19 Comments
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Elinor Abbott's avatar

please PLEASE tell me there is somewhere i can read more of these clan of the cave bear summary comics 🙏🏻 i love telling people about how insane those books are (they were in my parents collection and were where i learned about sex stuff in the pre-internet days)

Sarah Cox's avatar

Haha I’ve heard this from so many people 😅 I could hardly look at my mother knowing she had read those parts 🫣

jessamyn's avatar

My husband makes fun of me but it was truly a sexual awakening !!

Austin Kleon's avatar

Loved this one! ❤️❤️❤️

Joan Reilly's avatar

That bra shop experience has stayed with me, and probably always will. I remember the woman saying, "You have to put yourself into it," as she grabbed one of my boobs and shoved it into one of the cups of the bra.

Joan Reilly's avatar

...also, your True Line is a miraculous thing, a force of nature. And I love your smudges.

Anna Blomfield's avatar

I love this article! First off I love your pencil drawings and your humor, so it’s great to see your drawings of your mom’s PT guy. I also love your article on your passion for pencil - in part cos it takes us on a romp through your media experiments. Fascinating to see. I once heard of a lovely word - pentimenti - it refers to those erased pencil lines. I looked it up, it comes from the Italian word to repent or change one’s mind. I love seeing your erased lines. Hope your mum is doing better :)

Our Alzheimer's Comics Memoir's avatar

I love this! When I’m feeling stuck creating a comic, I will revisit your work and ask myself: “WWVDD?” I find inspiration in your real lines and the possibilities that your pages open up for me as a comic-maker.

Josh Kramer's avatar

I relate to the never ending struggle of finding a process that I like and think looks great. Whaddya gonna do? Good stuff

Nick Parker's avatar

I love the idea of ‘connection with your real line’ being the thing. I’ve not thought about it in that way before. 🙌

Nick Abadzis's avatar

Pencil art and the small scale crumbling of graphite forced against paper is the most expressive mark making in existence and you are a maestro of it. I still love pencil art over and above any other supposedly “finished” look in print, and BAH! to the tyranny of inking.

AT&T Mail's avatar

Absolutely brilliant!

Tor Freeman's avatar

I loved this, so interesting and SO helpful - I too have suffered from the tyranny of not feeling like I was using the proper tools (mostly pen), and although I have finally started to really enjoy pen, I feel like my Real Line has always been in pencil too. I wish you had written this and I'd read it 20 years ago! I'm lying, I mean 30 years ago! Thanks Vanessa - please post all the time, I love everything you do.

Sarah Cox's avatar

It’s so great to hear you talk through this - and to see what you mean in the images. I feel like someone could devote their entire life to technical aspects of traditional inking and still not have themselves come through the way you do in pencil. Also damn that compressed charcoal portrait is so great and now i want to try that.

Leela Corman's avatar

Aaaaggghhh I love your comics so much. You are such a big influence on me. Your work always makes me realize I can loosen up and play more. Also oh my god, Jondalar! And, and, you drew FEIGY from Orchard Corset! Buying bras from her and her husband is like shopping for lingerie in an I.B. Singer story.

Lili Todd's avatar

Loved reading this!

Jessica's avatar

love this! love your line. agree procreate is no fun

Kelley Clink (they/she)'s avatar

This is fascinating. I erase SO MUCH. I love procreate for this reason. I draw it all really smudgy and crappy and paper, and then do it over digitally. Maybe I need to experiment with not erasing? It sounds scary!