Kleefeld on Webcomics - now on YouTube!

Updating our original post to try to reach more platforms in an effort to dominate local comics news coverage!

Kleefeld on Webcomics - a ComicsDC video interview

By Mike Rhode

Sean Kleefeld, independent comics scholar and author of the new book, Webcomics, was the subject of our first video interview (via Zoom). Sean's been writing about comics for 14 years at his blog, Kleefeld on Comics, and Webcomics (Bloomsbury, 2020; $33) is the first academic book on various aspects of a newish form of cartooning.

I was joined today by two local experts on webcomics - Robb Tanner, who as Xavier Xerxes, was one of the main comics journalists covering the early days of the field - and Megan Halsband, curator of the web comics collections at the Library of Congress.

 Sean joined us from Chicago to discuss his definition of webcomics, the process of writing a book on them, his choices for 7 key texts in the field based on trying to capture the field's diversity, the role of social media and collectives in creating and distributing webcomics, the difficulties in preserving an ephemeral field and other issues.

  I would recommend this book as a key text in an understudied area of the comics arts. I found it very readable and a good, solid explanation of the field whose prehistory dates from 1987, but in reality which took off in 1997, not quite 25 years ago.

Click here to go to the video at the Internet Archive.

https://archive.org/details/comics-dc-kleefeld-on-webcomics in case you missed it.

 

A couple of footnotes - 

 

Robb notes (21:25), "There were four anthology Joey Manley sites: Modern Tales, Serializer, Girlamatic, and GraphicSmash."

 

Sean's final words (36:01) are "...and make money." so just insert that in your head when you listen.

 

For more information on the Library of Congress' webcomics initiative, use these links - 

 

Webcomics Web Archive

Small Press Expo Comic and Comic Art Web Archive

Comics Literature and Criticism Web Archive

Quarantine Q&A with TJ Kirsch

 I missed this yesterday, but the video is available at Facebook.

 

Quarantine Q&A with TJ Kirsch

Leah Ly

Fantom Comics October 7 2020

https://www.facebook.com/FantomComics/videos/2821270501479009

We're doing another comic creator event for your enjoyment. We'll be talking to cartoonist TJ Kirsch about his work; in particular about his newest project Willie Nelson: A Graphic History, in which he teams up with several other artists to tell the story of this country music icon from Hill County, Texas.

Flashback - John Gallagher interviewed 10 years ago

Ten years ago, give or take a few months, I did an interview with John Gallagher about his career to date. The City Paper may be doing something to its archives due to its current covid-19 financial trouble, but I'm interviewing John this week about Max Meow his new children's graphic novel from Random House, and I couldn't find the original talk we had, so I'm republishing it here so I can refer people to it. 

Meet a Local Cartoonist: A Chat with Buzzboy’s John Gallagher

Posted by Mike Rhode on Mar. 29, 2010 formerly online at

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/books/2010/03/29/meet-a-local-cartoonist-a-chat-with-buzzboys-john-gallagher/

 

With his character Buzzboy, John Gallagher has been a mainstay of the local independent comics scene for years now—for a decade it turns out. John’s a regular exhibitor at Baltimore Comic Con’s section for children’s comics, and is a nominee for the 2010 Harvey Award, which will be given out at the convention. Although he’s got a full-time job, he tells us that he’s also about to launch a new Web comic.

Washington City Paper: What type of comic work or cartooning do you do?

John Gallagher: I am primarily a creator of kids comics, but in the same sense Calvin and Hobbes was a “Kid’s Comic.” I have self-published Buzzboy, a fun and funny super hero comic, for 10 years through my own Sky-Dog Press. I am getting ready to launch a web comic and simultaneous graphic novel called Zoey & Ketchup, about an imaginative little girl and her golden retriever. I also speak at schools across the country, talking about the magic and educational values of comics.

WCP: When (within a decade is fine) and where were you born?

JG: December 28, 1967—same birthday as Stan Lee, just 40 years later, and with none of the fame!

WCP: Why are you in Washington now?  What neighborhood or area do you live in?

JG: I moved from rural PA to the area after college, for no other reason than my best friends from high school lived here, and that’s all that really mattered, having someone to hang with on weekends. Now, most of them have moved away, but I have stayed in the area, and maintained a high level of immaturity, living in Falls Church VA.

WCP: What is your training and/or education in cartooning?

