Jocular

I got the rare treat of visiting a professional cartoonist's studio this weekend. Skip Morrow is my friend's hometown neighbor out in the Vermont wilderness. They live about 6 blocks away with only one house between them.

Skip let us explore his newly contructed gallery with framed prints of his artwork. He and I talked shop, as it were, about how we go about drawing things. Neither of us studied professional cartooning, but we both learned a lot on our own.

His gallery included a lot of his drawings from his books, corporate commissions, greeting cards, and also a few original art pieces. He has a lot of things for sale, and seems to do really well with getting customers coming out to his remote gallery.

After looking at his work, he let us take a peak at his studio. It was such a treat to see all of the samples glued to the walls, the bookshelves stacked with references, quirky picture books, and old sketchpads. Toys lined the small shelves above the door. It was like a grown-up's playhouse.

He also had some musical equipment out, since he was working on recording new music. We got to talk about playing, writing, and peforming as well. I was very impressed with what Skip had been able to make for himself. I was also really jealous that he was living an almost ideal lifestyle from my point of view. Skip has most certainly earned it, though. I really hope that I get to do what I love for a living.