Rat Face x2 (by Bruno Duhamel and Lamisseb)

You may already know this, but it’s a tradition here in France for the mailman and other public service folks to sell calendars at the end of the year. Well, I gotta say… my mailman must want me to buy a whole box of calendars off him next December, because he keeps bringing me some really cool stuff. Stuff like this:

The above drawing of Rat Face, from my friend and fellow writer-artist Bruno Duhamel, really made my day. A few months ago we'd agreed to swap drawings, and I chose to draw Bruno’s ruthless bounty hunter Patrick William Mullighan, from his two-volume western series, Kochka:

I attended art school with Bruno in Angoulême, France from 1996-1998, and he was one of those artists whose presence at the school I never really understood. Why was he there? His rough sketches were better than my finished pages, and he knew more about perspective, anatomy, composition and cartooning in general before he arrived than I did when I graduated. He has gone on to make a name for himself over here, and has co-authored and drawn several bandes dessinées, including Kochka, Butch Cassidy, La Comédie Humaine, Sillage, and Harlem, among others. Even if you don’t read French, I highly recommend tracking down his books….and if you can’t find them where you live, go check out his site, you’ll see why I hold his work in such high esteem.

And since good things almost always come in pairs, I thought I’d share this drawing young French cartoonist Lamisseb sent me the other day. He writes and draws the darkly humorous weekly webcomic Et Pis Taf!! Although he is just starting out, he has some good ideas and works hard, so go give him some support and feedback!


Merci beaucoup Bruno et Seb!

I’ll be back tomorrow with something you’ve most definitely never seen around here before. Stay tuned!