JG: Mostly self taught—I went to a year of art school as part of Temple University in Philly—but it was just too small—when I transferred to Penn State, I was happy to be part of a very prestigious graphic design program, but was shocked to find no illustration classes. Most likely I would have gone to SVA or Kubert School, if I only knew they existed (no Internet back then!), but it turned out to be a godsend—I now do a combination of comics and grahic design, combining many of these skills for animation and comics for corporations, and pro sports teams like the Washington Capitals, Dallas Cowboys, and New York Islanders.

WCP: Who are your influences?

JG: The first art I drew was duplicating the Alex Toth-designed DC Comics’ Super Friends characters, and it was the foreword to Jules Feiffer’s The Great Comic Book Heroes that gave me the idea that I could create my own comics. As the years went on, Chuck Jones, Jack Kirby, Kyle Baker, Walt Kelly—they have all had a great influence on me. Currently, Richard Thompson, Steven Pastis, and Raina Telgemeier are my faves.

WCP: If you could, what in your career would you do-over or change?

JG: I am right where I like to be—on the  verge of mediocrity. Kidding—I am lucky enough to be drawing comics and cartoons, and making a living at it—every few years my goals change, so now I have my sights set.

WCP: What work are you best-known for?

JG: Buzzboy, the adventures of the world’s coolest super-sidekick.

WCP: What work are you most proud of?

JG: I am really proud of the upcoming Zoey & Ketchup comic, which is being co-written with my daughter Katie, a comics virtuoso at age 8! It’s the first time I have really stepped away from super heroes, and embraced the kids side of what I do—it will really be a hybrid of sorts, part comic strip, part graphic novel, part diary-type, prose sections, when the story calls for it. Zoey keeps a sketchbook, like I did as a kid, and it chronicles her strange thoughts, like a diagram of the inner workings of her brother’s brain, consisting of one part drool, and the other part pickle obsession.

WCP: What would you like to do  or work on in the future?

JG: I am intrigued about the connection between the cartoonist and the audience that takes place in a Web-based comics blog—so that’s why Zoey & Ketchup will be a fun change.If I could take over anybody’s character, I would love to draw DC Comic’s Shazam/Captain Marvel, because he was the star of the first comic I ever read— the little boy in a big hero’s body is every kid’s dream.

WCP: What do you do when you’re in a rut or have writer’s block?

JG: I do one of two things—one is to reread my favorite comic strips (Peanuts, Pogo, Get Fuzzy, and Calvin & Hobbes), and let my mind start to get in the fun comics mode—the danger here is I often get so caught up in the story, I forget why I started reading, and don’t get back to the drawing board.

The other thing I do is do the opposite of comics, I goof off, I watch TV, I play with my kids—it’s living life that gives me ideas for stories, so walking through the real world allows me to see things and think, “What if this happened?”

WCP: What do you think will be the future of your field?

JG: For comics—a mix of Web, digital e-readers, and books and graphic novels only. Comics shops will become more like book stores, and floppy comics, at least by indy artists, will disappear, due to a combination of high print costs and poor distribution options.

Comic strips, the same, except I feel they may become even more important to the struggling newspapers—and could see a resurgence, if they are found to help circulation as much as I think they do.

I think the idea of giving away the short form comics on the Web or in the newspaper, will lead to better sales of the books and graphic novels.

WCP: What’s your favorite thing about D.C.?

JG: Well, Batman is pretty coo—oh, you mean Washington, DC! For one, I found my wonderful wife, Beth there—and she thought I wouldn’t find her wearing that fake mustache. C’mon, we’re the capital of the coolest freaking country in the world, everybody loves us!…

WCP: Least favorite?

JG: …except those who don’t love us.

WCP: What monument or museum do you take most out-of-town guests to?

JG: Air and Space at Dulles—they have a space shuttle! that blows just about everything else away. Natural History is cool, and the Smithsonian’s pop culture exhibits are truly inspiring, like last year’s Jim Henson exhibit.

WCP: Do you have a Web site or blog?

JG: Wow, a plug? I wouldn’t think to benefit from… oh, OK. I’ve already mentioned skydogcomics.com and zoeyandketchup.com, but there’s also stuff for sports teams at www.starbridgemedia.com.

WCP: One last note—on the Starbridge Media site is a link to NASCAR Heroes comic books.

