2,716
edits
Changes
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
A Master Piece with Tom Richmond (view source)
Revision as of 02:10, 5 August 2020
, 02:10, 5 August 2020Created page with "==Article Transcript== A Midwest Caricaturist in King Alfred’s Court ...or “A Theme Park Caricaturist’s Long Journey Down a Freelance Path” I’ll never forget my fir..."
==Article Transcript==
A Midwest Caricaturist in King Alfred’s Court ...or “A Theme Park Caricaturist’s Long Journey Down a Freelance Path”
I’ll never forget my first
summer drawing caricatures.
It was 1985 and I was a new
artist for Fasen Arts at Six Flags
Great America in Gurnee, Illinois.
Madonna was the newest pop
star, Arnold Schwarzenegger was
a budding action movie hero, and
people would actually recognize
a sample of Grace Jones hanging
on the wall. I had just turned 19
and was getting paid to draw.
Paid. Real money (sort of). I spent
that summer thinking, in my best
stereotypical Italian cartoon voice,
“Thees eesa da life!”
I enjoyed doing live caricature. I must
have — I did it full time for over 20
years. I found it challenging in its unique
dynamic, which demanded a combination
of speed, accuracy, and interaction with
the subject, all the while in front of an
audience. After a while, however, I got a
little tired of watching all my work being
carried away in a rolled up tube bag or
a cheap frame destined for the wall of
someone’s basement rec room, or on a
refrigerator via a magnet shaped like an
ear of corn, or some dusty junk drawer. I
knew live caricature was always going to
be some part of my career as an artist, but
I also wanted to branch out and see if I
could become an illustrator doing comics,
cartoons, advertising, magazine illustration
… wherever “humorous illustration”
was needed. I wanted to be a freelance
illustrator — I just needed to know where
to begin.
I get a kick out of people who seem to
think you get “discovered” as an illustrator
and that overnight you go from doing
art for your local church social to TIME
magazine covers. That happens to no one.
A freelance career is something you have
to develop over the course of many years,
slowly building a client base while tirelessly
pursuing jobs. Developing that freelance
career takes a combination of hard work,
perseverance, determination, fearlessness
in the face of failure, and a bit of luck.
By the way, that last one isn’t totally out
of your control — luck is something you
make for yourself. Luck in freelancing is
simply having your work on the desk of an
art director right at a time when they are
thinking they need an illustrator with your
set of skills for a job. The previous four
elements of building that freelance career
set up that fifth one ... you make the luck.
The most valuable piece of advice I ever
got about freelancing came from the great
caricature illustrator David Levine, and
he told it to me in that timeless repository
of all wisdom and great thoughts: the
restroom. It was 2000 and I was then
president of the NCN (for you young
members, the former name of ISCA) and
had organized a mini-con around a panel
presentation on caricature taking place
in Minneapolis as part of the American
Association of Editorial Cartoonists
convention. In addition to David, the
panel also contained Philip Burke, David
Cowles and Steve Brodner, moderated
by Bob Staake. About 20 NCN members
were in the audience thanks to a special
fee that local host and editorial cartoonist
Steve Sack got for us just for the panel. It
was enlightening — not surprising, given
the talent on the stage.
After the program, I was in the hotel lobby
bathroom when Mr. Levine entered and
came up to the urinal next to me. We were
observing the male ritual of staring straight
ahead into the tiles while engaging in small
talk as we relieved ourselves. He told
me he noticed I had asked several good
questions on freelancing.
“Do you want to know the real secret to a
successful career in freelance illustration?”
He asked.
“Uh.... yes!” I replied.
“People,” he said. “That’s the key to
making a living and being successful as
a freelance illustrator. It’s all about people
and building relationships with people.”
He went on to say that doing good work
was what got you your first few jobs,
but continuing jobs was about building
relationships of trust and respect with art directors, because they invariably moved
on to other art director jobs and passed
your name on to other ADs, who would
give you jobs and then you’d build a
relationship with them, eventually creating
a large web of contacts and people who
know you were a professional who did
not only good work but who did it in the
professional manner they appreciated. That
was some great advice, and I have built my
career around it.
