Seth on cartooning
One of my favorite comix artists, Seth, wrote an essay for The Walrus about "the quiet art of cartooning." It's a lovely piece and gives some nice insight the artist's mind at work. Seth's article is accompanied by a comic strip and also an interview with him. From The Walrus:
Seth: The Quiet Art of Cartooning (Walrus Magazine, via Drawn!)A cartoonist isn’t like a writer. Writing requires a special kind of focus. Your mind must be utterly devoted to the task at hand. When I’m breaking down a strip or hammering out dialogue, I’m using that writer’s focus. But drawing and inking are different. They use different parts of the brain. I often find that when I’m drawing, only half my mind is on the work — watching proportions, balancing compositions, eliminating unnecessary details.
The other half is free to wander. Usually, it’s off in a reverie, visiting the past, picking over old hurts, or recalling that sense of being somewhere specific — at a lake during childhood, or in a nightclub years ago. These reveries are extremely important to the work, and they often find their way into whatever strip I’m working on at the time. Sometimes I wander off so far I surprise myself and laugh out loud. Once or twice, I’ve become so sad that I actually broke down and cried right there at the drawing table. So I tell those young artists that if they want to be cartoonists, the most important relationship they are going to have in their lives is with themselves.
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I completely concur.
Whenever I work on my projects (via wacom tablet, canvas, drafting table, etc.) my mind is free to drift and think of other things while mired in the task-- plenty of space to listen to audio books.
However, while writing, I can only listen to music at most, and sometimes I have to hear lyric-less tunes so I can concentrate on the word choices.
VERSH @1, Interesting! I'm not an artist/designer, but when I write I prefer silence. Although there's something about background din that seems to help sometimes. Cory gets at that a bit with this post about the book Noise from a few years ago.
Same for me. I listen to music or podcasts when I paint or make something. But if I'm writing, reading, or editing I can't listen to music. I mean, I don't even hear it. My brain shuts it out.
them brains is crazy/cool
I used to work at a vintage clothing and furniture shop in Waterloo ON, and Seth was a semi-regular customer there. Super nice guy, with a keen sense of style!
I have the same feeling while writing that you do while cartooning.
Go figure.
Seth's work is great. Thanks to his appearances in Joe Matt's autobiographical comics, I feel like I almost know him and Chester Brown personally.
Halloween Jack@6: Me, too. I always picture Seth in a suit and hat, blowing cigarette smoke from the side of his mouth.
I also find there is a strong memory associated to a design, drawing, or various project of what I may have been listening to or watching at the time.
I can also recall how I "felt" while working on something, like I was engaging or exorcising deep realms of my psyche and then that experience would forever be remembered for that sensation. Truly strange and wondrous!