2021: Seated Boxer — NathanJDiPerri.com

For anyone who doesn’t get the reference in this post’s title, please visit https://smarthistory.org/apollonius-boxer-at-rest/ for an art history lesson. Seated Boxer is one of my favorite sculptures. We see a man, experienced in his profession, resting briefly after a match before returning to the ring for another fight. He is battered and weary but he carries on to fight all the same even though he probably doesn’t want to anymore. Perhaps we we were all Seated Boxer in 2021.

And I think it’s safe to say we’re all sad to have lost Betty White today with just about two weeks until what would have been her 100th birthday. The Golden Girls premiered the year after I was born so Betty White was a big part of my childhood. Thank you for being a friend.

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Even though 2021 wasn’t the year we were hoping for, it’s the year we got. At least for me, part of my coping has been to focus on what I can control, like being attentive at home, personal fitness, and creativity. As far as projects go, it was a fairly simple year of magazine gag cartoons, animation, and Coffee Lovers’ Christmas.

2021 started off with a surprise cartoon publication in The Spectator. That kicked off a series of Frega DiPerri cartoon sales this year to several magazines including 2 Million Blossoms, Teachers of Vision, Phi Delta Kappan, and School Administrator. In February, we were honored to have a cartoon spotlighted in a newsletter and blog post by former New Yorker Cartoon Editor Bob Mankoff (a nice assist that lead to a sale for that cartoon too)!

This cartoon got a lot of attention on social media. Consequently, it has become our bestselling cartoon…

Meanwhile two of my favorite cartoons that we’ve done didn’t sell at all! They were both drawn in 2020 and we just couldn’t sell them (one editor emailed us to say the husband cartoon was “hilarious” … but had no interest in publishing it). I don’t get it. So I made mugs out of them. Kind of a sick twist on his and her mugs. His will be an everyday mug. It is for me!

Also in January, author Pete Lincoln’s short story memoir, Tales from the Cabin was published. The book features over thirty ink illustrations by yours truly. The book is wildly entertaining (and witty) so if you’re able to get your hands on a copy, you’re in for a treat.

In February 2019, I began work on a third Buddy and Romeo animated cartoon. After about a month of work, I stopped animating — for almost two years. I resumed work on that short in December 2020 but in March 2021, I put it aside again to work on a new one. Moving Piano! a Buddy and Romeo short jumped the line to become the third animated Buddy and Romeo short and premiered just this morning!

Our Coffee Lovers’ Christmas card, print, and product line had a great year. Julie and I were startled, in fact. And grateful! We introduced giclee prints this year and three new designs, one of which quickly became one of our best sellers. In addition to greeting card, postcard, print, ornament, mug, coasters, and pin sales (which was exciting enough) we were thrilled to have our first art show at a local coffee shop! Julie and I have several more designs in our sketchbook and we plan to introduce more of them in 2022.

Even though I can’t control whether any progress is made in this pandemic, at least I feel like I’m making progress with images. Julie and I sold more cartoons this year than we have in all previous years combined since we started out, Coffee Lovers’ Christmas had its best year, and (in this moment) I’m proud of the work I did this year in animation (getting better and looking forward to improving more next year and the year after that). I can’t control or predict what happens in 2022 but I’m getting back in the ring anyway.

What follows is the best media I encountered this year (not all of what is listed came out in 2021. Rather, this is when I first encountered them).

TV SHOW: Loki (Marvel Studios, 2021)

MOVIE: Rocky IV: Rocky Vs. Drago | The Ultimate Director’s Cut (MGM, 2021)*

BOOK: The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton (1942)

These are the songs that defined my year:

TVA First View - Natalie Holt

Bluey Theme - Bluey & Joff Bush

Quiet Town - Josh Rouse

yellow is the color of her eyes - Soccer Mommy

and

deja vu - Olivia Rodrigo

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