Today we’d like to introduce you to Matthew Sargent.
Matthew, please kick things off for us by telling us about yourself and your journey so far. I’ve been drawing for as long as I can remember. My family was always very supportive of my interest in art, and I was pursuing it pretty seriously by middle school. I learned and experimented with different mediums and styles through various art classes, but I always gravitated back to the clear, expressive linework of cartooning. That lead to studying illustration at the college level. Upon graduating, I found my freshly printed degree and portfolio of random school projects failing to open up any traditional career doors, so I started freelancing. Very poorly at first, but after almost a decade, I think I’m starting to figure it out. I’ve found my niche in comics, storyboards, and (for something weirdly specific) Dungeons & Dragons character portraits.
Can you give our readers some background on your art? Most of my work is related to storytelling. Sometimes directly, in the case of comics and storyboards; sometimes more tangentially in the case of character designs or spot illustrations. I’ve always liked stories, and illustration is a powerful tool in telling them. So much can be conveyed with just a few lines.
Stylistically, I gravitate towards clean, crisp lines and fairly flat, simple color (if there is color). I’m sure a lot of that comes from early influences from newspaper cartoonists, but deeper down, I think I just value clarity. And clarity in image often translates to clarity in message to me, so I strive for that in my artwork.
What would you recommend to an artist new to the city, or to art, in terms of meeting and connecting with other artists and creatives? Artist life can indeed be very lonely, but we’re fortunate enough to live in the age of the internet, which can be pretty good about providing ways to get people with similar interests together. Find a Facebook group with other creative people, attend a Meetup for cartoonists, start talking to other artists on Twitter. I once hid a bunch sticky note drawing with my website on them around my neighborhood. A couple local artists found them and contacted me through my site. Through them, I ended up meeting other local artists, and I recently contributed to a comics anthology one of them put together. Networks start small, but they can grow pretty quickly and in unexpected ways.
What’s the best way for someone to check out your work and provide support? My work can be found on www.skippinginfinity.com and all the social media sites it links to. People can support that work by checking out my books Wyverns & Watchtowers: Book of Coloring +1 and The Complete Bag Drop or by commissioning entirely new work.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.skippinginfinity.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/skippinginfinity
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/skippinginfinity
- Twitter: www.twitter.com/mbsargent
- Other: www.bagdropcomic.com
Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
