After learning of Joe Matt’s passing last year I was in shock. All those years ago when I started making comics I came across Joe’s work and it changed how I saw comics and what I wanted to do with my work. A few years later I came across David Collier’s work which had a similar and subsequent effect on my work. But now that Joe Matt was gone, it felt like a big part of my artistic dream was gone. It sounds dramatic and perhaps a touch silly, but that was my immediate reaction. Before I heard the news, I had already been intimately studying Joe work for the umpteenth time. I’d been exploring lettering and art sizes, trying to find the perfect one for both. I loved Joe’s comics and so I got out my ruler and measured his panels, lettering sizes, brush work. Copying and redrawing pages. One thing that struck me is the deceptive simplicity of his work. There was nuance and subtlety in his line work that wasn’t immediately obvious unless you tried to copy it. I knew the be...