Meet a Local Cartoonist: A Chat with Sierra Barnes

by Mike Rhode

 Sierra Barnes, aka Sierra Bravo, is a local webcomics creator. I'm going to lift her bio from her website, since we haven't met in person during these crazy times.

Sierra Barnes is a historian-turned-comic-creator who currently lives in Washington, DC making webcomics and print comics based on history and folklore. She graduated in 2014 from the College of William & Mary with a double-major in History and German Studies, and graduated in August of 2019 with a MFA in Comics from California College of the Arts. She is particularly interested in the relationship between history, mythology, and memory, and her comics (including webcomic HANS VOGEL IS DEAD) reflect this. When she’s not making comics, you can usually find her haunting cafes and museums like a very nerdy ghost.

What type of comic work or cartooning do you do?

I do graphic novels and webcomics! Mostly long-form a la Monstress and Namesake.

How do you do it? Traditional pen and ink, computer or a combination?

Digital art all the way, baby. I started out drawing pencils and scanning in but found it really cumbersome, so now I work directly in photoshop/clip studio with a Cintiq tablet.

When (within a decade is fine) and where were you born?

I was born in 1991 in Houston, Texas! Don't ask me anything about it though, my family moved out of state six months later.

Why are you in Washington now?  What neighborhood or area do you live in?

I moved to Arlington to be with my fiancee (I've spent most of my life in Northern California), but mostly because I was done living in a small rural town with not a lot of art prospects.

What is your training and/or education in cartooning?

I taught myself how to draw with help from my mother, who is a fine artist, and got an MFA in Comics from California College of the Arts last year.

Who are your influences?

Writing-wise I love Susanna Clarke, John Connolly, and Marjorie Liu, and visual art-wise I draw a lot from Mike Mignola, Natasha Alterici, Ivan Bilibin, and Alex Alice. I love Eastern European folk art as well!

Is Sierra Bravo a pen name that you use?

Sierra Bravo is a pen name I use! It's just my initials in the NATO alphabet, but since my first name is also Sierra, I thought it was kinda funny.

Are you a full-time artist now, or do you have a job that pays the bills?

I wish I were arting full time! I work part-time as an admin assistant for AASHTO's publications wing working with transportation and infrastructure oversight. My favorite part about the gig--other than my coworkers haha--is that they have all the records of transportation standards and whatnot stretching back to 1914, so I've gotten the chance to look at some really cool transportation history in America! Road materials in 1920 pre-standardization were WILD.

If you could, what in your career would you do-over or change?

I don't think my career is far enough along for me to have regrets, per say, but I think I definitely would have resized all my pages to be industry standard comic size if I knew five years ago I would spend 40+ hours trying to format my weirdly-sized webcomic pages for print!!

What work are you best-known for?

I would say my webcomic of five years, Hans Vogel is Dead. A dead Nazi realizes in the afterlife his actions in our world have had greater consequences than he could have imagined, and must journey through the world of the Brothers Grimm fairy tales to rectify them. 

What work are you most proud of?

Probably still Hans Vogel is Dead, I finished Volume 1 in August of this year and had a print run that sold out in three days!! Very exciting.

What would you like to do or work on in the future?

I'd love to be picked up by a publisher for HViD, but I also have another series I've been pitching around to agents as a print-only run. I really would love to be working on graphic novels full-time someday...

Why are you doing a World War II flying story? 

I did a lot of work studying various aspects of aviation history and mythology in undergrad: the Nazification of the German air force from 1918 to 1940, how that was framed in popular culture, the general myth of the "Knights of the Skies," how Manfred von Richthofen's life was weaponized as propaganda--stuff like that. I found the intersection of the popular conception of heroic and chivalric pilots and the reality of the 2-week life expectancy and horrible deaths to be really interesting, and I also found that the weaponization of those popular conceptions went hand-in-hand with how the German Air Corps of WWI became the Luftwaffe of WWII. I knew I wanted to tell a story about how regular people could become radicalized, and with my background in aviation history and the rich imagery of WWI and WWII pilots, I felt like pulling from the visual library of the Battle of Britain and the Luftwaffe would have some cool and poignant results. I did a lot of research while I was living in Austria on my Fulbright, spoke to people, and visited a lot of war memorials to get more information on how that trauma was processed--and is being processed now--in collective consciousness, and sort of solidified the idea of Hans Vogel as who he was and how he became what he did. While I was there, the far-right FPÖ party gained power in the state where I was living, and seeing the rise in right-wing nationalism around the world since has galvanized me in my decision of making this anti-fascist story. I hate it when people try and divorce things like the German Military in WWII from politics--and I see it a lot in military history nerd circles!--you just can't do that ethically. In a lot of ways, Hans Vogel is very much pushing back against the whole "Good German" myth and trying to have a conversation about culpability even when you don't "mean" to do bad things. You gotta step up.

