings like these:

Donna knows horses. If I'm looking for culpability, here's some evidence for that …

… which is a good translation and better than mine, because she actually speaks German, whereas I just make a jab at it betimes.

This made my day, need it be said?

[art] "I Got This": When The Wife™ Cartoons

3228.

My spouse likes to hide her light under a bushel in some ways. When it peeks out, it tends to be delighfully amusing.

The job of the bon mot in this house is typically left to me. I'm not just boasting here; of the two of us, and she'll back me up on this, I'm the one much less likely to be left to the so-called 'wisdom of the stairwell'.  She's brilliant, just not exactly in the ways where I'm clever, and that works the other way too.

So, a few weeks ago she dashed this out on a slip of paper over coffee at Powell's. The spots are my fault; I stowed it between two books to keep it flat and somehow it got damp there. I am a crap archivist. But the wit is all hers. This kept me laughing the rest of the night.

Just a simple whimsical thought, deftly accomplished.

I'm not the only wit around here. 

[artist] Jack Ohman Comes Back To Portland

3154.

… but just for a night. But one night is better than no nights, then, isn't it?

I will admit to being a rather giddy fan of Jack. During the 80s, the 90s, and the double-aughts, as he defined political humor for The Oregonian, I became a fan. Impossible not to, as far as I'm concerned. His wit, so dry as to make the planet Arrakis seem a rainforest, and an unmistakable drawing style were first-class to me, and I was smugly proud that, being The O's cartoonist, he was ours.

I've been a fan of the editorial cartoonist in general since I was a little kid who was one of the few I knew who could pronounce the word Watergate. I've been a political news-obsessive for that long. All of my favorites, I found, served their wit on wry; Toles, Danziger, MacNelly, Oliphant, Herblock. An acid wit was a must for me. Still is.

When me and a lot of local Ohmanites found out, just about two years ago this month, that Jack had decided to leave The Oregonian, devastated … well, that word will have to do, though it be somehow inadequate. Tear out our hearts, why don't ya, Oregonian?

Well, that was then; this is now. Jack's gone on to the Sacramento Bee, and has cut an amazingly funny (and aptly trenchant) figure; anyone who can make Rich "Governor Goodhair" Perry cry is just my kind of cartoonist. The drawings remain as crisp and funny as ever, though now focussed on California politics, and this isn't a bad thing, really … I can't remember having this much fun following lower-left coast politics. When I heard that he was coming back to Portland to do a talk on political cartooning, I was hooked; when I found out it was free, I was netted and boated; when I hit the World Affairs Council of Oregon's website and found that I was early enough to nab a couple of seats, I was served for dinner.

The conditions of Monday were covered in the previous missive; I shant retread that path, trompe l'oeil or no. I will make the short, shameful admission that I've never, unto now, have visited the Oregon Historical Society, and it's shameful because my taxes make it so that, as a Multomah County resident, I can visit for free. I should know better than this.

Tickets were unnecessary; all that was required was to check in at the door. We entered the spacious atrium area and was able to get a seat up at the front.

The casualness of the crowd could belie the importance of some of the people that were there that night. But a bit more on that presently.

Jack recognized me in the front row and shot me a friendly hello; I returned thumbs up. I am fortunate to have his friendly custom on FB, and that's how he recognized me. If anyone remembers how sharp and witty the humor in his cartoons were, I can tell you that Jack's one of those rare people who come off in reality as advertised virtually. Warm, generous of spirit, and funny as hell.

On the left, OHS director Kerry Tymchuk. On the right, Jack Ohman.

Somehow I got a photo of his shoes.

The talk began right on time, and OHS's Kerry Tymchuk did the wisest thing in letting Jack roll about his times here in Oregon. You may have heard Jack was smart; I had an inkling, reading his cartoons and writings through his Oregonian years. Forgive me the obvious joke, but I didn't know Jack; the man is an encyclopedia of mid-to-late 20th Century lore on everything Oregon Politics from the legendary Senator Wayne Morse forward, and I suppose it stands to reason. Uncurious people do not make good or memorable political cartoonists. Sharp wits collect the best stories.

And now, I have more reading to do.

I found it funny, though it stands certainly to reason, that politicians who get japed at by political cartoonists want the originals, even if the portrayal isn't always that complimentary. It's a little like "Wierd Al" Yankovic in a way … you know you've arrived if Jack makes fun of you in the paper. It's a sign you've arrived.

