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Sounds like a question from a hippy—I know.  Only a hippy would ask someone if there’s a connection between your soul, your essence, your outlook and your mark making.  And I avoided thinking about it for a while because I didn’t want to be seen as a non-shoe-wearing, flower-in-the-hair, there’s-a-universe-in-all-of-us type of limp wristed twit.  Guys who are too internal usually take themselves too seriously and (what’s worse), flake out on deadlines.  So my goal for a long time was to be stone cold and scientific about my approach.

But the question “art you in your art?” isn’t one that I can avoid these days, especially when my favorite artists are the ones who are truly “in” their art.

Last night I went out to Cliff Chiang’s opening for Vertigo’s “Greendale” graphic novel.  Cliff is a great guy, a talented artist, and smart as hell (Harvard grad), so I try to butter him up any chance I get.  Afterwards, we all went out for dinner and drinks.  Paul Pope—one of my all time heroes of art/writing—was rumored to be in the area, and sure enough, he was already at the restaurant when we arrived.  I’d never met him and wasn’t sure how I’d handle myself, so I told my girlfriend to kick me if I got too intense toward Paul with my man-crush.

As it turned out, Paul knew me as well.  In fact, he waved to me from across the room when we arrived, which was strange because I couldn’t figure out how Paul would know my face—I’m sure the “Jim Morrison” of comics has better things to do then dick around with Joe the Barbarian.  So later on I asked him how he knew me and he gave me the best compliment:

“You look like your art man.”

So that’s what’s motivating this journal.  I think the universe is telling me that, as much as I hate to be a hippy, it really is important to acknowledge that the soul of an artist should end up on the paper.  Yes, even as an atheist you can have a spiritual outlook.

I got back home and showed my girlfriend Paul’s Vertigo book “100%”.  And sure enough, she agreed with me.  “Yeah,” she said, “this art matches Paul to a T.”

So what does it mean to be “in” your art?  I can’t explain it, but I know it when I see it.  And nothing makes me happier than meeting an artist who somehow matches their work.  I’ve actually had this talk with a few different people when they ask for a crit on their pages.  Usually they’re expecting comments like “work on anatomy” and “draw more backgrounds”, so when they hear “you need to be IN your art more” it always gives them pause.  It’s a tough internalizing question that can really hit certain artists in a deep way—if they follow my meaning.  Or sometimes it’s a statement that they don’t really understand, which means it can go one of two ways: either they ignore it and go back to drawing a house style (or some other breed of their art heroes), or they think “of course I’m in my art—it comes from me so therefore I’m in it” and they move on without connecting with the deeper meaning of what I’m getting at.

I hate to mention “house styles” again, but I think there’s a point worth mentioning.  If you’re drawing a “house style”, then how can you possibly be IN your art?  Arguably, you’re in it a little (because it’s coming from YOU), but the very nature of carrying the “house style” torch throughout your career means you’re not carrying your OWN torch.

My personal description of “house style” is this: a varied mixed of Jim Lee, Neil Adams, Travis Charest, John Byrne, Adam Hughes and a slew of Silver Age comics.  All those guys are awesome artists whose style makes a great impact.  But combining them usually means watering them each down so a point where you’re making VERY LITTLE impact.  Sure, we all have our influences (I used to trace Jim all the time) but at some point you’re supposed to leave them in the past and venture out into doing you OWN thing.

Is there an effort for companies to try and have a “house style”?  I argue yes, although I don’t think it’s always an intentional effort.  But I understand why they do it:  all the artists I mentioned above are great artists who fans will spend money on.  It makes perfect sense that a corporation would want to streamline their product into a consistent, marketable “look” that readers will be comfortable with.

Of course, the “house style” phenomenon is partially our fault—the artists—as well.  A lot of artists are huge fans of comics and nothing makes them happier than carrying that torch.  And I don’t mean to take anything away from their work—consistent styles are what support the industry enough for us “weirdo style” guys to make a living with our risky mark making.  In fairness to the big two, how can we blame them for going with a “house style” look if that’s what’s being handed to them in 80% of their submissions?  It’s a positive feedback loop.

So are we any closer to knowing what it means to be “in” your style.  No, because it all subjective anyway.  I can speak for myself though by answering how I try to be in my work.  

I love joking around, so that explains why some of my panels look like cartoons.  I love acerbic jokes especially, and sometime I go too far with people.  So I think that explains my use of strong blacks and an overall “dark” look in my stuff.  I’m not trying to be overly dramatic here, but if you read these journals a lot then you’ll probably guess that they’re not too flowery.  In a way, I guess what I’m after in my work is dark cartooning.  But I LOVE old-school storytelling, so as odd as my mark making can be, I try to be as clear as possible as an overall rule.  And as much as I try to be realistic with my rendering, for some reason my brain isn’t geared toward photo-realism—but still I use photo refs because that’s what an honest artist should be doing.  I’ll never NEVER use digital inks because I’m bad with technology, which makes sense because I’m still using a Razor cell phone when I should have an iPhone.

So that’s my explanation for my stuff.  Sorry to go on about myself, but it’s the best way I could think of to describe what being “in you art” means to me.  For you it’s different I know, so I’m curious to hear your thoughts on the matter.