Tom Gauld

Tom Gauld
Born1976 (age 47–48)
Aberdeenshire,[1] United Kingdom
EducationEdinburgh College of Art
Royal College of Art
Known forIllustration, cartoonist
Notable workGoliath (2012)
Mooncop (2016)
Baking with Kafka (2017)
Websitehttp://www.tomgauld.com/

Tom Gauld (born 1976) is a Scottish cartoonist and illustrator. His style reflects his self-professed fondness of "deadpan comedy, flat dialogue, things happening offstage and impressive characters".[2] Others note that his work "combines pathos with the farcical"[3] and exhibits "a casual reduction of visual keys into a more rudimentary drawing style".[4]

Career

Gauld is best known for his comic books Goliath and Mooncop as well as his collections of one-page cartoons. He has also authored a number of smaller-scale books such as Guardians of the Kingdom, Robots, Monsters etc., Hunter and Painter and his cartoon Move to the City, which ran weekly in London's Time Out in 2001–2002.

Gauld studied illustration at Edinburgh College of Art, where he first started to draw comics "seriously",[3] and the Royal College of Art. At the Royal College of Art, he worked with friend Simone Lia.[3] Together they self-published the comics First and Second under their Cabanon Press,[5] which they started in 2001.[6] (The two volumes were subsequently published together by Bloomsbury Publishing in 2003, as Both.)

As part of commercial projects, Gauld has done some animation work; in an interview, he commented that "Comics are a lot of work but animation ... was too much.")[2]

His books are now published by Drawn & Quarterly and he regularly produces cartoons and illustrations for The New Yorker (including cover art),[7][8] The New York Times, The Guardian and New Scientist.[3]

Influences

In a 2011 interview, Gauld listed his "Cartooning heroes": William Heath Robinson, Gary Larson, Roz Chast, Richard McGuire, Ben Katchor, Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware and Jochen Gerner.[3]

Personal life

Gauld grew up in the countryside in northern Scotland,[8] and has said that he had always wanted to be involved with something creative related to drawing.[2] He now lives in London with his wife, artist Jo Taylor, and his children.[9]

While his full-length book Goliath is based on the eponymous biblical figure, Gauld is not religious.[2]

Bibliography

  • First (with Simone Lia) (2001)
  • Guardians of the Kingdom (2001)
  • Second (with Simone Lia) (2002)
  • Three Very Small Comics vol. 1 (2002)
  • Both (with Simone Lia) (2003)
  • Move to the City (French) (2004)
  • Three Very Small Comics vol. 2 (2004)
  • Robots, Monsters etc. (2006)
  • Three Very Small Comics vol. 3 (2007)
  • The Hairy Monster: a guide (2006)
  • Hunter and Painter (2007)
  • The Wise Robot Will Answer Your Question Now (2008)
  • The Gigantic Robot (2009)
  • 12 Postcards (2010)
  • Goliath (2012)
  • You're All Just Jealous of My Jetpack (2013)
  • Endless Journey: a myriorama (2015)
  • Mooncop (2016)
  • Goliath (2017)
  • Baking With Kafka (2017)
  • The Snooty Bookshop: Fifty Literary Postcards (2018)
  • Twenty-Four Cartoons (2019)
  • Department of Mind-Blowing Theories (2020)
  • The Little Wooden Robot and the Log Princess (2021)
  • Revenge of the Librarians (2022)

References

  1. ^ Lees, Gavin (2011), "Interview: Tom Gauld", Graphic Eye, archived from the original on 12 May 2012
  2. ^ a b c d Campbell, Hayley (23 May 2012). "Small Human Ordinariness: An Interview With Tom Gauld | The Comics Journal".
  3. ^ a b c d e "Q & A with Tom Gauld". Casualoptimist.com. 24 August 2011.
  4. ^ "The Comics Reporter". Comicsreporter.com.
  5. ^ "Cabanon Press". 18 September 2009. Archived from the original on 18 September 2009.
  6. ^ "About". Archived from the original on 17 April 2015. Retrieved 6 September 2019.
  7. ^ Mouly, Françoise; Kaneko, Mina (13 October 2014). "Cover Story: Tom Gauld's "Fall Library"". Newyorker.com.
  8. ^ a b [1] [dead link‍]
  9. ^ "Tom Gauld". Comiccon.org. 3 December 2012. Retrieved 6 September 2019.