When I first met Steven Bowman, I wasn’t expecting the gravity of the moments that would follow. A few months ago, I stopped by a local art festival to support a friend and his wife who were selling photographs and earrings. I navigated my stroller holding my baby girl through packs of people in costume who were “preparing” for some sort of beer-drinking relay race and made my way toward the craft booths.
After about 20 minutes, I felt I’d done my duty to buy local and said my parting words to my friends. Before I turned away, they said, “Hey, you should check out this guy a few booths down. He has some really cool robot art.” How am I supposed to ignore quality local robot art? I made my way around a drunken Mario, passed a group of ladies who looked like something out of a Dr. Seuss story, and walked toward the bionic booth.
Through a clearing, I spotted a table of comic books and some large prints of heartbroken and downtrodden robots. Drawn in, I couldn’t pull my wallet out fast enough. I’d been looking for a great print for my area of our office building and I found it: a scotch-soaked metal man slumped over a bar, exactly what I need to see as a pick-me-up around 2 p.m.
“How much?” I asked, after praising the gentleman for his art.
“The prints are 10 bucks,” he responded. “Comics are four.”
I was shocked and went on about how crazy cheap that was.
“I try to keep my prints and anything I sell priced fairly so everyone has a chance to get it if they like what they see,” he replied.
Feeling like I was stealing from this guy, I gave him $15 and told him how great it would look framed and up on my wall. He gave me his card: “Steven Bowman – Astounding Tales Comics.” I slid the print in the undercarriage of my stroller and went about my way.
Driving away, I couldn’t shake what had just gone down. There was this guy standing all alone, selling his fantastic art for less than the price of a 3D movie ticket. Intrigued by Bowman, I was really curious as to how he ended up behind that booth on that day. I got in touch with him shortly thereafter to get a little insight on his story.
“Selling locally isn’t the way to make the biggest impact, but it’s still important to me,” said Bowman. “There’s something about seeing your book on the stands of your local comic shop. I guess I’m old fashioned though because I just like having a physical copy of the latest issue in my hands and not just a digital copy on your mobile device. I’m a dinosaur.”
Like many cartoonists and artists, Bowman grew up reading comics and wanting to draw them.
“I was never happy just drawing the characters I saw in the books,” said Bowman. “I wanted to create my own characters and tell their stories. I watched cartoons, but they didn’t give me the same inspiration as comics did.”
He wasn’t alone in finding comics as a source of inspiration.
“I met some of the guys from the Louisville Cartoonist Society a few years ago and I was amazed that there were so many other people in the area into doing the kinds of stories and art I loved doing,” said Bowman. “It’s very encouraging to be able to meet up and spend some time with people who share your interests. It inspires you to see what other people are working on and makes you want to pick up your pencil.”
It is no surprise to hear that Louisville is home to supportive communities for artists of all mediums. However, the question still looms: Is making a living off one’s art an attainable goal?
“It is my goal to be able to make a living doing art,” said Bowman. “Art is what I love and everybody wants to do something they love for a living. Getting noticed is definitely a mixture of talent, style, and luck. You’ve got to have your basics down and be solid in your fundamentals, but you also need that little bit of something unique that makes your work pop out. Even then, it’s still difficult to get your work in front of the right set of eyes. So you definitely need all three of those aspects. I’m still trying to figure out the right percentage of each.”
For anyone who may have stopped in a comic shop in the last couple decades, it is apparent just how important it is to have a unique or charming quality to a book. Thanks to many independent breakthroughs in the comic industry, iconic comic shops like The Great Escape now carry everything from works of Bob Kane to books drawn by the guy who makes your latte every morning. Although the wall of comics looks very intimidating when it’s refilled each Wednesday morning, it should be noted how impressive sales are for indie books. Sonya Linser, manager of The Great Escape, said that they get at least three local books submitted each year to their store. Those locally-made titles frequently sell out.
Local resources like The Great Escape encourage those who have a story to tell to put it on paper and get it on their shelves. For any artist who is willing to put their work out for public view, The Great Escape is glad to accept and help promote local talent – not requiring any specific paper, binding, or content. They will hang your promotional poster and even host a book signing if you are daring enough to meet your readers. According to Linser, The Great Escape’s customer base is at an all time high.
“Write it; draw it; get it out there!” encouraged Linser. “If you truly have the desire to start a book, or finish the one you have been reluctant to finish, do it!”
Furthermore, innovations in technology have led to a slew of advancements and dramatic changes in the comic book industry. Everything from comic creation to distribution has been revolutionized by advancements in software and hardware. That’s not to say it’s necessarily easy to release and distribute your own work, but there is less friction when it comes to getting work in front of the right set of eyes. Just as Dark Horse Comics and Image Comics broke away from the big corporate red tape in the ‘90s, blog sites like Tumblr have changed what’s possible when it comes to displaying your creations, gaining an audience, and breaking the shackles of codes and fees that typically come with any big name publisher. Although resources like Adobe Illustrator and Wacom tablets do come with their own “fees” of a sort, the many members of Louisville Cartoonist Society have leveraged these advances to support their own work independently.
“I think it’s great that there are so many avenues to get your ideas out in front of people,” said Bowman. “I guess the con is that, yes, it does make it harder to stand out and not get lost in the shuffle, but that’s what challenges you as an artist – trying to improve yourself and make people want to see more when they get a glimpse of your work. The pros are that, if you have a story to tell, you have ways to get it out there. You may not ever get noticed on a huge scale or get 100,000 hits on your site a day, but there is a satisfaction to telling your story and getting it out of your head.
As I reflect on the process, from idea conception to putting it to market, I think back to that street festival where I first met Bowman. I could have gone home and avoided having to fumble around in the crowd, protecting my baby from the crowd that engulfed us, but I stayed true to my goal and found something pretty incredible. I feel like it’s a nice parallel to how artists carefully cradle their own bundles of joy through obstacles and toward hopes of a greater experience. Had I taken that path of zero resistance, I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to meet our local talent and to further encourage creators to continue creating. The resources are out there. The outlets are waiting for your input. If you have a story to tell, know that there are people waiting each Wednesday morning to read each new chapter.
– Chris Hawkins @MFCH
Check out the websites below for more information on how you can get hooked up with the local comic community and help support local talent.
Louisville Cartoonist Society events calendar
Steven Bowman’s “Astounding Tales”
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