Grendel

I was thinking about posting artwork from people who were encouraged or influenced by Seth. So, looking for something that people have sent me, I started going through letters in my file, and found this that someone sent. It is a drawing that Seth did quite a long time ago, either during the era when he was working on Happydale, or maybe afterwards. The person who sent it to me called it Grendel, though I don't know the story. I remember this drawing, but Seth sold it a long time ago; I vaguely remember sending it to someone.
It has that kind of manic energy and delight in details that his Happydale work has. It also shows how much better his drawing became later. Here his people are not quite all the same size; some that should be larger because of perspective are smaller, and vice versa. And the perspective doesn't seem quite true.
The drawing is an absolute pleasure to look at, nevertheless. It is a nonserious subject, a drawing that is pure fun. The guy on the table is clearly the center of attention, and he catches our eye first, but the reactions of all the dinner guests are what is interesting. Even this early in his career, his drawings are filled with details that he did for the sheer pleasure of them; if I could find a better scan of this you could see them better. He also loved to draw pictures that were mysteries. A lot of his early drawings were ones where you would say, what is going on here anyway?