'Toons

Upon quitting my longtime job as manager of the Biograph Theatre, 23 years ago, my very first sitting at the totally independent cartoonist’s drawing board resulted in a rather dark vision of the West Grace Street neighborhood I knew so well and had just fled. Bad mood? What was up?

(Click on the image to enlarge)

Well, the street itself had recently been switched from one-way traffic to two-way. That was an extremely unusual thing to do -- city planning-wise and a big mistake, in my book, both then and now. Yes, I still think it was a goof and it's fun to have been right. Plus, it seemed to me then that local popular culture, in general, had hitched a ride in the absolute wrong direction, too. Disco, Heavy Metal or Hardcore? That was suddenly the choice, scene-wise.

Ah, times were changing and I had moved on, or so I thought. Perhaps, in truth, I was sitting still while all else moved on.

'toon:

This "zism" (my name for it) was done in 1987 for the first two-color tabloid edition cover of SLANT. I started drawing this image -- the twisty part in the middle -- in the early '80s, as a cartoon attempt to symbolize time passing. I had been looking at a lot of European early-1900s abstract art then, especially that of Russians and Germans. I've used this as SLANT's logo from its 1985 beginning.

political 'toon

This was the cover art for the Summer 2003 issue of SLANT

caricature

This portrait of Chuck Wrenn was done using mixed media for the invitation to his 40th birthday party (1985).