A. Owsley
A selective (and partially true) history.
A selective (and partially true) history.
1965: A. Owsley is born on a mountain top in Tennessee. However, his attempts to “cill a bar at the age of three” are thwarted by the Great Smoky Mountain National Park Service
1975: At the tender age of 10, A. Owsley’s first cartoon is published in the Electric Company Magazine. His name is misspelled.
1983: He enters the Art Institute of Atlanta to learn the arcane tools of the graphics trade. He graduates with honors and a brain brimming with knowledge of pica rules, em quads and photostat cameras. The MacIntosh computer is promptly invented, rendering it all obsolete.
1987: After viewing a six-hour documentary about Martin Luther, Owsley marches down Peachtree St. and nails his cartoons to the door of a Midtown art gallery. Many art patrons take notice but no one offers to name a religion after him.
Sept. 1990: He contributes spot illustrations and graphics to the Japanese language/comics magazine Mangajin. Japan responds by collapsing their economy.
Dec. 1990: He joins up with the rag-tag art collective 800 East The next seven years are spent in a haze of guerrilla art, freak shows, drag queens, improv, black light proms, one-night stands, raw meat, and way too many hand puppets.
April 1991: He curates the first Cartoon Show at 800 East which manages to lure all local cartoonists out of their subterranean hidey-holes to rub elbows with the freaks. Fortunately the matings do not produce offspring.
April 1992: The second Cartoon Show is lovingly debuted to the outside world. Unfortunately a scheduling conflict with the National “Riot for Rodney” festival prevents anyone from attending.
1993: The local free bi-weekly newspaper Highpoint offers a pity page to Owsley to fill with scribbles. He promptly calls up his most cynical cartooning buddies to submit stuff. For two years “The Funny Pages” dares to mock any public figure who crosses its path. Then Highpoint reaches low-ebb, and subsides leaving only the public to mock back.
February 1995: Owsley, along with fellow cartoonists Shira Levine, Alex Burns, Patty Leidy , Mark Buford, Walter Czachowski, Hart Chamberlin, and Skip Williamson decide to knock heads and produce a collective comics-only paper called DRAWL. Shira offers to act as publisher and take all the blame. Owsley offers to edit the mess around. Everyone else just asks for groupies.
March 1995: One month after unleashing the lumbering Golem of DRAWL to the world, Shira Levine flies off to Metropolis in search of Superman and Sarah Jessica Parker. She later sells her soul on eBay. Alex Burns picks up the pieces. Owsley keeps editing.
1996: While the rest of Atlanta is off to the Olympics, Owsley sits at home illustrating the book “Senryu, Haiku Reflections of the Times” for Mangajin and the Japanese Foreign Ministry. Mangajin implodes immediately after the book’s release and all copies are whisked off to the rising sun. He’s told that the book is big in Japan but no one offers to buy him sushi.
1997: The 800 East era ends in a tune of Smoke when all involved move on to enlightenment, Heaven, Hell, re-hab or Brooklyn. Owsley remains in Brokeland.
1997: Alex Burns runs off to Athens, GA in search of his heart and cheap housing. Owsley takes over DRAWL to finish its resolute journey to the grave.
1998: Jon Waterhouse foolishly asks Owsley to run a truncated edition of DRAWL in the back pages of Waterhouse’s Atlanta Sideshow magazine. Owsley plays him for a sap and proceeds to do just that.
1999: Mysterious organizations with cryptic names like Primal Screen and Wild Hare Studios offer Owsley money in exchange for helping draw little moving pictures of characters like Aquaman, Power Puff Girls, Super Friends, Dexter’s Laboratory, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force. Not having cable, he has no idea who these characters are. He only knows that the other people who draw them throw great parties. The party finally comes to an end when some idiot stands up and says, “I, George W. Bush do solemnly swear.....”
2000-2008: Dark, evil years of which we will no longer speak.
The Present: Shiny and new, with more to come.
1975: At the tender age of 10, A. Owsley’s first cartoon is published in the Electric Company Magazine. His name is misspelled.
1983: He enters the Art Institute of Atlanta to learn the arcane tools of the graphics trade. He graduates with honors and a brain brimming with knowledge of pica rules, em quads and photostat cameras. The MacIntosh computer is promptly invented, rendering it all obsolete.
1987: After viewing a six-hour documentary about Martin Luther, Owsley marches down Peachtree St. and nails his cartoons to the door of a Midtown art gallery. Many art patrons take notice but no one offers to name a religion after him.
Sept. 1990: He contributes spot illustrations and graphics to the Japanese language/comics magazine Mangajin. Japan responds by collapsing their economy.
Dec. 1990: He joins up with the rag-tag art collective 800 East The next seven years are spent in a haze of guerrilla art, freak shows, drag queens, improv, black light proms, one-night stands, raw meat, and way too many hand puppets.
April 1991: He curates the first Cartoon Show at 800 East which manages to lure all local cartoonists out of their subterranean hidey-holes to rub elbows with the freaks. Fortunately the matings do not produce offspring.
April 1992: The second Cartoon Show is lovingly debuted to the outside world. Unfortunately a scheduling conflict with the National “Riot for Rodney” festival prevents anyone from attending.
1993: The local free bi-weekly newspaper Highpoint offers a pity page to Owsley to fill with scribbles. He promptly calls up his most cynical cartooning buddies to submit stuff. For two years “The Funny Pages” dares to mock any public figure who crosses its path. Then Highpoint reaches low-ebb, and subsides leaving only the public to mock back.
February 1995: Owsley, along with fellow cartoonists Shira Levine, Alex Burns, Patty Leidy , Mark Buford, Walter Czachowski, Hart Chamberlin, and Skip Williamson decide to knock heads and produce a collective comics-only paper called DRAWL. Shira offers to act as publisher and take all the blame. Owsley offers to edit the mess around. Everyone else just asks for groupies.
March 1995: One month after unleashing the lumbering Golem of DRAWL to the world, Shira Levine flies off to Metropolis in search of Superman and Sarah Jessica Parker. She later sells her soul on eBay. Alex Burns picks up the pieces. Owsley keeps editing.
1996: While the rest of Atlanta is off to the Olympics, Owsley sits at home illustrating the book “Senryu, Haiku Reflections of the Times” for Mangajin and the Japanese Foreign Ministry. Mangajin implodes immediately after the book’s release and all copies are whisked off to the rising sun. He’s told that the book is big in Japan but no one offers to buy him sushi.
1997: The 800 East era ends in a tune of Smoke when all involved move on to enlightenment, Heaven, Hell, re-hab or Brooklyn. Owsley remains in Brokeland.
1997: Alex Burns runs off to Athens, GA in search of his heart and cheap housing. Owsley takes over DRAWL to finish its resolute journey to the grave.
1998: Jon Waterhouse foolishly asks Owsley to run a truncated edition of DRAWL in the back pages of Waterhouse’s Atlanta Sideshow magazine. Owsley plays him for a sap and proceeds to do just that.
1999: Mysterious organizations with cryptic names like Primal Screen and Wild Hare Studios offer Owsley money in exchange for helping draw little moving pictures of characters like Aquaman, Power Puff Girls, Super Friends, Dexter’s Laboratory, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force. Not having cable, he has no idea who these characters are. He only knows that the other people who draw them throw great parties. The party finally comes to an end when some idiot stands up and says, “I, George W. Bush do solemnly swear.....”
2000-2008: Dark, evil years of which we will no longer speak.
The Present: Shiny and new, with more to come.
