Make a Comic

This four-panel strip follows a figure attempting to create a comic strip, moving from initial inspiration through drawing, gathering models, and finally presenting the finished work. The progression demonstrates the mechanics of comic production itself—a meta-commentary on the newspaper strips that were becoming America's dominant popular art form. By the mid-1920s, daily and Sunday comics had established the visual vocabulary still in use: sequential panels advancing narrative, speech balloons containing dialogue, exaggerated anatomy and gesture for comedic effect. Comic strips appeared in nearly every major newspaper, reaching millions of readers and establishing both the format and the recurring characters—from Felix the Cat to Gasoline Alley—that would directly inspire the comic books emerging in the following decade.