Long-Hand Interviews With Comic Creators
September 7, 2007 11:47 AM   Subscribe

"About five years ago I had the idea of doing hand-written interviews with cartoonists I loved. I took a shot and wrote the top guy I could think of - Robert Crumb! And he wrote back!" Also featuring Joe Matt, Jeffrey Brown, James Kochalka, and Adrian Tomine. [Via Drawn!]
posted by Alvy Ampersand (10 comments total) 14 users marked this as a favorite
 
This is totally awesome.
posted by mckenney at 12:27 PM on September 7, 2007


"Also you as the artist are cut down to size when, often, these devoted fans whose attention you find so swelling to the head start mentioning their other favorite artists... whose work you don't respect very much or even hold in contempt... if someone tells me that me and Bob Dylan are his biggest influences in his life, see, that puts the whole thing in perspective."

Ahh, Robert Crumb, God bless him. Makes me seem like less of a grump every time I read something from him.

Jeffery Brown seems kind of lonely on this page. Poor guy. It makes sense, given his work, but this really drove the point home to me that he's writing his own life down.

Also I wish I had handwriting as good as these guys...
posted by 1f2frfbf at 12:28 PM on September 7, 2007


Wow, I didn't think I'd enjoy reading Crumb that much. What a lucid, well-written interview. Seriously.
posted by craniac at 12:28 PM on September 7, 2007


Really fascinating, and inspiring. Thanks for the post.
posted by Drexen at 12:31 PM on September 7, 2007


Seconding what everyone's said. I'm just glad these came to light.

What I found especially interesting re: the hand written responses was that it was somehow like listening to the artists speak. For instance, when Crumb is asked about something unpleasant (the years-long intrusion of Zwigoff's film crew in his life), his penmanship gets less neat, more "hurried", and you get the sense that yeah, this is something that upset him.

Great handwriting, too.
posted by papafrita at 1:11 PM on September 7, 2007


This is quite cool. A great idea, and a perfect subject for this considering how we are connected to these people through their handwriting. I enjoyed reading R Crumb. I'm bummed I never got to meet him since he lived in Winters all those years, and I was just a town over in Davis...
posted by Eekacat at 1:18 PM on September 7, 2007


I met Crumb in 89 at a Psychedelic Solution show on 8th Street. He knew I was a student of Harvey Kurtzman -- had been in 85-86 -- and I imagine that is maybe... maybe why he signed my sketchbook. I did not ask pushily, hell I was glad to stand near him being comics passionate, as well as a sometime creator of them

CRumb seemed a bit out of sorts, with all those people crammed into that second floor gallery.

This guy who wrote these comic artists had a great idea -- and I wrote him to tell him so.

Great find - great post.
posted by RubberHen at 1:26 PM on September 7, 2007


Great. Thanks for the link
posted by Outlawyr at 1:38 PM on September 7, 2007


I met Crumb when he came to visit me when I was living at SCUD aka the Jello Mold building in Seattle. He probably stayed for about an hour and a half and he was quite funny and very talkative.

While chatting away, he was also casually rummaging through my drawers and boxes, just looking. Most of the time he was there, he just sat on my bed (which was in my very tiny studio at that time) and we kvetched about the local art scene, and we told some rather off-color jokes.

He was kind enough to draw me a self-portrait of himself while sitting at my desk, using my drawing pen. Sadly I wish I knew where I put the drawing, but I still have the pen!
posted by MizMadame at 11:30 PM on September 7, 2007


Related Update Goodness!

From artist Jesse Hamm comes scanned excerpts of Claire Briggs' How To Draw Cartoons, published in 1926 and featuring Q&As with such luminaries as Frank King and Windsor McCay, with more to come!
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 6:28 AM on September 20, 2007


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