Ward Sutton is an illustrator and cartoonist based in Fort Collins, Colorado. His bright, bold, comic book-influenced illustrations, cartoons and humor pieces have appeared in numerous publications, and he contributes regular graphic political commentary to the Boston Globe and other newspapers and magazines. Sutton also moonlights as Stan Kelly, the editorial cartoonist for The Onion, “a fake cartoonist for the fake newspaper,” as he describes it. A collection of Sutton's work as Kelly has just been published. Kelly: The Cartoonist America Turns To received a glowing write-up in The New Yorker, and should be on anyone's holiday gift list who enjoys humor and  cartooning.

MY LIFE:
After roughly 20 years living in New York City (followed by a two-year adventure living in Costa Rica), my family and I recently moved to Fort Collins, Colorado.

I grew up mainly in Minnesota and attended St. Olaf College. While there I went on a month-long Art-In-Manhattan program that would plant the seeds for my future career and life in NYC.

After graduating in 1989, I began working as a freelance illustrator and cartoonist. In the early years, I would supplement my income with odd jobs such as selling balloons, pasting up movie advertisements, and working at a record store.

I cut my teeth working for alternative weekly newspapers in Minneapolis and Seattle, but I craved the chance to move to New York to break into the magazine world. In 1995, I made the plunge and arrived in town with a handful of contacts and recommendations, the biggest name being … Bob Newman at Entertainment Weekly!

I’ll never forget visiting you (Bob) at the EW offices. Art Chantry, the design guru of the Northwest, had given me your name, so we instantly had a bond over Seattle and its music publication, The Rocket. After you looked through my portfolio, you asked if I did likeness drawings—caricatures—because that was something you really looked for at EW. I said, “Yeah, sure!” Then you noted that it was the end of the day and the art department had all gone home. Could I bring my portfolio back the next day? “Yeah, sure!”

So I went home and immediately started drawing caricatures of celebrities—Oprah, Jerry Seinfeld, David Letterman. I brought the portfolio back to the EW offices the next day full of the new drawings. A week later I got my first assignment. I’ll never forget seeing the issue of EW with that first illustration of mine on the newsstand at Penn Station just before I boarded a train for Thanksgiving. It may have just been a small spot illustration, but it was my first big break in the magazine world and I was thrilled! After just a couple months I already had a lot to be thankful for.

MY WORKSPACE:
The glorious thing about working freelance is that I can work anywhere—knock-on-wood. I’ve worked crammed-in under a homemade loft bed in a tiny NYC apartment. I’ve worked in a 150-year-old farmhouse in North Dakota. I’ve worked in restaurants, hotels and literally on the side of the road while traveling. In Costa Rica, I worked overlooking the beach, poolside. Now that I’ve moved to Fort Collins, Colorado, I hope to create for myself a “real” work studio—finally, after all these years.

HOW I MAKE MY ILLUSTRATIONS:
I work digitally, using a Wacom Tablet and Photoshop. On the rare occasions when I do draw analog, I find myself reaching reflexively for “Control-Z” when I make a mistake, and then cursing when I realize I’m going to have to break out the White-Out.

MY FIRST BIG BREAK:
The opportunity to create the artwork for John Leguizamo’s Broadway Show Freak came through amazing serendipity: I cold-called an art director at a magazine, met with him, and he told me, “You should meet this guy I just met on the subway…” That led to a meeting with then-up-and-coming theater designers Spot Design. I brought in a stack of the silk-screened rock posters I’d been creating (for bands like Pearl Jam, Pavement and Beck) and I got the job.

By early 1998, the day-glow posters for Freak were all over town.

MY INFLUENCES:
I’m a junkie for visuals and I also follow the world of comedy and satire. I’m inspired by the different realms of the comic universe (i.e. comic books, comic strips, gag cartoons, animation, etc.)— both the classics and new stuff by younger artists.

MY MOST ADMIRED CREATIVE PERSON:
I guess one person who comes to mind at the moment is Louis CK. His work is honest and authentic, he tries new things and takes risks, he doesn’t rest on his laurels—and he’s hilarious.

MY INSPIRATION:
I follow political cartoonists (Tom Tomorrow, Ruben Bolling, Jen Sorenson, Matt Bors, Matt Weurker, and more); browse newsstands to see what illustrators are drawing and where; web-surf (New York Times, Politico, New York magazine/Vulture, Huffpost, The Onion, The Nib, Twitter), and follow the cartoons and covers of The New Yorker.

THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE OF WORKING ALONE:
I used to wish I could be part of a “movement” or a “collective.” But then I read Susan Cain’s Quiet: The Power Of Introverts In A World That Won’t Stop Talking.

