CARTOONING

Unlike drawing, cartooning is a technique of distortion and abstraction. Cartooning involves a process of simplifications, which has led to the development of a shared understanding of signs. Scott McCloud argues that people tend to react better to simplified drawings, rather than to complex and extremely detailed representations. 

Furthermore, comics are supposed to be read as stories, and it is generally easier to represent fictional people and places by using cartooning, rather than drawing. This happens due to the fact that the degree of realism involved in cartooning is minimal, and therefore the image perceived is not automatically linked to a real person or place. 

Cartooning requires a lot of talent and patience, and each artist develops his or own style. The signature of each artist consists in the manner of representing the image, but also in the way in which he or she manages to render the image as distorted and abstracted as possible, while making sure it stays intelligible. 

It is also important to mention the fact that, due to fact that comics readers have grown extremely familiar with the abstraction used in cartooning, they find it strange when realistic drawings are inserted into the narrative.

Cartooning and drawing remain the most popular types of illustration in comics, although other types – such as photo-comics and painted comics – do exist. Roger Sabin points out the fact that painted comics are often a more sophisticated version of pen-and-ink cartooning. The advantage of painted comics over traditional pen-and-ink illustration is that paint allows for a greater degree of abstraction. Nonetheless, not many cartoonists have taken advantage of this fact.

Finally, it is important to mention the fact that cartooning ultimately conveys the artist’s vision. As Roger Sabin put it,

   The fact that drawing style is the most immediate aspect of comics means that what you see when you look at a comics book is a particular, personal version of its artist’s vision – not what the artist’s eye sees, but the way the artist’s mind interprets sight. (Roger 125).

WRITTEN BY MADALINA BORCAU

EDITED BY ANTONIA GIRMACEA