The Art of the Comic Strip

Did you miss me? (o;

I realize that this Thursday (almost Friday) post is insanely late, but it's been a madhouse at work recently. Then again, it always is this time of year...but, coupled with everything else going on in my life right now, I can barely keep up!

I thought I'd give myself (and everyone else) a little break and post some comic strips.

But first...allow me to digress into a mini-discussion about cartooning. At two different points in my freelance illustration life, I was hired to create comic strips for 2 different companies as part of their advertising campaigns. I can tell you from experience that comic strips are definitely an art form that should get some serious respect. That stuff isn't easy! (Also...I make one miserable excuse for a comic strip artist. Really. Don't ask me to do them anymore. The outcome is just sad.)

Anyway, I go through phases where I can get a bit obsessive with one thing. I will read/watch/devour or otherwise drown myself in that topic until I'm ready to move on. That goes for comic strips too. There's been many I've enjoyed, but I'll just give you a few examples. In high school I adored Calvin and Hobbes. Currently, I'm eating up the Get Fuzzy compilations. (Loooove!) Between those, there was period immediately following my college graduation where I became a worker bee in The Hive. We're talking corporate cubical life for barely any money, here. Basically, I was Dawn from The Office:

Or if you watch the American version, I would be Pam:Yep. That looks pretty familiar. And they were both artists who were clearly NOT working in their field. See what I mean...? Sigh.

Guess what was my favorite comic strip at that time? You got it...Dilbert! When you start identifying a little TOO much with Dilbert, I think you might have a problem. But, for your amusement (and sympathy), here are a couple comic strips I collected during that era of my life:

Panel #1 was what made me tear this one out of the newspaper. Tells you a little how I was feeling back then, huh?

This is just sad and true. And hysterically funny. I hope no one ever says that to me!!!

I gotta give props to Scott Adams for taking jabs at the establishment for the amusement of all working stiffs. You gotta laugh at your predicament or else it'll take you down. I'd also like to note that one of my all-time favorite quotes about art came from Scott Adams. I'll leave it as the last word of today's blog:

"Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep." -Scott Adams