It's National Cartoonist Day 2020 !

 

Vic Forsythe from a clipping circa 1920’s

Bud Fisher 1916

Fay King

Rube Goldberg

Pierre Artigue from Judge early 1900’s

British cartoon from 1919

Nina Allender, Cartoons Magazine 1916

William Kemp Starrett  

Fred Schwab

Walter Allman and a long list of cartooning buddies, 1916

 For more posts on National Cartoonist Day check here:

https://larryrippeeandmollyreaart.blogspot.com/2019/05/yes-once-again-its-national-cartoonist.html

and

https://larryrippeeandmollyreaart.blogspot.com/2018/05/today-is-national-cartoonists-day.html

It Must be Time for a Covid Cartoon

I guess the news is getting to me. Here’s drawing I did today in my sketchbook.

c Larry Rippee 2020

See No Evil - One More Time

These things happen.

In the realm of gag-making, cartoonists wind-up duplicating cartoons overtime usually without ever seeing the cartoon-cousins.

I was amused to see the recent Bizarro cartoon by Dan Piraro which echoes a cartoon I did for the infamous Berkeley Barb a few decades ago when the CIA was raising a ruckus.

My cartoon was essentially an editorial cartoon, Piraro’s is more of a general social commentary (And beautifully executed).

There have been countless cartoon variations on the Three Wise Monkeys or Three Mystic Apes (aka "See No Evil, Hear No Evil Speak No Evil") but this is the first one that I have see that is similar to my old cartoon.

Again, this happens--and without any intent of “appropriation". Dan Piraro undoubtedly never saw my version.

My Easter Sketch

Happy Easter

Larry’s Comic Art Memorabilia

While we are all ‘confined to quarters’ during this terrible pandemic, many of us are doing some version of spring cleaning—sifting through the debris of our life.

I’ve been attempting to organize/clean/purge my studio-office (aka Larry’s Cartoon Vault). It’s a slow going process to be sure.

I’ve also received a couple of old-cartooning-days blasts from the past of late.

Here are a couple.

Kevin Brady sent me this scan of a cartoon drawn by another Kevin—Kevin East.

The drawing commemorates the first encounter of a handful of young, neophyte cartoonists. We all met at the first Bay Con held at the Claremont Hotel in Berkeley in 1975.

Me, Marc Miyashiro (who at the time drew ‘Xeno’ for the Berkeley Barb), Michael T. Gilbert (of Mr. Monster fame and various mainstream enterprises including, Superman, Dr. Strange and Mickey Mouse), Kevin Brady (a Dan O’Neil cartooning student who became host and/or wrangler of the soon to be GroundUnder Cartoonists and still making art up in the foothills of the Sierras) and Kevin East (another former Dan O’Neil student and Berkeley Barb cartoonist).


Speaking of the GroundUnder Cartoonists: I just rediscovered, in the Cartoon Vault, a tattered, torn, poorly printed official “GroundUnder’ T-shirt.

The late Roger May instigated the creation (and silk screening) of the meat-grinding T-Shirt featuring cartoon self-portraits of most of the core members.

‘Membership’ was a loose distinction, in deed. We met every Thursday night at Kevin Brady’s place in the Sunset district of San Francisco. We ate, drank, did a lot of show-and-tell, and created some very rambling cartoon jam sessions (many saw print in various Roger May self-published comics such as Vibratory Provincial News). 

Right to left, top row are: The amazing Melinda Gebbie as an amazing squid, Trina Robbins, Marc Miyashiro, Shelby Sampson, Roger May and Dot Bucher. Center: Kevin Brady. Right of Kevin: Michael T. Gilbert. Bottom: Me.


Michael Gilbert dug up a photo (circa 1977?) previously unknown to me.

Right to left are: Hairy Me again, Al Gordon (Marvel, DC inker), then Mary Gordon (a good calligrapher), Michael T. Gilbert, Steve Leialoha (another well-known DC and Marvel artist) and (legendary underground comix pioneer and comics “herstorian”) Trina Robbins.

I don’t know what the heck were supposed to be doing or why.  It looks like an out-take from an Austin Powers movie.

Stay Healthy

Happy 101st Birthday Lawrence Ferlinghetti

The Howl Trial

(Note the woman in the far corner is holding a copy of Howl)

Ferlinghetti  experienced something similar with Zap Comix

Lawrence Felinghetti was born March 24, 1919

Self Isolation

                                  "A Sunday Afternoon of Self-Isolation"
Ben Jenning’s great take on Georges Seurat painting from The Guardian.


Here’s the original:

A Public Service Announcement

Here’s Alton Brown’s easy guide to hand washing..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIwdf3WKe3Y

Happy 99th Birthday Al Jaffee

Friday the 13, 2020 is master cartoonist Al Jaffe’s 99th birthday.  Jaffee was listed as having the longest career of a comics artist by the Guinness World Records (and that was back when he was only 95).

                                           (Photo from The Daily Cartoonist)

Jaffee is probably best known for his long tenure (64 years) with Mad magazine.

He created popular feature such as Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions :

and the Mad Fold-In:

                                           (Here’s a classic from the 1960’s)


Jaffee also created a syndicated comic panel, Tall Tales, designed to accommodate one newspaper column width. It ran for about 5 years.

(This one's from my collection)

(These scans from The Fabulous Fifties blog)

Before Mad he worked for Harvey Kurtzman’s other short lived parody magazines Humbug and Trump.

Here’s a strangely timely piece that Jaffee did for Humbug in response to the 1957 Asian Flu Pandemic (Humbug#5, December 1957)

Al Jaffee is still at it.

You can read about his remarkable (and often tragic) life in Mad Life written by Mary-Lou Weisman.

Here’s Al Jaffee’s website:

https://www.originalaljaffee.com/splash

A Mother Jones interview:

https://www.motherjones.com/media/2010/09/interview-al-jaffee-mad-life-snappy-answers/

Jeffrey Beauchamp exhibit

Jeffrey Beauchamp, yet another fine West Marin artist, just concluded a fun solo exhibit at the Fine Arts Gallery of the College of Marin.

Here’s a video clip of the work with guitar accompaniment by Jeffrey:

Super Bowl Sunday in the ’20’s

The 1920’s, that is...

Wes Wilson 1937-2020

Wes Wilson, creator of what was perhaps the definitive ‘psychedelic' poster style died January 24th.

(This classic Wilson poster is the first one I ever walked out of the Fillmore with in 1967)

Here’s a clipping about Wilson’s post-poster days from the December 31, 1969 edition of the Marin county weekly, the Pacific Sun.

(Click on article to enlarge)

Wes Wilson in his Lagunitas studio, Marin county circa 1970

(Photos copyright Harlan Floyd. Courtesy of Hank Floyd).

One of Wes Wilson’s latter day posters. This was created for the San Geronimo Valley Community Center’s first annual International Day of Peace Festival in September 2015. We hosted Moonalice, Wavy Gravy and a "What Does Peace look Like?” group art show among other activities at the event.

https://larryrippeeandmollyreaart.blogspot.com/2015/09/postscript-international-day-of-peace.html

2020 Vision

Here’s our New Year’s card (which so far this year certainly rings true; We haven’t a clue what’s going to happen next).

Happy New Year!

Happy 2020