Will Hans Vogel have a second printing?

Hans Vogel will have a second printing, but I'm waiting to hear back from a publisher before I pull the trigger on ordering a second print run myself. I should know by mid-October, so I'll be making an announcement then! 

What do you do when you're in a rut or have writer's block?

Despair mostly. I'm really struggling with figuring that out!

What do you think will be the future of your field?

I've really loved seeing the growth in digital and webcomics recently, as well as seeing a rise in independent and self-published comics. I think there's a real future in non-superhero comics and comics from smaller, independent creator-owned publishers! There have been some truly fantastic indie comics, especially webcomics, that have come out in the last few years and I think the industry is coming around to recognizing these self-published pieces can be really great. Seeing the success from smaller publishers like Iron Circus and Vault has given me hope that this is the future of comics.

What local cons do you attend? The Small Press Expo, Awesome Con, or others? Any comments about attending them?

I've done one year of Small Press Expo in-person, one year of AwesomeCon in-person, and one year of DCZinefest digitally (scheduling issues between COVID and masters program has made things complicated!). I highly recommend all of them, although I will say that SPX and DCZinefest are much more indie-friendly than AwesomeCon. Even so, all of them were a great time!

What's your favorite thing about DC?

Oh man, I can't pick just one!! I love the museums, I love the National Zoo, we've got some really great restaurants, but also the hiking and kayaking around here is great? I guess most of those things are "before-COVID" pastimes but someday I believe we'll be able to go back in and draw animals at the zoo again... I appreciate that there's a lot of boba tea places near me that do good takeout at least!

Least favorite?

The weather. I don't think I'll ever be used to the humidity, or the summer thunderstorms, or snow. It's just so wet all the time here...

What monument or museum do you like to take visitors to?

I always make people visit the Air and Space Museum with me, I love to go look at the planes in the WWI and WWII exhibits. A few years ago they had a traveling exhibit on WWI artists that was INCREDIBLE. I was really happy I got to go see it.

How about a favorite local restaurant?

Daikaya in Chinatown, Sakuramen in Adams Morgan, and Hanabi Ramen in Clarendon! I'm a huge ramen fan. I also love Chill Zone in Arlington, it's a lil mom and pop Vietnamese place that I used to go pop down and grab banh mi and work for a bit.

Do you have a website or blog?

My art website is here: https://www.sierrabravoart.com/
webcomic is here: https://www.webtoons.com/en/challenge/hans-vogel-is-dead/list?title_no=62633
Twitter: @chjorniy_voron
Instagram: @sierra_bravo_art

How has the COVID-19 outbreak affected you, personally and professionally?

Closing shows has really bummed me out, and that's really the biggest impact it's had on my professional career as well. Online shows have not had the same response as in-person, and they're nowhere near as fun. I miss getting to do the networking and hanging out. Personally, it's been a struggle to keep up with productivity and burnout is real, but I'm hoping that I'll be able to use the end of the year to kinda collect myself and figure out how to start the next volume of my webcomic and get some more pitches out there!

Alexandra Bowman talks to India's "Wade" animation directors

"Wade" Co-Directors on Discussing Climate Change Through 2D Animation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nNKLXQZkK4&t=1s

"Wade" Co-Directors on Animation Inspiration, Production, and Self-Distribution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWWjJfPMxlk&t=2s

"Ghost Animation" Co-Founders on Creating an Animation Studio, and Animating for Amazon and Google https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13X3_mGkGI8&t=2s

From the press release -

Upamanyu Bhattacharyya and Kalp Sanghvi's 'Wade' addresses the dangerous sea rising levels in Kolkata, India

Upamanyu Bhattacharyya and Kalp Sanghvi's Wade addresses the importance of climate change by focusing on the dangerous sea rising levels in India. This stunning animation will be screening online as part of Annecy International Animated Film Festival in June and Palm Springs International Shortfest also in June where it will be competing for the Best of the Festival Award and Best Animated Short.