As we were flushing and zipping up, he
commented: “Bathroom wisdom … it’s the
best kind.”
I agree.
Not that just “knowing people” alone will
get you very far. The ability to do good,
eye-catching work that has an appeal to
art directors is the first order of business.
Many live caricaturists are great at doing
a single caricature of a subject, but their
comfort level stops at the neck. Caricature
is one of those skills that is “evergreen” in
the world of illustration, meaning it does not
go out of style. When you get right down
to in, most stories, articles, books, shows
and other media are about people, and
caricature is a unique and entertaining way
to depict people that is much more than
just photography. As a result, caricatures
are something that work for almost any
facet of media communication at some
time or another, and are always in demand.
The popularity of styles come and go, but
caricature as an element of illustration is
here to stay. That means illustrators who
can do good caricature can always find
outlets for their work.
Notice I said “illustrators who can
do caricature” as opposed to just
“caricaturists.” That’s because when you
are talking about illustration, it’s more
than just from the neck up. You have to
go beyond doing just a caricature of your
subject’s face. You have to caricature
the whole universe. One of the
greatest humorous illustrators of
all time, Jack Davis, is a perfect
example of this. Jack’s caricatures
and drawings of people are instantly
recognizable — but so are his
drawings of everything else. A Jack
Davis fire hydrant
is unmistakable as
his work. Likewise
a Jack Davis chair, or
fishing boat, or telephone, or
ham sandwich. Jack’s art shows
us the universe thorough his eyes,
all aspects of it. Virtually all great
humorous illustrators share this talent:
Mort Drucker, Arnold Roth, Jules Fieffer,
Sergio Aragonés — the list goes on
and on. That is one lesson I learned,
early on, that caricature is only a single
element in an illustration, and other
elements need the same amount of
attention as I would give the caricature.
My freelance path reads like a textbook
guide for how to start small and slowly
build a career doing illustration. I started
when I was still in college in the late
1980s, doing a few small jobs for some
of the professors at my school who
were also art directors for
ad agencies and design
firms, and local art like
kids menus for area
restaurants. In 1990 I
got work from a small
comic book company
called NOW Comics doing a title called
Married...with Children, which eventually
led to a miniseries for Marvel called
The Coneheads in 1994. I did my first
magazine illustration for a local publication
called MPLS ST. PAUL magazine in
1991, which led to my doing work for the
Minnesota Twins when that art director
moved over to do the Twins magazine
(the Levine Principle in action). In 1993
I did some of my first advertising work
when I picked up the ball from another
artist who was not getting the job done
on a promotional anti-drugs comic book
for kids for a company called Business
and Legal Reports. I ended up doing six
more comic book projects for them that
were messages about the inadvisability
of smoking, drinking, bullying, etc. for
grade-school-age kids. That work led to
work for kids magazines like Scholastic,
and National Geographic for Kids. In
1997, I did art for a series of CD-ROM
parody games for a small company called
Parotty Interactive, which led to a big job
doing a game for Hasbro called “Super
Scattergories”. In 1999, I started doing
work for Cracked Magazine, a nowdefunct
MAD rip-off, doing TV and movie
parodies. In 2000, I was in my first issue
of MAD. My work at MAD has led to many
opportunities over the past 13 years. My
“overnight success” took 15 years of hard
work and building, and it’s still ongoing
after 28 years.
I’ve been lucky, but there have been
many, many more unlucky moments
overcome than lucky ones taken
advantage of. During that first 15 years,
I sent out innumerable postcards and
tear-sheet promos, invested in ad pages
in Sourcebooks like the Directory of
Illustration, and scoured the newsstands
looking at what kind of artwork different
publications were using and which
might be most interested in my style of
illustration, then adding them to my mailing
list. One key ingredient: I used the financial
bedrock of my live caricature work to pay
the bills when I was struggling to find
steady freelance work. Most illustrators
have to have a “day job” for a long while
until they get that client base built up, I
was lucky my day job was still being an
artist. That gave me not only time to find
and develop those client relationships that
David Levine later advised me about, but
to develop my skills as well and become a
better illustrator. Without my live caricature
work and experience, I’d not have ever
made it as a freelancer.
