drawing the bikes

drawing the bikes

Hey, it’s been a minute but you know how the end of the year is, all that festivity and depression and freezing cold darkness etc. Plus, I started 2026 with the flu! Anyway, here are a couple new bike art items:

detail from a comic "Little Ride Sensations 2025 -- shows the silhouette of a cyclist riding in the dark and says "Forgetting my lights and riding home in the dark--scary ... but cool!"

That’s a detail from my latest comic for The Radavist all about little things I noticed while riding my bike last year.

And then here’s an illustration I had fun with, now available on my Etsy.

a pencil and watercolor illustration of a cyclist riding uphill.

Finally here’s a detail from another new bike comic, appearing in the newest issue of Calling In Sick magazine:

a drawing of a barbarian warrior pedaling down a cobblestone road

So that is a very bikey update. There will be further bikey updates but I’m hoping to diversify offerings more this year as well.

trash sketchbooks

trash sketchbooks

Lately, rather than buying sketchbooks, I’ve just been making them out of trash. This was inspired partly by an old video I watched of Trent Holbrook making his own sketchbooks. I have some of the same problems with “real” sketchbooks as Trent mentions in that video:

  • I worry about ruining a too-nice sketchbook with bad drawings.
  • I tend not to finish sketchbooks due to distraction, or losing track of them, or wanting a new book, or whatever.
  • I shy away from using them for the rough planning, note-taking, list-making, and other nitty-gritty parts of the art process for fear of sullying the beautiful art book aesthetic.

So I end up with all these dumb, constipated, half-finished, store-bought sketchbooks. And worse, it’s a deterrent to drawing. Making sketchbooks out of trash solves this.

All I’m doing here is cutting some scratch paper (in this case separator papers that were inserted into a job by a copy shop) down to 5″ x 7″, slapping them between any nearby packaging cardboard cut down to the same size, and putting two staples in the spine. I cut off the page corners for some crude rounding. That’s it.

I have no anxiety about cutting loose on these trash sketchbooks with dashed-off, ill-conceived, messy drawing, which, for me, is my favorite drawing. I also have no problem using them to jot down a shopping list of art supplies or keep score in a Magic: the Gathering game. I can jam them into any pocket and abuse them as I see fit. They were TRASH.

Some artists fill their sketchbooks with page after page of beautiful drawing and it’s inspiring to see. But for me, a sketchbook functions best as a place to barf out unformed ideas. I’m down here in the dumpster, and loving it.

2 new bike comics

2 new bike comics

a strange figure holding a bike aloft proclaiming, "This is the true machine of reality!"

They come in bunches, I guess, huh? The above is a detail from my first comic for the excellent bike site The Radavist, a site I’ve been reading and vibing with for a long time, so of course I’m excited to be a contributor. Read the entire comic now!

2 page spread from Calling In Sick mag

And then I also have 3 pages in issue 15 of the crucial bike culture magazine Calling In Sick! This issue is jam-packed with beautiful words and pictures. I recommend you grab it.

wheels on the wasteland

wheels on the wasteland

A comic about stomping the pedals angrily while the country goes to hell

Another comic for you about riding bikes and the contradictions of dystopian living.

workplace safety sign that says "0 days since the company appeased a fascist"

And a fitting safety sign for our modern American workplaces.

Meanwhile, to relax in these times, I’m preparing to play Gaslands, a game of post-apocalyptic vehicular combat, which means kitbashing and painting Hot Wheels.

Gaslands Mini
Gaslands Delorean
Gaslands Bel Air

Finding comfort in making my own little, ugly things.

bikes & spikes

bikes & spikes

a drawing of a grimdark barbarian person riding a bicycle down a mountain.

I’ve been looking at a lot of over-the-top, grimdark fantasy art lately. Also, I’ve been happy riding bikes this summer. Not a lot more to say about this one! Though I could see exploring further as a comic in the future. Add it to the list.