My Feature on the Blackwing Makers Series
My fave pencil company is bigging me up this week!
I spent the first twenty years of my career operating under a complete delusion. I firmly believed a pencil is just a piece of wood with some dirt shoved inside it.
“It is just graphite,” I tell my peers, violently snapping the lead off a cheap yellow dollar-store HB for the fourth time in a row. “You guys are in an overpriced cult.”
Cartoonists are notoriously stubborn. We find a tool that barely works, we adapt to its flaws, and we aggressively reject any suggestion that our lives could be easier. I was a strictly an ink and pen guy (Digital tablet for finishing, colouring & other stuff). I refused to entertain the idea of a luxury pencil.
Then, out of sheer exhaustion, (And seeing that my mate Amy Kurzweil made an entire graphic novel using Blackwing pencils) I finally bought a box of Blackwing 602s…
If you enjoy my work and would like to support, please take out a premium subscription (just $1 per week)
The moment the graphite hits Bristol, the delusion shatters. The line is dark. It holds a perfect point. The weird rectangular eraser actually works instead of just smearing grey grease across the page. I realise I’ve been actively depriving myself of this joy for two decades out of pure, unadulterated stubbornness. I am now fully indoctrinated into the cult. I get it.
Because I will no longer shut up about these tools, the team at Blackwing recently reached out. They asked to feature me in their Makers Series. (WHAT!?)
We put together an interview about my entire chaotic workflow. We discuss the absolute necessity of the “human wobble” in analogue art. We talk about how to survive in a frictionless digital world by actively choosing to slow down.
It is a great, highly specific conversation about the physical mechanics of making things. Read the Blackwing Makers Series Feature: Jason Chatfield
Now, if you will excuse me, I need to go sharpen a ludicrously expensive* bit of wood.
‘til next time!
Your pal,
*Worth it.
PS. An artist I really like called Brian Biggs just made a great post (with a different take) about pencils here:
and here’s one I did a while back about Pencils:
PPS. Look, if this actually did something for your brain (or at least distracted you from the creeping dread of your own inbox for six minutes), please consider restacking this and sharing it with your people. It’s the only way the word spreads.
This is now on my bucket list-an interview with a pencil manufacturer. I think you have Blackwing locked up. I’ll settle for Musgrave.
Have you considered doing some “Choose the struggle” merch? The last thing I need is another t-shirt, but I might just spring for one to wear to class.