I remember a certain Ohman cartoon which showed Lon Mabon losing it over two men grasping hands in a certain way, and the man who was with the Mabon character telling him to relax, it was only a secret fraternal handshake. I find myself wondering if Mabon ever asked for that original … I'm betting no. Lon Mabon didn't strike me as a man with much humor in him.

The field of political cartooning is nowhere near what it once was, with the national supply going, sadly, down. According to what I heard, not only did a lot of smaller-market dailies have political cartoonists, but the bigger ones had two or even three (when Jack started out, at age 19, at The Columbus Dispatch and later at the Detroit Free Press, if I heard correctly, he was in one of those arrangements). I still feel a deep loss that The Oregonian wouldn't hang on to Jack, but as far as the role he's playing at the Sacramento Bee, where I still follow his work, I'm thrilled that some actual-news-7-day-delivery-paper has the good sense to support him.

The talk was capped by Jack talking about various cartoons and cartoonists and their impact on their subjects. This was where I heard the story about subjects wanting the originals, and we all got to chat and shake hands. Jack, I found was a very encouraging presence. A woman who wondered to me how someone would get a start at editorial cartooning, who was asking on behalf of her kid, was treated as a new friend; I stood for a few minutes next to Norma Paulus, who was almost Oregon's governor circa 1986, and was momentarily within about an arm's length of David Sarasohn, who still writes pretty much the best opinion articles The Oregonian publishes, which crackle with dry wit and great style.

I did shake Sarasohn's hand and just thanked him for being who he was, which I think is a necessary thing, especially these days. and yes, I'm a giddy fan, so there's me for you.

I don't know what its like for other people who meet people like this who are nationally acclaimed and that one really sincerely admires. But the few minutes I spent near Jack made me feel like a friend. This was a big experience for me, and I'm thankful.

Jack, as you can see, did me the ultimate benediction sketching me an quick-self-portrait in my diary (yes, this is my diary. Not even my wife has seen the inside of it but Jack has). It's in volume 19, which happens to also be my favorite number, but now I'll be able to find it, too.

And, you know, I don't usually let people see the inside of my diary, but when I do, it's because a remarkably inspiring friend has made a sketch there.

Thanks for hitting Portland again, Jack, and thanks for being a friend. 

[#art] All Over Coffee with Paul Madonna

3115.

Add this man to the list of artists without which I cannot do.

Paul Madonna is a SF-based artist who does one of the most singular comics out there. All Over Coffee is a impressionistic masterpiece, with moody, visually-delicious drawings of San Francisco street scenes with bits of text strewn within. The text itself is, at best, tangentially referential to the picture; the text seems to provide a sound track to what is happening within the picture, kinda. 

It's very subjective. You can imagine the text as someone thinking to themselves about something that something in the picture referenced; a snatch of a distant conversation heard by the person at the POV; or just text living in the picture.

It's the perfect blend of word and picture, forming a poetry and music of its own. Sometimes the words live within the picture, forming a grim, yet funny existential punchline.

Ultimately what a person sees within an All Over Coffee strip is what they find there; you will probably see what you bring to the experience. And, to be sure, the idea of putting only-vaguely-sequitur words with images is hardly something new or unusual. The way Madonna does it, though, is unique … though it defies embodiment in something as surly as mere words, it certainly is there. There's something approaching vulnerability there, the artist's vulnerability, his love of his hometown, and the pure liberating passion of drawing that make the series absolutely beguiling, and once seen, never to be forgotten.

I've lusted for Madonna's  first eponymously-named collection for quite some time, drawn in by the beguilement that cannot be quite expressed in print. Some weeks ago, I found a copy at Powell's, only to be disappointed that someone had razored-out a single page. Bad human! but at our last visit, last Sunday evening, there was a copy, at a price.

All Over Coffee is now mine to leaf through whenever I want. They have a copy at +Multnomah County Library, and I encourage any of you all to check it out when you can. There's a second volume of AOC collected, Everything Is Its Own Reward, which I shall lust over perforce.

[pdx] OR-7: A Predator's Predator; A Predator you can Trust!

2866.
Famous gray wolf OR-7's Presidential campaign is getting off to a strong, if late start, and already he's at the head of the … ah, pack:

OR-7 Presidential Campaign PRESS RELEASE
Contact: Jack Ohman, Campaign Director

PORTLAND--The new Pew Research poll shows OR-7 taking a commanding lead among predators, leading with personal injury lawyers 42 OR-7, 36 Romney, 22 Obama, mortgage bankers 46 OR-7, Romney 31, Obama 23, and used car salesmen 56 OR-7, 30 Romney, Obama 14.

So … who you gonna call?

Well, Jack Ohman, I guess. His name is on the press release, there.