I’m good at keeping my posts on the tumblelog tagged, and the other day I was clicking around and thought, “Hey, you could make a pretty decent bio out of those tags…”

My name is Austin Kleon and I am a writer and a cartoonist and a web designer. I make these things called newspaper blackout poems, which some call poetry.

I grew up in a small town in southern Ohio, and still have family there. I think you are where you were, and so place, worldbuilding and maps are obsessions of mine.

Writing, storytelling, songwriting, cartooning, and drawing are all ways that I play so I can feel alive and happy.

I’m fascinated by how we see and process the world around us, which involves vision, memory, and neuroscience.

I believe that visual thinking is one of the best tools we humans have to solve problems and that we should, like the cavemen, practice drawing on the walls. Sometimes a picture is better than words, and so we have Isotype and wordless stories. Most of the time a picture is better with words, and so we have comics, information design and infographics.

I love pure black and white, but I’m trying to learn color.

For artists, I think that sometimes you don’t have to go to college, you should keep your day job, and write the book you want to read. I also wonder, what if we give it away?

Like most people, I like music and movies. Sometimes I talk politics and religion.

These are just a few of the folks who blow my mind: Lynda Barry, Kurt Vonnegut, Charles Schulz, Edward Tufte, Anders Nilsen, Kevin Huizenga, Tom Gauld, Saul Steinberg, Otto Soglow, Bill Callahan, and Joann Sfar.

I believe life is a story and often that story is just a collage or remix of who/what came before us.

I’m married to a wonderful woman and I live in Austin, Texas.

Forgive me if this is really f***ing cheesy.