Character Proofs

Progress is slow but steady in the Monkey-Rope Test Labs. I've been working the past few weeks on developing and designing the three primary characters for the Storytellers book project. My original drawings were too literally based on human anatomy and portraiture, but I quickly shifted to exaggerated proportions and cartoonish styles as I thought ahead: these characters will have to be recognizable even in small cells, and able to be consistently drawn over and over again, so simple lines and geometric caricatures would work best. I've never been very good at working in just one notebook, so my test drawings are on paper scraps and the back of utility bills, but they occasionally find their way into nice sketch books.

I shared with a confidante at Slow Industries that it has been a challenge for me to not jump directly in to drawing pages for the book. While I know that these early tests are good practice, it's hard to not become impatient; working for hours and without being able to point to a finished page is unsatisfying. However, previous projects suffered for my overly eager rush to the last step, and I think this project deserves the time it will need. She suggested that I post about my preliminary trials here. I feel a little red-faced sharing incomplete drafts, but I'm confident she is right.

Some early aimless sketches...

...turned into purposeful tests...

...and on to more detailed measurements of proportions and movement.

This is the first draft of formal character portraits. I'm not satisfied with the color test, and the style still feels stiff (the word I used when describing my daydream for how this book will look is "lush" and this ain't lush), but every new version feels closer to what I want.

For giggles, I drew a quick test-scene with the main character, to play around with color.

The rough inked drawing, scanned in...

Color test #1 (black & cyan screens)

Color test #2 (just blue)

I still need to do more planning: I will have to lay out floor plans and details of important locations, get a better feel for the three characters visually, learn a lot more about how to build a wooden boat, and design page layouts...but I'm practically there. Right?

Adventure Research

Monkey-Rope Press operations were pleasantly cloistered inside for most of the weekend, with a seasonally appropriate but still impressive blizzard hitting Chicago with brutal force on Sunday. I spent hours over the weekend at my desk, drawing and testing and re-testing character designs for the book project with only drudging progress. In a moment of particularly focused frustration and distraction, I checked the weather report online: not only were there winter storm advisories (no surprise there), but there were also flood advisories. With 50mph winds, the waves in Lake Michigan peaked at 20 feet high near the beach and higher deeper in the lake. It hit me: an important scene in the book I am working on occurs in a storm on the ocean. Time for a field trip to the lake!

The waves crashed loudly, but they were only barely audible over the whir of the wind. The snow kicked up by the gusts were intermittently blinding, and if it says anything about the chaos of the storm I only felt safe getting as close to the lake as I did in the picture above. It was powerful and beautiful. Best research ever!

Bookish Progress

Early, frustrated notebook

For the past two months I have been laying the ground work for a new book. Getting the momentum going at the beginning was not easy: this is a larger, more involved project than anything I have attempted before, and the difference in scale and emotional commitment was enough to set my feet in proverbial concrete for the first few weeks. I diligently tried to write, and write, and sketch, and plan, and re-write some more, but distraction came easy and I went on a lot of angry, frustrated walks to try to talk through the friction. I ended up spending hours at local coffee shops staring at my notebook, pulling my hair, sipping tea, and going home in defeat.

Through the muck and grime a few ideas stuck, and as I worked to develop a promising thread the other secondary ideas fit in smoothly. I suddenly had a coherent narrative and the whole project made sense. I can't describe what a relief that was! My notebooks grew increasingly more orderly.

In the background: a proper (for me) outline format!

In the foreground: a quick sketch to work through page composition

Steps towards production are moving swiftly. I made a small signature to work through pacing in the first (most fully developed) chapter, to get a sense of how many pages the book might be; I have grant deadlines in my back pocket for this project; I have figured out press sheet and final book dimensions, and so on.  Most importantly, I typed up the project plan in full yesterday and sent it to three groups of trusted & talented friends for critique and feedback. 

It is going to be a hand-illustrated comic/graphic novella with no text or dialogue, just visual sequences. I don't want to give away too much about the story yet; that will come as the illustrations are  completed. For now I can say that I have been thinking a lot about what it is to make work, why I am (/others are) drawn to production and creation and output, and what happens when that fails. Also, fire!

Flow and the Wandering Mind

One of the purposes of this news section is to honestly document the creation, from beginning to end, of the projects in production at Monkey-Rope Press. Inevitably, it is not all good news.

In addition to the print series, Monkey-Rope Press is also in the early stages of writing and illustrating a book. Print production is old hat: I took all of the fine printmaking classes I could work into my college schedule, worked for a year as a pre-press and press operation apprentice in a small-production offset facility, and then a year honing my typesetting and letterpress skills with my friends at Starshaped.

I am reminded of the work of positive psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihályi on flow. Flow is the creative production ideal: a loss of self-consciousness, a total absorption in the matter at hand, a loss of track of time & physical needs. It is pure, undistracted, rewarding concentration. When settling in to print work, flow comes easily. I know the process thoroughly enough to not need to look up answers to problems; I find every aspect of design and carving, ink-mixing and printing challenging and rewarding; I find myself irritated at daily necessities that get in the way of continuing on the project. Why do I need to buy groceries? This block needs hours more work! I can eat tomorrow.

Unfortunately, it has been markedly different with this book work. While I have made small "sketch" books and taken bookbinding & book arts classes with artist & educator Melissa Jay Craig, I have never before attempted anything on this scale. Every decision breeds two new questions, breaking any rhythm I had briefly found. In almost every way, this project is thrilling: it is the fulfillment of two years of daydreaming and testing and hind-brain planning, but it also has that carpet-pulled-from-under-feet feeling of working in new, untested media. Even worse, without settling into that easy rhythm of production-flow, I find myself seeking distraction. Cats walking by my feet? They must need entertainment! Computer in the same room? Surely something of life-or-death importance has been sent to my email! Suddenly I find my bicycle too dirty to function without a good cleaning, the day too beautiful not to walk in, and then the whole day has passed with my notebooks untouched.

The only solution I have found that works is to physically isolate myself from distraction. Without a Woolfian room of my own, I settle in to the comfortable cliche of Young Urban Writer Slash Artist Working in Independent Coffee Shop. This has been much more successful a strategy than working in my home studio, which is encouraging. Since changing spaces 3 weeks ago, I've made a lot of progress. I'm not as far as I'd hoped, but this forward movement is significant. I am still writing the story, with the goal of finishing writing by the end of the year to turn to production in January.

I can't wait for that production-flow. Until then: off to the coffee shop.

In Development

Monkey-Rope Press is emerging from a two-month hiatus after an agressively over-scheduled spring and summer, and I couldn't be more excited to get back to work. While an unhealthy amount of Buffy has been watched and veritable gallons of stew cooked & consumed, the holiday has also allowed for undistracted down-time to percolate and plan two long-term projects that I hope to document here as they unfold.

In response to the rash of queer teen suicides over the past few months, I am working on a collaboration with friend & historian Jacqui Shine to support her project writeyourprincipal.com. Monkey-Rope Press is producing a monthly series of diptych prints portraying mid-20th century queer pioneers in the United States. Proceeds of the sales of the prints will go directly to support Write Your Principal, and in (at least) my dreams, the collected series of prints could be organized into an educational traveling show for LGBTQ youth centers or high schools across the country. Coming up soon (to subvert the acronym and put a trans experience first): Christine Jorgensen.

Secondly, in an effort not to get addicted to brain crack, I am working on (finally) developing and producing a book that first emerged as a series of drawings in spring 2009. The comic/graphic novel(/novella/nivola) is only just beginning to take a clear narrative form, and I will post updates here as it develops.