Just days after graduating college, former Liberty student Sar DuVall was hired for a massive project: illustrating a 220-page graphic novel.
The novel was written by Peter Tomasi, who is an established writer for DC and Marvel. It was Tomasi’s passion project, and DuVall was hired as the artist before he and his team pitched it to publishers. Aptly titled The Bridge, the novel explores what happened after the original engineer of the Brooklyn Bridge, John Augustus Roebling, passed away in 1869. His son was tasked with completing the monumental project, but more tragedy struck. The Bridge details how the Roeblings were able to rise against adversity and construct one of the greatest bridges the world had ever seen.
“The hardest part of making The Bridge was recreating the 19th century setting without a great deal of accurate or detailed reference. With the lack of photographs to reference, it was the largest scale project I’ve ever had to work on where I had to guess as to how certain things or people looked,” DuVall said.
The project was an immense undertaking which included thumbnailing the entire story, illustrating it in pencil, and lastly, in ink. It was successful nonetheless, and after a year and a half of tireless work, DuVall was finished. But it was only the beginning.
DuVall is always focusing on many artistic ventures and is currently working on two comic-related projects, both of which are collaborations with other writers. Not only that, the full-time freelance artist has exciting plans in the future, including writing and illustrating original graphic novels. DuVall’s inspiration comes from people, notably Liberty’s own art teacher Annie Cooper.
“I only felt like I could pursue art as a career thanks to my experience in AP Art, and with the encouragement of teachers like Mrs. Cooper, so I would love to pay it forward and talk about working in the comics and illustration industry,” DuVall said.