Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Portrait of the Artist as a Headless Man.

At the University of Minnesota I was a member of the ATO fraternity and every Monday evening we actually put on jackets and ties for our 'house meeting'. For some reason I can't explain now, I had campaigned and been elected as 'Worthy Usher', a lofty title for a position that entailed the sole duty of answering the house phone during the meeting and taking messages. Dutifully armed with paper and pen phone calls were few but the doodles I made were plentiful. The sketch above was my point-if-view from my chair, as I awaited the telephone's ring. Note the nifty wingtips.

KONG!

Odd choice to start this site with a drawing I did in a hopital bed at the age of twelve but here it is. After being banged up in a car accicddent (no, I wasn't driving) I spent seven weeks in the hospital (back when health insurance allowed such lengthy stays) where I wiled away my days clicking between the six (SIX!) channels on TV, drawing comics or reading them. Everything rendered during those days isn't worth reprinting here but this visage of the tragic giant ape, copied from a cover of a Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine had a certain pathos that reflected where my head was as a kid in traction during the dog days of summer vacation.