Zine Review: Aaron Read’s Doobie Woobie Sportsman Fabutan Thank You Maam

Today we’re taking a look at the multi-talented artist Aaron Read’s latest zine, Doobie Woobie Sportsman Fabutan Thank You Maam. Originally, the book was to consist of drawings accompanied by chanty adolescent style poems like “we wanna pitcher not a belly itcher,” but it ended up just being the artwork. We asked Aaron to tell us a bit about it:

“The drawings themselves are constant combinations of several different ideas that morph and change as I go. Usually if something makes me laugh or something is really pretty I’ll go for it and put it on the page. I think all of the drawings are a take on how sad and funny life is, and how funny it can be when something’s really sad but never really sad cos’ it’s funny. I feel like we are always surrounded by just garbage people and policies, and life is just trash. But at the same time there is beauty in ugliness and humour in tragedy. The coach drawing is about masculinity and aggression, and the set roles that develop in high school regarding gender and culture. The second drawing is about how drugs change who you are, whether immediately or slowly over time. And some of it is really gross, and some of it is really cool. So I guess it’s about the positive/negative sides of substances. The drawing of the rat is called “Even rats can feel the sun,” and it’s a sentence I have used before in a tape. I really like this idea because even this thing that we find disgusting – this opportunistic eater who eats our trash – loves to sit in the sun and just soak the rays.  And he’s got a garbage juice martini, which was really fun to draw. The Clown drawing is called “racist Clown” and it’s about how the clown wig is rooted in intense racism and the mocking of black culture.  I thought it would be interesting to think about clowns being creepy because they inherit this sort of residual hatred. The New balance shoes are shown because Neo Nazis re-appropriated that brand because of the two N’s. Similarly the number 88 is shown because it was also re-appropriated by Neo Nazis for it’s reference to HH in the alphabet.  The world peace hands giving the finger is a take on those posters in school that had a white hand and a person of colour’s hand shaking and uniting. 

As for the colours, shapes and forms, it’s all a mix of influences like The hairy Who, Leon Sadler, thrift store items, and industrial signage (like pumpkins with faces on them and beautifully painted hams at grocery stores). Beyond all this explanation they are drawings about the sadness and hilarity of plastic living in 2015. And they hopefully make people laugh!!”

COACH KILLED THE ART TEACHER AGAIN

Coach Killed the Art Teacher Again

DON'T DO DRUGS. DON'T EVEN DO HUGS

Don’t Do Drugs. Don’t Even Do Hugs. 

EVEN RATS CAN FEEL THE SUN

Even Rats Can Feel the Sun

RACIST CLOWN

Racist Clown

The zine is available at Lucky’s Comics and through http://shop.ddoogg.ca/
Or feel free to contact the artist at readaaroncharles@gmail.com