Notebook Drawings 2012-2014

In 2011, after fifteen years of drawing exclusively for work, Jim Rugg started drawing for fun again. He picked up a ballpoint pen—the same kind he doodled with in history class—and filled notebooks with whatever came out: superheroes, movie monsters, pro wrestlers, pinups, cars, cartoons, and the detritus of a life spent consuming pop culture at full throttle. The result was a creative awakening that produced two of the most charming art books in modern comics.

Notebook Drawings 2012-2014 is the second volume in Rugg’s series of ballpoint pen sketch collections, published by AdHouse Books in a limited edition of just 300 copies. Designed to look and feel like an actual spiral notebook (complete with a heavier stock cover and debossed title logo), the book collects 40 full-color pages of drawings that range from fan art to movie homages to pinups to 3D experiments—all rendered in the loose, seemingly effortless ballpoint pen style that has become one of Rugg’s trademarks.

Juxtapoz described the work as “reminiscent of irreverent high school doodling, only ten times more awesome and sophisticated,” and that’s exactly right. But there’s more going on here than nostalgia. Rugg’s notebook drawings capture something essential about the creative process: the freedom that comes from making art with no audience, no deadline, and no purpose other than the joy of making marks on paper. “I draw in notebooks the same way I did in school during class,” Rugg writes. “Back then I drew out of boredom, and maybe my suburban existence inspired this return.”

The second volume expands on the first with several unexpected experiments—including drawings composed in 3D, using separate red and blue pen lines to create stereoscopic depth that Copacetic Comics warned “only Jim Rugg could pull off.” It’s a glimpse into the playful, endlessly curious mind of an artist who treats every blank page as an opportunity to try something he hasn’t tried before.

The first volume, Notebook Drawings 2011-2012 (also limited to 300 copies), served as the catalog for Rugg’s “Notebook Nerd” art exhibition at L.A.’s iam8bit gallery in 2012. Both volumes are now out of print and highly collectible.

Perfect for fans of sketchbook peeks, ballpoint pen artistry, and anyone who’s ever filled a notebook margin with doodles and wondered what might happen if they never stopped.