Some quotes from an old interview in Communication Arts with illustrator R. O. Blechman:
“I can’t take advertising so seriously – because it simply doesn’t mean that much. It’s fun, but it’s inconsequential. It’s just a way of earning a living – it’s not a means of earning my self-respect, which is more important to me than making a living.”
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“The key to success is having a healthy disrespect for what you are doing. This sounds peculiar, I know, but I mean you can’t be in awe of a job you are doing. If you are in awe of it, you can’t manipulate it, work with it. In art, if you’re self-conscious about your work, then it will come out stilted and unnatural – it won’t have the flow that all art must have.”
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“Drawing does not come easily to me. I can do a drawing fifty or sixty times until it comes out right. Even the signature. I can do that fifty times too. Usually I like part of one drawing, and part of another, and maybe a line from yet another, and then I glue them together. It’s kind of a massive transplant operation.”
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“Being imitated doesn’t really bother me, because the style and technique are nothing. It’s what I have to say that’s important. And if I say something, nobody else can say the same thing. A lot of it comes from within, and of course a lot of it is contrived. You see your work go naturally in a certain direction. You simply push it along its natural course. It’s a good style if it’s more natural than artificial. But your style is something you really can’t control. It just happens if you have a point of view about things, if you feel strongly about things, somehow your style, your drawing, your life, all reflect it. It can’t be done consciously.”