In an imagined future where Kolkata is rendered unlivable by rising sea level, things take a dark turn when a family of climate change refugees are ambushed by a tiger in the flooded streets.

Co-director Upamanyu Bhattacharyya is an animator, filmmaker, comic artist and illustrator. Upamanyu co-directed the highly acclaimed short film Wade with Kalp Sanghvi. As a founding partner of Ghost Animation in Kolkata, he has worked on a wide range of animation and illustration projects for clients including Google, Amazon, and Penguin. Bhattacharyya worked on the title sequence for acclaimed director Mani Ratnam's film OK Kanmani, storyboarded his other film Kaatru Veliyidai and has also worked with Academy Award winning composer A.R. Rahman to create storyboards for his VR project Le Musk.  Currently, he is finishing his work on his next solo animated short Ten, a dark comedy about the mass exodus from Bangladesh in 1971 and is developing his animated feature City of Threads, set in Ahmedabad in the 1960's.

Co-director Kalp Sanghvi is also an animation filmmaker and illustrator who co-founded Ghost Animation in Kolkata in 2015. He has worked on various animation and illustration projects for clients including Amazon and Sony Entertainment India. Kalp has worked on title sequences for feature films including acclaimed director Umesh Shukla's 102 Not Out, featuring Amitabh Bachchan & Rishi Kapoor. 
He is developing his first animated series Rajbari: The Ancestral House, a fantasy family drama set in Kolkata and working on an animated short film about tiger conservation in collaboration with the Wildlife Trust of India called Remains.

Wade has currently applied to over 60 festivals and its selections so far include 
Palm Springs International Short Fest, Brooklyn Film Festival (Best Film, Audience Award), ITFS Stuttgart, Krakow Film Festival, Animayo Film Festival (Best Art Direction) and OFF Odense International Film Festival.

This film screened online as part of the Annecy International Animated Film Festival on June 15th to June 30th and won the "City of Annecy" Award and at Palm Springs International ShortFest on June 16th to June 22nd.

Meet a Local Cartoonist: A Chat with Dick Wright

by Mike Rhode

Dick Wright of The Providence Journal-Bulletin was the 1983 Pulitzer Prize Finalist in Editorial Cartooning. As Dave Astor has written, “Wright worked for the [San Diego] Union-Tribune … (starting in 1976) and later joined The Providence (R.I.) Journal, the Nashville (Tenn.) Banner, and The Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch. Currently [2005], he’s affiliated with the Gwinnett Daily Post of Lawrenceville, Ga. He was syndicated by Tribune Media Services, then Copley News Service, and finally for several years in the early 2000s by Daryl Cagle. His work was collected in the book If He Only Had a Brain... in 1998. The Cartoon Art Museum in San Francisco “houses over 300 political cartoons illustrated by famed cartoonist Dick Wright in the mid-1990s.” He retired from editorial cartooning in 2005, around the same time he was profiled by the Washington Times. Wright has recently returned to editorial cartooning.

What type of comic work or cartooning do you do?

I draw editorial cartoons.

How do you do it? Traditional pen and ink, computer or a combination?

I use a brush, pen and India ink.

 

When (within a decade is fine) and where were you born?

I was born in 1944.

Why are you in the Washington area now?  What neighborhood or area do you live in?

I live in Warrenton, Virginia.

What is your training and/or education in cartooning?

I am self-taught. I went to Long Beach State University and I majored in finance.

Who are your influences?

Mad magazine, and especially Mort Drucker. Also, Walt Disney.

If you could, what in your career would you do-over or change?

I think I would do more local cartoons.

What work are you best-known for?

I can't think of a single piece of work. In general probably my caricatures.

What work are you most proud of?

Well, when I started I was pretty rough. I guess that given where I started I am most proud of what I developed into. My work is a far cry from when I started. I had some help along the way. Mort Drucker was a great encouragement to me as well as Karl Hubenthal in Los Angeles.

What would you like to do or work on in the future?

I am content to do cartoons about Virginia at this point in my career.

What do you do when you're in a rut or have writer's block?

I used to keep a file of "ideas" that I used to trigger new ideas. If you worked at it long enough something would come.

What do you think will be the future of your field?

I think that the future in cartooning is in online venues.

What local cons do you attend?

I don't attend any.

What's your favorite thing about DC?

I worked in DC for Scripps-Howard Newspapers. I got to know DC a bit. I guess being in the middle of the action was my favorite thing. I ran into many people that were real players. I enjoyed that

Least favorite?

