Hey, there’s a flyer for a reading I’m participating in. Mill Valley Public Library, April 29 at 6:30PM, with Donna Almendrala, Rina Ayuyang, Justin Hall, Frederick Noland, and Sophie Yanow. Should be a hoot. Here’s the link to register: https://millvalleylibrary.libcal.com/event/16420317
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:
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.
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!
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.
Another comic for you about riding bikes and the contradictions of dystopian living.
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.
Finding comfort in making my own little, ugly things.
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.