Bored Panda reached out to Ostow to ask some questions about him and his creative process. Here's what the artist says about himself: "I live with my wife and two boys in New York City. I’m a stay-at-home dad, which means taking care of the kids comes before drawing, but I’m always looking for the jokes to be gained from my interactions with them and their world. I have no real formal artistic training outside of what I learned in architecture school, but in my younger years, I took a few figure drawing classes here and there and always kept sketchbooks. Now that I have a family there’s less time for that. Maybe as the kids get older I’ll dive back into taking classes and drawing from observation more regularly."
We were curious to know how Ostow's journey as a comic artist began. "When I was in elementary school I used to enjoy copying drawings out of the comics. My friends and I would also think up our own superheroes and spend all day drawing them. That fell by the wayside, though, as I got older and I never imagined I’d actually grow up to draw cartoons," the artist told us.
Ostow shared with us that he studied art history in college and went to grad school for architecture. "In grad school, I never developed a real knack for designing buildings, but I did develop a love of filling up sketchbooks. That and my class clownish nature is probably what brought me back to the world of comics and cartooning after a decade plus in the design world."
David Ostow's funny comics are all about real life. He gets his ideas from the silly and sometimes strange things that happen when you're just trying to get through the day in today's world. As Ostow says, "Some days it makes you want to cry but when you’re lucky it can lead to serious comedy. Also, having two young children, there is no shortage of jokes to be mined from the behavior and habits of these weird little lovable aliens." So, Ostow's comics aren't just jokes; they're like a funny mirror showing the chaos and joy in our everyday lives.
As we step into 2024, David Ostow has a big dream: he wants to make a children's book, but so far, it hasn't happened. He says, "I have a number of ideas and I’m hoping 2024 is the year I can finally make something happen. Eventually, I’d love to be writing and drawing books for adults too but that may be further down the line. Right now, I’m taking notes from the books I read to my kids. And of course, I’ll continue to draw single-panel cartoons. They’re too much fun to come up with and draw to ever stop."
