Bored Panda reached out to Rémi Lascault to find out more about what's going on in his mind. So let's start from the very beginning...
"I started drawing comics when I was a kid. But then I left this a bit aside because my work took a lot of time. Then, after a few years of working, I was a bit bored in my work, so at lunchtime, I started drawing little comic strips that I started to share on Instagram and I got good feedback, so I continued!" said the artist.
Drawing comics still doesn't pay the bills, so Lascault is a freelance art director in advertising.
"I’ve learnt a lot by doing advertising, like how to tell a story very fast or how to twist an idea to make it more unexpected. I’m also working on a movie project I have, that’s my next goal!"
We asked Lascault where he draws inspiration for his comics from: "I can be inspired by anything, a detail, an object I see when I take a walk, a conversation... Inspiration is a weird thing, it seems to come and go as it wishes! In terms of artists, I've been inspired a lot by Joan Cornellà or Gudim. But I'm also inspired by all the comic artists from whom I've read comics since I was a kid."
"My comics are mostly stupid. But they can have a deeper feeling to them sometimes too. But whatever the idea I get, I try to have an interesting and unexpected twist to it. It can seem absurd at first, but it always has a kind of logical feel to it," Lascault described his comics.
He said that the most challenging thing about creating comics is finding a good idea and the most rewarding is when "you show it and feel that it is a good one."
Lascault looks for ideas that will make people laugh rather than expressing his personal opinions and his weapon of choice is dark humor.
"Dark humor, and humor in general, is a way to be able to laugh about many things. We live and die in a world where we can't control many things, but we can at least laugh, and that's a good way to be happy!"
This kind of humor is not for everyone, but 60.4k Instagram followers show that it's more common than you'd expect.
"People react generally pretty well to my comics, so I'm really happy about that. And it keeps me going. Yes, sometimes I get some negative criticism. Most of the time it's trolls, or sometimes it's just a matter of not liking my idea or my style, but you can't please everyone. And very few times, some people take the joke personally and feel hurt, then I answer them and explain that I joke about anything if the joke seems good to me, and it has nothing to do with them. And in general, they get it. Also, it happens that I remove a comic when I'm not sure it's good, or if I see that people don't get it at all."
Lascault said that the proudest moment of his career so far was the publishing of his first comic book called "lorem ipsum dolor," which was his childhood dream come true.
"Antoine, a friend of mine, introduced my work to an independent publisher he was working with in France, « editions lapin », and they liked my work, so they contacted me and we started working on the book. I had to redraw every single one of my comic strips for the book as most of them were drawn really quickly, and I wanted them to look better. It was a bit complicated as it was out just before the lockdown where all bookstores were closed in France, but it still managed to sell a bit!"
Lascault said that the second book is on the way and there are some ideas for the future as well: "I have some other comic book ideas I’m planning to work on, and I plan to continue doing my comic strips as long as people enjoy them!"
Since the pandemic struck the world, many comic artists have taken that as inspiration and included common struggles in their content; however, Lascault isn't one of them.
"The pandemic didn't change a lot of things in my work. I did not really want to talk about it in my comics, as we are hearing about it everywhere, all the time. But it made me want to make people laugh even more. The darker the days, the more (dark) jokes you need!"
Lastly, here's a precious piece of advice from Lascault to upcoming artists: "Fail, and try again, until you succeed. Because that's how you learn and do the best things."
