Narrator and Child.
n.e.s. #121 of 480
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Monthly Archives: May 2020
n.e.s. #120 of 480
We are a quarter of the way through our journey, Friends.
RIP Ahmaud Arbery (n.e.s. #119 of 480)
Rest In Power, Ahmaud Arbery.
n.e.s. #118 (a-e) of 480
Sometimes I’ll draw something and a reach a point where it could go any number of ways. Usually I’ll guess the best way and then proceed. But this time I took advantage of my printer and cranked.out some copies, and each copy WENT that different way. Then I printed a four-up of the drawing turned four ways, and that made a fifth way.
The Original may go yet a sixth way–we’ll see.
n.e.s. #117 of 480
A take on the poet Dylan Thomas.
n.e.s. #116 of 480
Getting above problems and only needing to sit quietly . . .
n.e.s. #115 of 480
Some of these things take a half hour or less. This one took all of a long day. It was worth it to me, and I hope it will be worth your while, though it will not be easy to digest–which is a lot of the point.
n.e.s. #114 of 480
On one grid and off another.
n.e.s. #113 of 480
My previous post detailed a text exchange with my friend Russ K while I was working on this piece. I promised a Reveal this post, so here you are, Friends. Who knows–you may be viewing it from the bridge of your Starship. 🙂
The making of “n.e.s. #113 of 480”
Today Russ Kazmierczak, Karaoke Fanboy and creator of Amazing Arizona Comics, texted me while I was working on my latest page. Russ was letting me know that he had finished, and was printing, Volume 2 of the COVID-19 micropoems he’d written, with minor contributions from me.
We bantered awhile (example: I told him about my latest Bad Pun, “Gatored Community,” and talked about how to get it to work), and then I showed Russ my work in progress, in steps as we texted:
GB: Work in progress. Not much drawing left, but a boatload of dialog in word balloons…
RK: Looks great!
GB: Thanks. Good thing it doesn’t have to. 🙂 Gil Kane once discussed the “Little Orphan Annie” strip–said the artist may as well have been drawing lumps of coal. The illustration took a back seat to the word-ballooned story. Somehow that is comforting to me. 🙂
RK: Oh, I’ll hang my hat on that one!
GB: Ha–your drawing is quite serviceable. John Byrne Jr. with a touch of Fred Hembeck. –Only better, he hastened to add…
GB: Now it’s just a race to the punchline. –Oh, and coming UP with a punchline…
I see I left out a parenthesis…
GB: Then “And YOU are captain AND crew.” And then maybe “Where to?” Or “GO BIG or GO HOME–wait, you ARE home…” or “Bon Voyage…”
GB: One thing I like about word balloons is they are composition-balancers.
RK: Absolutely, I wish I used them like that a bit more.
GB: And you can get playful with the tails…
RK: Definitely
GB: And sometimes tilt the words for dynamic angling. That’s rarely done in what I’ve seen. There’s a right-angle anality to almost all lettering…
…so when you throw that off the reader is a bit frissoned without knowing why.
RK: Definitely serves to reveal a disorientation in the speaker…or like you said to GIVE disorientation to the reader…only in comics art!
GB: All done but the cleanup. And..you…were…there… 🙂
RK: Awesome to see and read the process! Thanks for sharing this
GB: That was fun! So, what DOES “n.e.s.” stand for?
RK: Boy…that could be a stumper…Neo Existential Sketch is the first to come to mind
GB: “Existential” IS a word in one of the candidates! Well done! –Hey, is it OK with you if I include this exchange of ours in my blog post?
RK: Ha! Awesome…and of course
GB: Great! Thanks!
RK: No problem!
GB: ETA 8pm. Or nine. Or next week? 🙂
RK: I’ll keep my eyes peeled
GB: Painful!
RK: Ha!
****
Here then, Friends, is how this one particular work (almost) came to be. I say Almost because there was more than Cleanup involved–a whole other stage, in fact. Next post is the Reveal!
One with Clay, Image and Text 