People like Michael DeForge

Michael DeForge (born 1987) is a Canadian comics artist and illustrator.

DeForge grew up in Ottawa and attended the University of Toronto, dropping out after two years. He lives and works in Toronto.

According to DeForge, he has "always been drawing cartoons" and learned to read and draw from his parents' comic strip collections such as Bloom County, Far Side, Peanuts and Calvin and Hobbes. He has described Peanuts as his all-time favorite cartoon strip. He read and tried to draw in the style of superhero comics until junior high and high school. He has described his early comics as "just these dinky revenge cartoons" in response to having been "picked on a lot growing up". In high school he realized that drawing could be a vocation and started drawing gig posters, initially in exchange for free entrance to concerts until he started charging for his work. He became interested in the work of Marc Bell (which he saw for first time in Exclaim!) and Matt Brinkman and has described Chester Brown's I Never Liked You as his "introduction to alternative comics". He also cites Chloe Lum and Yannick Desranleau's Seripop work as strongly affecting how he wanted to draw for some time. Artists that he cites as having been important during formative points in his life include Hideshi Hino, Jack Kirby, Derek Jarman, Eduardo Muñoz Bachs, Prince, Mary Blair, Saul Steinberg and Mark Newgarden.