The book made me realize that I was an introvert, that I do my best when I work alone, and that I actually love it that way. I guess the biggest challenge is finding the line between work and personal life, because no one tells me the workday is done and it’s time to go home, because I already am at home.

A MEMORABLE ASSIGNMENT FROM THE PAST YEAR:
I love working with GQ, and this spring they gave me the chance to visually imagine a Trump White House. I have to admit it was a lot more fun when the notion seemed far-fetched; now it’s just terrifying.

I also create editorial cartoons for The Boston Globe—a favorite from this year was “The Clintstones.”

DREAM ASSIGNMENT:
When I moved to NYC in 1995, I had two all-time goals: to illustrate the Record Review page for Rolling Stone (which I’ve had the honor to do a number of times) and to create a cover for The New Yorker. I’ve had luck selling cartoons to The New Yorker, but never a cover so far.

SOME OF MY FAVORITE ART DIRECTORS:
Sam Viviano and Ryan Flanders at Mad magazine are a lot of fun to work with. After all these years, Mad has really defined what it does, and they know what they want. It’s different from news or lifestyle magazines; the emphasis is on humor and they encourage me to add gags to the pieces I’m illustrating.

One special project with them was to create “April Fools” covers for DC Comic Books. I especially enjoyed doing a Teen Titans cover imagining the superheroes acting like actual teens.

SOME OF MY FAVORITE ILLUSTRATORS:
Zohar Lazar should be given some kind of superstar award.

Jillian Tamaki is fantastic. I love her NYC subway piece.

Tomer and Asaf Hanufa … talk about a power duo.

Yuko Shimizu is consistently dazzling.

Steve Brodner’s caricatures and political commentary are golden.

I also really like cartoonists Kate Beaton (she has a really fresh voice and I love her drawing, too) and Raina Telgemeier (her books are a hit with both my kids and me).

OTHER WORK:
Some advice I got from famed designer Tibor Kalman shortly before he died was “Stay on the street.” I try to remember that and take on projects that may not pay much (or at all) but that hopefully contribute to some kind of good in the world. A few examples:

I collaborated with Stefan Sagmeister to create an anti-Trump poster.

I’ve created artwork for my kids’ schools.

I’ve created posters in support of lower budget theater projects.

CREATING CARTOONIST STAN KELLY FOR THE ONION:
Scott Dikkers is one of the founders of the satirical newspaper, The Onion, and in 2004 he wrote me a letter because he liked my political cartoons. We struck up a friendship and eventually I asked him, “Why isn’t there an editorial cartoon in The Onion?”

He said he’d always wanted one, but that he couldn’t figure out how to parody a cartoon. I took that as a challenge and created Stan Kelly, a fake cartoonist for the fake newspaper. Kelly is a crank, a hack and a crackpot; his ideas are wrong, and his work is full of the tired tropes of editorial cartooning (see his ubiquitous weeping Statue of Liberty).

What started out as an experiment has now lasted over a decade. My name never appears on this work, because they are Kelly’s cartoons. It has been very liberating for me to create cartoons under the guise of someone else—I feel a real freedom to create comedy in a whole new way. Kelly draws differently than I do—always in black and white with stylized characters and plenty of cross-hatching. There are times I find myself slipping into drawing a Kelly cartoon in my own style and I have to go back and sort of dumb it down.

2016 is the 10th anniversary of my creating Kelly, although in the fictional Kelly universe, it is his 50th anniversary. To celebrate his half century of cartooning, a new book has just come out: Kelly: The Cartoonist America Turns To (TM).

HOW I STAY CURRENT:
I’m always looking for new opportunities and ways to use my artwork and cartooning. A couple examples:

In the late 90s, I began exploring the world of animation. The high point came when I got the chance to work with J.J. Sedelmaier on the opening segment of the cult-hit Comedy Central show Strangers With Candy.

From 2009 - 2013, I created illustrated book reviews for The Barnes & Noble Review.

HOW I PROMOTE MYSELF:
I rely on social media and staying in touch with art directors through email or in person when possible. I love going to the SPD gala and the American Illustration party. I do enter contests but only with projects I feel really stand out. The cost of all these things can add up, so one has to be selective.

ADVICE FOR SOMEONE STARTING OUT:
My advice is to just keep creating and getting your work out there. Don’t sit back and admire what you’ve done for too long. Keep working. If you don’t have any paying projects, think up something cool and just do it. Having awesome work you’ve created is the calling card no art director can refuse. It doesn’t matter where it appeared or didn’t appear—just make stuff you feel great about.

See more Ward Sutton illustrations, new work, and updates:
Ward Sutton website
Facebook
Twitter: @WardSutton
“Stan Kelly” on Facebook
“Stan Kelly” on Twitter” @KartoonistKelly