Traffic.

What monument or museum do you like to take visitors to?

The Smithsonian.

How about a favorite local restaurant?

I love Mexican food just about anywhere.

Do you have a website or blog?

I have a website for a book I wrote called "Growing Big In God". I wrote short messages about many topics about life. I was a pastor of two churches and used my experience and knowledge to help others deal with the tough side of life. Dick Wright Cartoons is my Facebook page with new cartoons.

How has the COVID-19 outbreak affected you, personally and professionally?

I work from home anyway so it really hasn't impacted me much.

 Can you tell us a bit about being a church pastor and your faith?

I grew up in church. I had a very powerful experience with God at about the age of thirteen. From that time forward, I was deeply engaged in church and was very focused on spiritual things. On my own I began to read the Bible every evening before going to sleep. In reading the Bible, I learned a lot about God and it changed me. Even as a young teen, I became very interested in someday serving the Lord as a pastor. My parents were middle class. We struggled financially even as my dad worked two and three jobs as far back as I can remember. When it came time for me to go to college, I did not have you the heart to ask for help in going to college. I was interested in going to a bible college to become a pastor. Instead, I attended Junior College with no particular direction. I dropped out and got a job as a draftsman because I could draw. In those days we actually drew by hand the things we were building. I advanced quickly and moved up to a junior designer at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, California. I became interested in engineering.

By then I was married with two little girls. I wanted to become a senior designer, but you had to be degreed. So I went to Long Beach State studying engineering and worked full time. While I was at Long Beach State I began to draw cartoons for the university newspaper, the 49'er. I did this a couple of years and finally I went to some local newspaper editors and asked them what they thought of my work. They were very encouraging and began to print a few. This changed my whole direction. I began to consider changing my career goal from engineering to cartooning. I spent about two years contacting newspapers looking for a job. Finally, I was hired at the San Diego Union as their back-up cartoonist and illustrator and I was on my way. It didn't take long for my editorial cartoons to be used more and more and I became the lead cartoonist. I was in San Diego for about eighteen months and then moved to the Providence Journal and that is where my career took off. I was focused on being as good as I could be. I would get up at about four in the morning and read the paper cover to cover. My intent was to know what was going on so my cartoons had substance. I worked at it. I became syndicated and my list of papers grew to about 420. This was a lot, since at that time there were only about 1700 dailies in the country.

This went on for years, but I never forgot the early experience I had with God and my very distinct call to be a pastor. As my list of papers grew I reached my limit. I began to struggle to keep the numbers up and had to work harder just to stay even. I began to realize that there was no way I could sustain what I had been doing for years and I became discouraged. I began to question what I was doing, and for what? At this time I began to think about becoming a pastor and fulfill that early calling. I was 52 at the time. I began to seek out what was necessary to become a pastor. I had a friend who was a pastor who told me that in Virginia all you needed to become a pastor was to be ordained by a church and I could become a pastor. His church ordained me as I had 30 years’ experience leading and teaching the Word. Within a month I had gathered together a group of 21 people and we started a church and I was the pastor. In 12 weeks the church grew to 100 attenders. Three years later we completed a new church building. In five years, my church had grown to more than 400. I retired and then came out of retirement to help another small church get established. I am currently the assistant pastor at that church now.

 You mentioned Mort Drucker who just passed away this month, after a long life. Do you have any specific stories or anecdotes about knowing him?

 When I was trying to get into cartooning, I wrote Mort a letter with some of my work to Mad magazine. I received a letter back from him. He was gracious and encouraging. He offered advice about cartooning that was very helpful. One of the things he told me was that every assignment I get and send off should be better than the last job I did. He said this was the way to get better. He said that when you plateau and level off, keep working at doing better than your last job. He said this is how he improved. Mort was a very kind and gracious man. Many years later, when I was the cartoonist at the Providence Journal, I was involved is getting the program set for an editorial cartooning convention. I contacted Mad and talked to the editor and invited all the cartoonist to the convention in Newport. Mort and Jack Davis showed up along with some others. What a thrill! I have a photo of Mort and myself taken at the mansion where we were hosting the convention. He was so gracious and kind to me. What a great cartoonist, a great man. I miss him.

 4/23/2020: Updated with links to Wright's Facebook page, thanks to DD Degg of the Daily Cartoonist.