When you're a kid, you just naturally want to draw and create. As you get older it becomes apparent that some people will retain the creative urge while others will not. The lucky ones who do are deemed "artists" and are prompty crammed into the artist shaped hole. The problem with this is that professional art has its own politics that are not unlike a high school popularity contest: you have to know the right people, show in the right galleries, and hate the right things. Each artist argues that not only do they know the difference between good and bad art, but they also know what should and shouldn't be considered art, period. After a while they're so busy "winning" at art that they've lost touch with that little kid inside that would sit and draw for hours just because it was fun.
To me, fun is what art is about, pure and simple. I do it because I love it.
And what kind of art are kids exposed to first? Cartoons, of course. I live for cartoons, and I believe cartooning is a far more complex and intriguing art form than most people think. The style and sense of humor it requires is something that you can't be taught in art schools. One of my favorite points about cartooning comes from Brad Bird, dircetor of The Incredibles. He says that animation in filmmaking is not a genre, but rather another way to make any kind of film. I feel that way about cartoons of all types; they can be funny, serious, happy, gross, angry, sexy, disturbing, or anything else. They are a way to tell a story, to make you laugh and to make you think, and I believe they take more of that deep down inner something to create.