Today’s world of publication may be
shrinking, but it’s far from dead. There
is plenty of work out there, especially for
illustrators who are adept at caricature.
So far, no one has written a computer
program that can create a caricature
— you still need an artist to do that.
While some of the larger magazines
are struggling, there are still hundreds
and hundreds of niche publications out
there with small to medium circulations
that need illustrations for their articles.
It’s the dirty little secret of freelance
illustrators that no one earns a living
doing TIME covers. Most illustrators —
even the big names like Payne, Brodner,
Burke, etc. — make a living doing work
for magazines you’ve probably never
heard of, like Snow Country (winter
sports), Detour (fashion/pop culture),
Broadcasting and Cable (TV/cable
industry), UTNE Reader (politics/
opinion), Financial Planning (accounting
industry) or Contingencies (actuary
industry). I’ve worked for all those and
many more you would not recognize.
They pay decently, and there are a
lot more of them than there are TIME,
People or MAD. TV/film, advertising,
products and the Internet aren’t going
away, and there are clients in those
areas of media who need illustration as
well, especially caricatures.
For those who want to branch out into
publication illustration, tomorrow is never
as good a time to do so as today is. Put
together a nice collection of your most
appealing work, start looking around
your area for companies and potential
clients who might be looking for artwork,
and start pounding the pavement. The
children’s menu you design and illustrate
for the corner family diner is the first step
on a path that might lead to that fabled
TIME cover. You’ll never know until you
step onto the path.
''Tom Richmond has been a member of the ISCA since 1997 and won the Golden Nosey in 1998 and 1999. He was president of the ISCA in 2000 and 2001. He owns caricature operations in several theme parks around the country, and has been a freelance illustrator and cartoonist since 1985. In 2012 he was awarded the National Cartoonists Society’s highest honor, the Reuben Award for “Cartoonist of the Year”, and is currently president of the NCS. He works out of a studio in his Burnsville, Minnesota home.''
A Midwest Caricaturist in King Alfred’s Court ...or “A Theme Park Caricaturist’s Long Journey Down a Freelance Path”
I’ll never forget my first
summer drawing caricatures.
It was 1985 and I was a new
artist for Fasen Arts at Six Flags
Great America in Gurnee, Illinois.
Madonna was the newest pop
star, Arnold Schwarzenegger was
a budding action movie hero, and
people would actually recognize
a sample of Grace Jones hanging
on the wall. I had just turned 19
and was getting paid to draw.
Paid. Real money (sort of). I spent
that summer thinking, in my best
stereotypical Italian cartoon voice,
“Thees eesa da life!”
I enjoyed doing live caricature. I must
have — I did it full time for over 20
years. I found it challenging in its unique
dynamic, which demanded a combination
of speed, accuracy, and interaction with
the subject, all the while in front of an
audience. After a while, however, I got a
little tired of watching all my work being
carried away in a rolled up tube bag or
a cheap frame destined for the wall of
someone’s basement rec room, or on a
refrigerator via a magnet shaped like an
ear of corn, or some dusty junk drawer. I
knew live caricature was always going to
be some part of my career as an artist, but
I also wanted to branch out and see if I
could become an illustrator doing comics,
cartoons, advertising, magazine illustration
… wherever “humorous illustration”
was needed. I wanted to be a freelance
illustrator — I just needed to know where
to begin.
I get a kick out of people who seem to
think you get “discovered” as an illustrator
and that overnight you go from doing
art for your local church social to TIME
magazine covers. That happens to no one.
A freelance career is something you have
to develop over the course of many years,
slowly building a client base while tirelessly
pursuing jobs. Developing that freelance
career takes a combination of hard work,
perseverance, determination, fearlessness
in the face of failure, and a bit of luck.
