I love this video that features comic-drawing rebel professor Lynda Barry doing her own thing. Around the six minute mark, Lynda confides in the audience that she knows that most folks abandon drawing when they try to draw a nose! She proceeds to draw a bunch of fun noses. First, she begins by drawing what her cousin advised to be the proper way to draw a nose, circa 1962. Then, she riffs on the wonderful world of noses. Starting with the shape of a head, Lynda Barry, one of our all-time great cartoonists, guides the viewer into visual anarchy. If there is only one rule to follow, it is this: the drawing still needs to “read” as whatever it is you’re drawing.
Making Comics
Lynda Barry has worked as a painter, cartoonist, writer, illustrator, playwright, editor, commentator, and teacher and found that they are very much alike. She is the inimitable creator behind the seminal comic strip Ernie Pook’s Comeek as well as numerous comic books and graphic novels, and is the recipient of both the Eisner Award and the R. R. Donnelly Award. She lives in Wisconsin, where she is an associate professor of art and a Discovery Fellow at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Her most book is Making Comics, published in 2019 by Drawn & Quarterly.
Making Comics
Brilliant and fun.
Lynda Barry is a highly original bright light. She’s the first to say that trying to emulate what she does is not the answer. The answer is to follow your own unique muse.