How to Draw Intermission: December 2023
Reflecting on a year of comicsmaking. Plus: Taiwan, Scavengers Reign, Taiyō Matsumoto’s Ping Pong, Blue Lake, and more!
Howdy, friend.
Next week I’m heading to Taiwan for a fourteen-day adventure. Sure, I can’t wait to explore Taipei and hike the mountains, but really, all I can think about is the copious amount of food I’ll wolf down: dumplings, bowls and bowls of beef noodle soup, fan tuan and bubble tea and scallion pancakes. And and and.
Because of my travels, I won’t have time for a full newsletter this month; instead, I thought I’d recommend some things I’ve been enjoying lately. First, though, I really can’t say thanks enough for checking out How to Draw this year. I started this newsletter because (1) I love to teach, (2) I love to talk about the creative process, and (3) I love comics. It’s been a joy to share my passion with you, and crafting this newsletter has helped me explore new depths as I work on my graphic memoir HARD BODY. I can’t wait to see what next year brings. ♡
Lately, I have been obsessed with Joseph Bennett and Charles Huettner’s animated HBO series Scavengers Reign, a show about the crew of a damaged deep space freighter struggling to survive on an alien planet. It’s a deeply quiet show, beautifully contemplative, a cross between Mœbius and Sir David Attenborough. You could watch the whole thing on mute (although, you know, don’t do that), and get just as much out of it.
Earlier this month I picked up volume 1 of Taiyō Matsumoto’s Ping Pong, an absolute masterclass in showcasing movement in a two-dimensional medium. Just look at this page, its frenetic energy, the keen storytelling. Gah!
A few days back I watched Sara Dosa’s Fire of Love—a moving, surprisingly ebullient documentary about the relationship and careers of volcanologists Katia and Maurice Krafft—and I can’t stop thinking about these amazing people, the majesty of the earth around us they died trying to protect and educate us about. I’m recommending it to practically everyone I know.
I recently devoured Éloïse Marseille’s Naked: The Confessions of a Normal Woman, a brilliant, funny graphic memoir about the author’s experiences with sex, dating, and finding love.
I mentioned Roaming in last month’s newsletter, but Jillian and Mariko’s new graphic novel—about three disparate friends on turbulent spring break in 2009 New York City—is a revelation. I’m likely going to dissect it in more detail in an upcoming newsletter, but for now, all I can say is: What a tremendous showcase of the form. You should get your hands on a copy ASAP.
I tend to become preoccupied with albums and songs, listening to the same ones over and over, hundreds of times in some cases. Blue Lake’s new album Sun Arcs has been this new preoccupation, an album Pitchfork likens listening to as a “gentle, unbothered pace of a week spent in nature.” It grounds me yet takes me far away.
Last, I can’t stop thinking about Daniel Clowe’s eerie, poignant new book, Monica. I don’t connect with all of his work, but this one shook me. I went back and read it a second time, and then a third. I searched for connections between the stories, dug for meaning. It’s a book about what happens when you refuse to live in the now or acknowledge the good in your life, looking only backward, and seeing yourself as less than. With an ending that was, quite frankly, shocking.
If this is your first time visiting How to Draw, a hearty welcome. You can check out our archive of posts here. And if you haven’t already, please consider subscribing so you don’t miss a thing.
See you in 2024, friend. ♡
– RJR