Thursday, January 26, 2006

Don Mossi




Here's a player I know nothing about, except he pitched for the Cleveland Indians in the 50's and has a great face that begs to be caricatured - long thin and vertical, with big ears sticking way out and a mischievous look in his eyes. I had to reign in my first sketch, proportionally, as you can see here. I used to do all my initial workup drawings on tracing paper, then refine with another sheet over the first sketch, which would frequently be waaay off proportionally.
Personal political-incorrectness caveat: Being an unenlightened kid growing up in mid-60's suburbia, (ignorance is a thin excuse, I know) it never dawned on me until I was an adult how offensive the team name and logo for teams like the Redskins (YOW!) and the Indians was. I merely thought Chief Wahoo was a funny, vaguely 30's little cartoon face. Not that anyone's asking me, but the inherent racism behind the name of the team - while unfortunately the norm for 1914 - has no place in the 21st century, where we should be a whole hell of a lot more aware and evolved than to name a sports franchise after the ethnicity of the indigenous people of the continent. Such ignorant, insensitive, umm, let's say, corporate thinking that reduces an entire race and countless complex cultures to cartoonish negative stereotypes should be beneath us in this day and age. One would hope. Say, maybe they should go back to being called the Cleveland Spiders? Product tie-in with Marvel and Universal! Tobey McGuire could throw out the first pitch! Gotta dream the dream...

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