The artist, who goes by Lark, was mesmerized by how she felt more connected to birds chirping, rather than the information her boss was blabbing about using very corporate phrases that made little to no sense. Lark shared: “‘That bird’, I thought, ‘is so much wiser than us to never set foot in a place like this and chain itself to our stupid lifestyle…’ But, what if it wasn’t so wise? What could possibly make a bird, born wild and free, give up on its freedom and start working the way we do? What is it that really separates us?” This is the question that started a comic series. Lark imagined the birds to be working in a corporate job at Catch.co, run by a cat CEO called Mr. Catch. This absurd premise turned into hilarious scenarios that we, as people, can also relate to. So, without further ado, let’s hop into this rather bizarre yet familiar world of working birds. More info: Instagram | catarse.me | TikTok First of all, the artist shared what challenges she faces regarding translating her own work experiences into comic form. “One of my biggest challenges in making not only comics, but comic strips, is the format and size of the media I have to work within. Comic strips are usually 2-6 panels long, and in my case, they have to fit a single Instagram post. Sometimes I want to convey complex ideas with the story, and I have to manage to, somehow, fit them into this limited space. With many years of practice, I’ve learned to exercise economy when writing: what’s the smallest amount of drawing and text I can do to completely express this exact message? That’s what I have to do. Many times, you have to leave some of this message between the lines and trust the readers will be able to read it. As an author, it is your responsibility to communicate what you want, but it’s very satisfying and rewarding when readers meet you halfway and get the subtext even if it’s not obvious!” explained Lark. “Probably one of my favorites was our end-of-the-year gift from the company. Where I live, it’s a custom for companies to give all employees a gift for the holidays. It’s often a box full of nice food and treats, and sometimes it comes with a really nice present, like speakers or something more expensive. There was this year when the company I used to work at gave everyone just a pair of socks, as a joke because socks are universally known to be a bad gift (the true joke was that they really thought they were being “disruptive” and employees would actually like it). Of course, everyone hated it and complained about it with their leaders. We spent the holidays watching people from other companies posting all the nice gifts they got, and we were stuck with a cheap pair of socks. But the unbelievable part of it was that next year, people had great expectations that, to compensate for last year, they’d get a nice gift for a change and they all got….. socks AGAIN! At that time, I wasn’t working there anymore, but a former coworker told me about it and I couldn’t help but make a comic implying that every year, Mr. Catch (the bad-guy-boss cat that runs the office in my comics) would steal his human’s socks to give as gifts for the employee-birds!” “As I said before, the room each social media offers to share my art has a huge impact on the shape and size I give each comic strip. But my favorite thing about it is the comments section. I always read all the comments, it gives me an idea about how the public is receiving the story, if they understand the plot and the punchline, if they like or dislike each character, and what they expect to happen. Part of building the story is giving people what they want, but to be an author is to find the delicate balance between attending the public’s demand and twisting their expectations in order to surprise them.” Also, that I always add subtle details to many scenes and characters, I hope you enjoy finding them!” Follow Bored Panda on Google News! Follow us on Flipboard.com/@boredpanda! Please use high-res photos without watermarks Ooops! Your image is too large, maximum file size is 8 MB.
