The blog of Richard Thompson, caricaturist, creator of "Cul de Sac," and winner of the 2011 Reuben Award for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year.

Thursday, March 18, 2010

A Mostly Accurate Map

This is hot off the drawing board, or really the watercolor paper stretching board. It's for a show opening next month at the Charles Schulz Museum, curated by cartoonist & historian Brian Walker, that features comics with a definite (if invented) setting. I'm loaning a few daily and Sunday strips and the cover of the first CdS book, and I wanted to do an additional piece for the show.  A map sounded like fun, as long as it wasn't too accurate. So here's this. I'll update later with some behind-the-scenes how-to stuff. 

18 comments:

chris said...

Richard,
It is beautiful.... geeeeezzz wow!
Crazy cool!

Anonymous said...

Oh, Babeleriffic. I love 'france or Japan'.

tcg said...

Magnificent! The enlargement showing pen and brush strokes is a joy to see. This mythical place reminds me of Minas Tirith!
Thanks for more fab work.

AbbotOfUnreason said...

Exactly as I imagined it. Reminds me of home.

What's the little orange building in the lower right-hand corner? It looks official.

Matthew Cordell said...

Man, that is sweet. And congrats on the show at the Schulz museum! How cool is that?

Hinzi said...

Wow; love it! Cul-de-sacs are taking to the hills, after having used up all available farmland...

Who is living in that monster on top; investment banker?

Jean Wogaman said...

That's brilliant! I never realized Cul de Sac was set in the middle of the Springfield mixing bowl.

Jesse Cline said...

I can see how Arlington would inspire this! awesome picture

Dan Steffan said...

A thing of beauty, Richard. Me want one.

Ooh, and big-time congrats on your Reuben nomination. When I read it I just had to play "Pollywollydoodle" on my uke to celebrate.

ajmitchell said...

This is a gorgeous piece! I've admired your illustrations in New Yorker for years but this is a nice combination of those skills onto a big Cul de Sac image. Beauty.

andy
andy@ajmitchellart.com

Kid Shay said...

This kind of reminds me of the album cover for All Things Must Pass...is there room for George Harrison in Cul de Sac?

This really needs to be part of your next book collection.

Mike Rhode said...

Verrrry nice.

Zazzle lets you make posters, btw.

Hint, hint.

Stacy Curtis said...

Where is the video of you making this? I brought my 3-D glasses.

fritzoid said...

Just lovely! I second (or third) the suggestion of a poster.

Is the little orange car that's repeated so often registered to Peter Otterloop Sr.? He gets around in that thing...

The unmarked building in the lower corner looks like Blisshaven, but that puts it outside the town walls. Can that be right? If not, Blisshaven is conspicuous by its absence.

CaffeineCowgirl said...

Ah, this is priceless. :D *thumbs up*

chris said...

sounds like we need another video. Richard this is just stunning.

richardcthompson said...

Thanks, I'm glad youall liked it. Like I said, I'll put up a post with some sketches & stuff in a day or so.

That is Blisshaven Preschool in the lower right corner. I meant to mark it with an arrow but ran out of room. Maybe I should plan these things a little better.

here today, gone tomorrow said...

Oh, Richard, this is sooooooooo beautiful! I love looking at the details and watercolor in the enlargement.