Artist: Steven Kraan
Project: Daily Drawing Anthology 2
Website: facebook.com/drawingdaily
Steven Kraan releases the ‘Drawing Daily Anthology Volume 2’ a collection of 23 short comic strips featuring characters as diverse as a disgruntled Jesus Christ, chirpy human blood cells, thieving cave-men and (my personal favourites) the inept astronauts.
The Anthology presents a small selection of the comics Steven draws and puts on-line for the world to see, every day (as well as some brand new ones exclusive to this book). It can be ordered from here – stevenkraan.bigcartel.com at the very reasonable price of €7.50.
Steven Kraan started ‘Drawing Daily’ in 12th April 2010 and since then his fan base has grown and grown so that Kraan has quickly become a cult hero of internet art and narrative illustration. I first encountered the world of Steven Kraan when I was embarking on my own ‘Drawing A Day’ on-line project. My project only lasted for one year, but Steven just keeps on going and going. Hopefully, as long as there are pens, pencils and the internet there will be Drawing Daily.
Anyway, back to Anthology 2, this incredibly digestible digest will hook you with it’s colourful artwork and Steven’s unique drawing style but what really impresses is the charm and genuine belly laugh inducing humour Kraan incorporates into each strip. Having just one day and one page to express each story commands real storytelling skills It is very hard to imagine having great comedy timing within a still image but Steven manages to achieve this brilliantly.
The other great thing about having this very handy, pocket sized printed version in my hands is seeing how brilliantly the artwork and colours translate to the printed form. It makes you realise the potential the vast amount of characters that populate the strange World of Kraan have away from pixels and computer screens.
Publishers, get this man a book deal now.
You can follow Stevens epic project here: facebook.com/drawingdaily and on twitter: @drawing_daily
Reviewed by David Litchfield