By the way, that last one isn’t totally out
of your control — luck is something you
make for yourself. Luck in freelancing is
simply having your work on the desk of an
art director right at a time when they are
thinking they need an illustrator with your
set of skills for a job. The previous four
elements of building that freelance career
set up that fifth one ... you make the luck.
The most valuable piece of advice I ever
got about freelancing came from the great
caricature illustrator David Levine, and
he told it to me in that timeless repository
of all wisdom and great thoughts: the
restroom. It was 2000 and I was then
president of the NCN (for you young
members, the former name of ISCA) and
had organized a mini-con around a panel
presentation on caricature taking place
in Minneapolis as part of the American
Association of Editorial Cartoonists
convention. In addition to David, the
panel also contained Philip Burke, David
Cowles and Steve Brodner, moderated
by Bob Staake. About 20 NCN members
were in the audience thanks to a special
fee that local host and editorial cartoonist
Steve Sack got for us just for the panel. It
was enlightening — not surprising, given
the talent on the stage.
After the program, I was in the hotel lobby
bathroom when Mr. Levine entered and
came up to the urinal next to me. We were
observing the male ritual of staring straight
ahead into the tiles while engaging in small
talk as we relieved ourselves. He told
me he noticed I had asked several good
questions on freelancing.
“Do you want to know the real secret to a
successful career in freelance illustration?”
He asked.
“Uh.... yes!” I replied.
“People,” he said. “That’s the key to
making a living and being successful as
a freelance illustrator. It’s all about people
and building relationships with people.”
He went on to say that doing good work
was what got you your first few jobs,
but continuing jobs was about building
relationships of trust and respect with art directors, because they invariably moved
on to other art director jobs and passed
your name on to other ADs, who would
give you jobs and then you’d build a
relationship with them, eventually creating
a large web of contacts and people who
know you were a professional who did
not only good work but who did it in the
professional manner they appreciated. That
was some great advice, and I have built my
career around it.
As we were flushing and zipping up, he
commented: “Bathroom wisdom … it’s the
best kind.”
I agree.
Not that just “knowing people” alone will
get you very far. The ability to do good,
eye-catching work that has an appeal to
art directors is the first order of business.
Many live caricaturists are great at doing
a single caricature of a subject, but their
comfort level stops at the neck. Caricature
is one of those skills that is “evergreen” in
the world of illustration, meaning it does not
go out of style. When you get right down
to in, most stories, articles, books, shows
and other media are about people, and
caricature is a unique and entertaining way
to depict people that is much more than
just photography. As a result, caricatures
are something that work for almost any
facet of media communication at some
time or another, and are always in demand.
The popularity of styles come and go, but
caricature as an element of illustration is
here to stay. That means illustrators who
can do good caricature can always find
outlets for their work.
Notice I said “illustrators who can
do caricature” as opposed to just
“caricaturists.” That’s because when you
are talking about illustration, it’s more
than just from the neck up. You have to
go beyond doing just a caricature of your
subject’s face. You have to caricature
the whole universe. One of the
greatest humorous illustrators of
all time, Jack Davis, is a perfect
example of this. Jack’s caricatures
and drawings of people are instantly
recognizable — but so are his
drawings of everything else. A Jack
Davis fire hydrant
is unmistakable as
his work. Likewise
a Jack Davis chair, or
fishing boat, or telephone, or
ham sandwich. Jack’s art shows
us the universe thorough his eyes,
all aspects of it. Virtually all great
humorous illustrators share this talent:
Mort Drucker, Arnold Roth, Jules Fieffer,
Sergio Aragonés — the list goes on
and on. That is one lesson I learned,
early on, that caricature is only a single
element in an illustration, and other
elements need the same amount of
attention as I would give the caricature.
