The Tragedy In My Neighborhood

In 2005, a young man working as a temp was assigned to our office. He was bright and enthusiastic, and at some point he told me he and his brother were gathering material to publish a humor magazine, which they planned to title ODDFELLOW, (named after an actual fraternal group with a long history). This came up in the context of our talking about my drawings, as I doodled all over the desk calendar and on any other scraps of paper on my desk. He asked me if I would be interested in contributing some drawings for a story they were publishing. I  said "Yes!" I also recommended they contact my friend Danny Hellman, a professional illustrator who began his career (as have many others of repute) drawing covers for the infamous SCREW Magazine, (actually, a tabloid newspaper published weekly in NYC). I gave him Danny's contact information, (and they did end up obtaining some work from him). Shortly after, the young man gave me the manuscript of a short story called "The Tragedy In My Neighborhood," a sharp little tale of suburban alienation, by Ken Cormier. The tale's narrator seems to be having psychological problems that cause him sleepless nights, compulsive writing of his thoughts, and crying jags at work. In fact, the story is told in the form of one of the narrator's journal entries. One night he witnesses his neighbor commit an act of arson. The next day at work, a new man at work is marched out of the office by the police for an unknown offense. He points accusingly at the narrator.

At this same time, I had become enamored with the graphic work of Swiss illustrator and cartoonist Thomas Ott. Ott works in the medium of scratchboard to powerful effect, and his drawings are dramatic and beautiful. I wanted to emulate his approach, and I thought this story would provide the perfect opportunity. I didn't want to use actual scratchboard, as I feared I would immediately botch the work, as I have no experience working with scratchboard. However, I did use PAINTER, computer software that emulates natural media, to do the work. First, I made the underlying drawings in pencil, and then scanned them into the computer. I opened each drawing in PAINTER in turn, and filled a layer over each image with black, reduced the opacity so I could see through to the underlying sketch, and drew with a white line, digitally carving away the black to reveal the image. These images are the results.

As my first attempts, I'm varibly happy with three of them.  The first image shows the many pages of the narrator's writings pasted on his wall, (perhaps obscuring a window to another view, a view outside his room). This is a way of showing the obsessive thoughts beclouding his consciousness. The image of the man sitting watching his house burn is a failure, in my view. It's stiffly drawn and awkwardly composed, and lacks all the drama such an image should have had. I'm most pleased with the drawing of the pointing man being taken away as the narrator watches from the left foreground. I think my first use of the scratchboard technique is adequate, but it is my underlying drawings that are uneven. But then, I look at Thomas Ott's earliest works and they are clumsy in their drawing and technique, as well. One has to begin somewhere.

The first issue of ODDFELLOW was published in Fall 2005 and contained the story with my accompanying illustrations. A second issue was published a few months later, with another short piece by Ken Cormier, which I illustrated with a single panoramic picture spanning both sides of the top of a double-page spread. I used the same faux-scratchboard style for that, and I may put it up here at some point. The third, and final issue of ODDFELLOW was meant to be the "Spring 2006" issue, hence, my cover illustration--which you can find here on this blog along with several preparatory drawings in a post titled "Dance of the Oddfellows"--a modern rendering of Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring." However, the issue was delayed and not published until the Fall of 2006, so the point of the cover drawing may was obscured, if not entirely lost.

Pseudo Hobo Boho

This is a drawing of Tom Waits that was published in a rock 'zine called THE VILLAGE NOIZE back in the 90s. For a period of time I had a one page comic in every issue for about 5 or 6 issues. The 'zine was a labor of love by its editor and came out irregularly, maybe twice a year, at most. It did appear on select newstands around NYC, and on the magazine shelf at Tower Books. I had drawn a portrait of Waits in my sketchbook, strictly as a portrait exercise, as I have never liked Waits' work. From the first time I heard and saw him, he struck me as someone aping the vocal mannerisms and dress of older black jazz hepcats, along with a heaping of faux-hobo-isms. It all seemed very self-conscious. I like Captain Beefheart very much, a similar vocalist (of very different music), in that his singing is very a pastiche of Howlin' Wolf's style. However, Beefheart was able to incorporate Wolf's timbre and mannerisms into his own singing and produce something genuine to him. With Waits, I've never NOT heard his singing as mere mimicry of his betters. Beyond that, it seems maudlin and caricatured, just a form of minstrelsy. My title for this post expresses my feelings about Waits.

In any case, the editor of THE VILLAGE NOIZE was doing an article on Waits and he asked me if I could provide a drawing to accompany the article. At first I thought I would draw a brand new portrait, but I hit upon the idea of making a copy of the sketchbook head portrait, and pasting it onto a separate new drawing of the upper half of a male torso in black leather...and so, voila! For the backdrop, I photocopied a black and white photo of the Manhattan skyline a few times to make it more graphic black and white, and I pasted that behind the figure in the foreground. This was all done by hand, as I did not have Photoshop, or even a computer, at the time I drew this. The head and leather jacket are drawn with a black Prismacolor pencil; the striped t-shirt was achieved by laying down strips of Liquid Friskit, which dries to a rubbery consistency, and then spattering ink with a tooth brush over the area. When the ink dried, I rubbed the dried, rubbery Liquid Friskit off the paper, and underneath those areas remained white. I think the end result is reasonably successful.

Urban Plight

This is a comic strip I drew over the course of my first couple of years living in New York. The story was inspired directly by the alienation I felt being in this big, strange, overwhelming city where I wanted to be but where I didn't feel at home. I felt intimidated by many of the rough, odd-looking people on the streets and subways...but then I thought of all the spree-killers who were "quiet, well-behaved, would-never-hurt-a-fly" type fellows, and I thought: "Maybe these people are afraid of ME!"

The story was originally published in two parts in RED TAPE, a literary/art zine published on the Lower East Side throughout the 80s and into the dawn of the 90s. This Wikipedia page provides some info, including some of the prominent contributors to the magazine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redtape_Magazine

I've been in New York for 37 years now, and it long ago came to feel like home.