And as I wallow I feel a yearning upon me.
I yearn to change the world.
...long for, pine for, crave, desire, want, wish for, hanker for, covet, lust after/for, pant for, hunger for, burn for, thirst for, ache for, eat one's heart out for, have one's heart set on; informal have a yen for, itch for.
Anyone who knows me knows that I have a Curriculum Vitae in world altering.
But of late as I yearn I also frustrate...
...exasperate, infuriate, annoy, anger, vex, irritate, irk, try someone's patience; disappoint, discontent, dissatisfy, discourage, dishearten, dispirit; informal aggravate, bug, miff....because I am not the man I used to be. I may have refused to grow up but my body protestith so when I ask it to rebel against its surroundings.
In my desire to express this conundrum ...
...communicate, convey, indicate, show, demonstrate, reveal, make manifest, put across/over, get across/over; articulate, put into words, utter, voice, give voice to; state, assert, proclaim, profess, air, make public, give vent to; formal evince.and solve it I am so glad I have come upon Comic Life which seems engineered for the likes of me: an ageing radical, a sixties hipster if you will, handicapped by life's foibles and follies.
And boy you shoulda seen my underground comics collection!Why bust a gut putting in the hard yards at the activist coal face, something that I can't do so well (read 'tis so hard for me to do') anymore, when I can cartoonize the world instead?
Live the dream: join with the panels.
But here in this decrepit bod there is a brain, skills and a will to match all going to waste.
The only person I'm entertaining is myself.
I've done theatre, stand up, monologues, street theatre, puppetry, musicals, reviews, cabaret, organized festivals, I've written satire and newspaper columns; made puppets and masks ... I've been the creative type on and off for yonks.
Can't help myself. It's a yearning.
But as soon as I saw some comics created in ComicLife I said I gotta get myself into dat.
Custom made for me.
Why?
Because that's how I think: I think in comics. Bubbles of words and thought..and preferably in caricature and grotesque. I luv da grotesque.
I love Gilray...
But ironically comic format also lends itself to the most personal: look at Persepolis and American Splendor and Ghostworld
My handicap is a self evident obstacle: I can't draw! Leastways not well enough to tell a story.
So in the past I sculpted and shaped my own puppets and masks and animated those.
Clay. Paper and clay and felt. Papiermache.
My maskmaking was a professional activity: The Mask Studio. I was a 'expert' on masks from commedia dell arte to the quirky or indigenous.
On tour Professor Ratbaggy's Red Cordial Show fostered riots among the under tens.
No pencil work required but I did always get a helluva response when Mr Punchcame to change 'baby', the infant urinated out into the audience!
(Psst! A syringe filled with water goes avery long way...)
Now that was ART and I knows what I like.
Best gag in the whole show.
But to be able to utilize my passion for collage and montage -- to me that means grabbing odd remnants from the web or wherever -- and reassembling them WITH WORDS of my creation in a comic format ...
That's making Whoopee!
So with ComicLife I too have a dream:
That's making Whoopee!
So with ComicLife I too have a dream:
