A self-portrait through one hundred portraits, Artists Authors Thinkers Directors explores cartoonist Paul Hornschemeier's sketchbook renderings of those who shaped his (and many others ) artistic views.
Culled from his drawing blog The Daily Forlorn, now one of Tumblr s featured illustration blogs, adding thousands of new followers every week these portraits are as stylistically varied as the subjects they portray. A scrawled, single line drawing of Lenny Bruce shares space with a triangular Werner Heisenberg. A monochromatic, stippled Stanley Kubrick stares intently at a muppetheaded Frank Oz. Each turn of the page offers a new take on a familiar face.
In the afterword, Hornschemeier includes brief notes on each portrait and that creator s particular work or insight that spoke specifically to him. And in that specificity, much of what is universally affecting in each creator shines through. Hornschemeier s graphic novels hop from one aesthetic to the next, varying the line and color quality to depict his narrative s mood. He plays with the language of comics. In these portraits we can clearly see him hard at experimentation, adding to his vocabulary.
