FUNNY DRAWINGS
SILLY STORIES & BLACK JOKES
Funny Drawings “Does Anybody Else Feel This Way?” is a selection of semi-sequential images looking at dark and disturbed emotions through a perspective both humorous and light. These comedic takes on terrible situations examine everything from mild frustration to poverty all the way through to murderous and suicidal tenancies. Of course each situation is turned onto itself through an absurd cartoon style devoid of any real context. The result is a less than black comedy of horrors designed to turn that frown upside down and show us just how silly life really is.
I don't recall being in any especially depressed state while I was making these short comics but I can certainly see a therapeutic element in the work. In was during the winter 2011-12 that I spent every morning in a local coffee shop scribbling away a couple of these characters. Winter in Toronto is pretty bleak and there is little to do other than wait for spring so I really enjoyed getting out of the house and working on these demented drawings. I suppose humor has always been my best means of battling the blues. Some people turn to drink, others like to shop and others still use social activities but for me it has always been drawing pictures of crazy people trying to bury themselves behind brick walls r chasing their spouses with an ax...truth is when you really look life, despite all it's horrors, it's pretty funny.
All of these illustrations were done in an 8 x 8 inch sketch book with refillable pens. I finished three short comics in that book during the early winter of 2011-12. The first two “ Computer World” and “Does Anybody Else Feel This Way?” were sort of surreal sequential experiments, each meditating on a single theme to express a feeling rather than a narrative. The third strip “ The Ledge” was drawn in a similar style but started to form a linear narrative revolving around a single character. As with many things in life I had to move on to other projects just as this little technique was starting to show promise but who knows maybe some other winter some day I'll pick up where I left off ( with a little cartoon man standing on the ledge of a building ...)