My freelance path reads like a textbook
guide for how to start small and slowly
build a career doing illustration. I started
when I was still in college in the late
1980s, doing a few small jobs for some
of the professors at my school who
were also art directors for
ad agencies and design
firms, and local art like
kids menus for area
restaurants. In 1990 I
got work from a small
comic book company
called NOW Comics doing a title called
Married...with Children, which eventually
led to a miniseries for Marvel called
The Coneheads in 1994. I did my first
magazine illustration for a local publication
called MPLS ST. PAUL magazine in
1991, which led to my doing work for the
Minnesota Twins when that art director
moved over to do the Twins magazine
(the Levine Principle in action). In 1993
I did some of my first advertising work
when I picked up the ball from another
artist who was not getting the job done
on a promotional anti-drugs comic book
for kids for a company called Business
and Legal Reports. I ended up doing six
more comic book projects for them that
were messages about the inadvisability
of smoking, drinking, bullying, etc. for
grade-school-age kids. That work led to
work for kids magazines like Scholastic,
and National Geographic for Kids. In
1997, I did art for a series of CD-ROM
parody games for a small company called
Parotty Interactive, which led to a big job
doing a game for Hasbro called “Super
Scattergories”. In 1999, I started doing
work for Cracked Magazine, a nowdefunct
MAD rip-off, doing TV and movie
parodies. In 2000, I was in my first issue
of MAD. My work at MAD has led to many
opportunities over the past 13 years. My
“overnight success” took 15 years of hard
work and building, and it’s still ongoing
after 28 years.
I’ve been lucky, but there have been
many, many more unlucky moments
overcome than lucky ones taken
advantage of. During that first 15 years,
I sent out innumerable postcards and
tear-sheet promos, invested in ad pages
in Sourcebooks like the Directory of
Illustration, and scoured the newsstands
looking at what kind of artwork different
publications were using and which
might be most interested in my style of
illustration, then adding them to my mailing
list. One key ingredient: I used the financial
bedrock of my live caricature work to pay
the bills when I was struggling to find
steady freelance work. Most illustrators
have to have a “day job” for a long while
until they get that client base built up, I
was lucky my day job was still being an
artist. That gave me not only time to find
and develop those client relationships that
David Levine later advised me about, but
to develop my skills as well and become a
better illustrator. Without my live caricature
work and experience, I’d not have ever
made it as a freelancer.
Today’s world of publication may be
shrinking, but it’s far from dead. There
is plenty of work out there, especially for
illustrators who are adept at caricature.
So far, no one has written a computer
program that can create a caricature
— you still need an artist to do that.
While some of the larger magazines
are struggling, there are still hundreds
and hundreds of niche publications out
there with small to medium circulations
that need illustrations for their articles.
It’s the dirty little secret of freelance
illustrators that no one earns a living
doing TIME covers. Most illustrators —
even the big names like Payne, Brodner,
Burke, etc. — make a living doing work
for magazines you’ve probably never
heard of, like Snow Country (winter
sports), Detour (fashion/pop culture),
Broadcasting and Cable (TV/cable
industry), UTNE Reader (politics/
opinion), Financial Planning (accounting
industry) or Contingencies (actuary
industry). I’ve worked for all those and
many more you would not recognize.
They pay decently, and there are a
lot more of them than there are TIME,
People or MAD. TV/film, advertising,
products and the Internet aren’t going
away, and there are clients in those
areas of media who need illustration as
well, especially caricatures.
For those who want to branch out into
publication illustration, tomorrow is never
as good a time to do so as today is. Put
together a nice collection of your most
appealing work, start looking around
your area for companies and potential
clients who might be looking for artwork,
and start pounding the pavement. The
children’s menu you design and illustrate
for the corner family diner is the first step
on a path that might lead to that fabled
TIME cover. You’ll never know until you
step onto the path.
''Tom Richmond has been a member of the ISCA since 1997 and won the Golden Nosey in 1998 and 1999. He was president of the ISCA in 2000 and 2001. He owns caricature operations in several theme parks around the country, and has been a freelance illustrator and cartoonist since 1985. In 2012 he was awarded the National Cartoonists Society’s highest honor, the Reuben Award for “Cartoonist of the Year”, and is currently president of the NCS. He works out of a studio in his Burnsville, Minnesota home.''
