Do you remember the kids who doodled in the back of the classroom in high school--the ones who filled the margins of their history notes with shockingly accurate, if crude, depictions of the way the teacher wore her hair or spit when she talked? Well, those kids got into Princeton, too.
Drawing cartoons has been a passion of Princetonians for generations, perhaps because they provide an outlet for commentary through the fancy of art. Many prominent cartoonists, including Whitney Darrow '03, Henry Martin '48, Mike Witte '66, Henry Payne '84, and Jim Lee '86, drew while on campus, then made art into a career, gracing the pages of newspapers and magazines like the New Yorker. Currently, cartooning (and all of the graphic arts) are thriving more than ever at Princeton. Three artists whose work is widely recognized among undergraduates as some of the funniest, most thought-provoking, and acerbic are Chris Brooks '97, David Orr '96, and Lily Prillinger '97.
Chris Brooks, who draws for the Nassau Weekly, says his sharp, stylized illustrations, which accompany many of the paper's articles, "bring vitality to something that people often think is dry." He considers illustrating "a service, a job," but tries to make his drawings--which hover somewhere between comic-book art and "Japanimation"--"something I'd be proud of on their own." Tailoring his art to the format of a newspaper allows him to explore "the contrast between discipline and play, how much I can get away with according to the given rules."

"The Princeton Administration", by Chris Brooks '97

Orr draws primarily for The Daily Princetonian, where he also worked as graphics editor. His cartoons, with their affable-looking characters and witty one-liners, lend an air of whimsy to often prickly subjects, providing an insightful yet mild-mannered look at campus controversies and world politics alike. Orr has broached topics from the ban on campus smoking to Clinton's foreign policy. The cartoonist says he is "a big fan of civility" and avoids extremism. Instead, Orr aims to make a statement that is "thought-provoking whether from the viewpoint of the left or the right."

A smoker's dilemma, by David Orr '96

However, the cartoons drawn by Prillinger for the Nassau Weekly are nothing if not extreme, giving readers a joyfully macabre look at the campus experience. Each week, her black humor shows us a Princeton in which we follow an undergraduate-turned-vampire who manifests his frustration by sucking the blood of frat boys and bimbos. Familiar student haunts like the WaWa Market and Prospect Avenue are the backdrops for her antihero's crimes. "In some ways cartooning is a cathartic experience for me," Prillinger explains. "When I see things going on at Princeton that disturb me, I deal with it best by poking fun." Prillinger has been drawing cartoons since grade school, when she first discovered they gave her "the weird power to make someone laugh."
Campus undead, by Lily Prillinger '97

Though Orr has been sending clippings of his cartoons along with his applications to law school, Brooks and Prillinger have another year to doodle in the back of the classroom before making plans for the future. But all three suspect they'll remain involved with art in some capacity throughout their lives--the ink's not dry yet on that issue.
Liz Vederman is an associate editor of the Nassau Weekly.