HEROES A BIG DRAW
Youngsters’ love of art and comics grow at Brooklyn shop
Seven-year-old Connor Lee sat on an oversized beanbag chair in a corner of Loot comic shop in Brooklyn, laser-focused on the white notebook page in front of him.
Instructor Joseph Mann had just put up a picture of Spider-Ham, a porcine Marvel Comics character, on his tablet, and Lee began to draw with feverish excitement. His brother Max, 6, sprawled out on the floor nearby with his own little sketchbook, attacked the task with similar gusto, shaping Spider-Ham’s face and eyes with particular intensity. Moments later, both boys looked down at their original interpretations of the red and black pig-faced persona. Mann, 23, came close to inspect.
“I’m making lines for Spider-Pig,” Connor declared, filling in the figure’s body.
“That’s perfect,” Mann said encouragingly.
The Lee boys’ enthusiasm was for good reason. After more than six months of being closed because of COVID, the Carroll Gardens shop officially opened for in-person drawing classes on Thursday. Connor and Max were the first ones through the door.
“WWe’ve’ bbeen ddyingi to open up again to serve these families,” said Loot’s owner, 39year-old Joe Einhorn. As a father of three himself, he’s all too familiar with the struggles plaguing young families since everything shut down in March: from the frustrations of remote learning, to the lack of socialization, to the major increase in hours spent staring at a screen.
“When you have kids in the city who are already predisposed to live a lot of their lives online, and throw COVID into the mix… their escape is online, on these devices,” he said. “We’re trying to provide some type of normalcy and some type of structure for these families during this uncertain time.”
LLoot fifirst opened in July 2019 as a place where kids could come to read and borrow comics, make new friends, and even create th heir own artwork, some of whichh theh shoph actually sells. Proceeds go back to the pint-sized artists in the form of ‘loot’— currency that they can use within the shop to buy or borrow more comic books. For the most part, parents aren’t allowed.
“The idea is that we want to get the kids to create, to collaborate and ultimately to thhink about entrepreneurship,” EEinhorn said.
Even though the store offeered more than 100 days of
riginal, online instruction thhroughout the summer, Mann iss also happy to be back to teeaching in-person. As an artist annd comic enthusiast since he coould hold a pencil, he feels that there’s nothiing like being able to draw side-by-side withsomeone else.
“This whole establishment was created specifically so kkids can come here and have this safe haven and express themselves and not feel judged … all suummer we’ve bbeen ddoingi onlineli classes, and it’s been great, but it’s really hard to get that passion and that inner voice to come out when you’re on Zoom,” Mann said.
“I find a lot of times in these classes, they’re just so excited to draw with another person, they’re just so excited to share, to compare each other’s art, to talk about what they did, what we did.”
As Mann began to show Connorand Maxhow allfigures are made out of shapes — like triangles for eyes and circles for heads — they quickly forgot that their father, Michael Lee, 40, was still in the room.
The elder Lee, himself a fan of comics since childhood, shared his sons’ enthusiasm.
“To sign up for the classes is really to support the store, trying to instill the love of comics in them, but also to make sure that there’s still a comic book store here,” he said. “They feel like this is a place they can hang out.”
While the spontaneity of just dropping in and hanging out is suspended for the time being — as the shop has to limit group sizes and make sure sessions are timed, to enforce social distancing — Einhorn hopes the city’s youngest comic fans can come to meet and mingle freely again soon. In his opinion, one of the most unique things about Loot is how kids come from all parts of the city with different socioeconomic backgrounds bond over a shared passion.
“It’s so important to give kids options, and hopefully this can be one option,” he said. “We’re going to stay positive and hope things get better, and continue to expand our offerings.”