Illustrator Terry Colon Retires

D. D. Degg July 5, 2019 1 minute 0 comments

Reason has announced the retirement of Terry Colon.

Terry Colon rose to indie comics prominence in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was a prolific contributor to the pioneering web magazine Suck, where he shared a masthead with Reason Editor at Large Nick Gillespie and drew the illustration for the iconic tagline, “A fish, a barrel, and a smoking gun.” At Reason, he has illustrated the short stories of abuse by authorities in the Brickbats section since 2006. He has also drawn for Entertainment Weekly, Cracked, Time, and many other publications.

Since joining Reason, Colon has generated an avalanche of art, but his Guernica is almost certainly “What Part of Legal Immigration Don’t You Understand?”—an illustrated flowchart that details the maddening complexity of coming legally to the United States. The illustration appeared in our October 2008 issue; Colon also drew that month’s cover.

Q: You came to Reason from Suck. What was your role at that site?

A: I was pretty much just the house cartoonist/illustrator. I had the title “art director,” but there wasn’t much directing to do. The site look was established before I joined, and it didn’t much change. Though being art director meant I didn’t have to run sketches by anyone for approval. I just did the art and that was that. And when you’re cranking out four to 20 art spots daily, well, it saved time and aggravation, that’s for sure.

Q: Is it better or worse to be a cartoonist now than when you started?

A: On the one hand, computers have made it easier. On the other hand, the political correctness that has crept into the publishing industry certainly makes it more annoying and constraining than it was in the past. One reason I stayed with Reason to the end is they never made silly P.C. demands or requests.

Read the Reason tribute and interview with their retiring cartoonist.

above: Colon illustration to Suck’s Henry Boltinoff tribute