John Callahan is a very extraordinary person. This charismatic man became a caricaturist and animator not out of a call of the soul, but out of a woeful vital need: as a result of a car accident, he was confined to a wheelchair for life.
And out of hopelessness, he began to draw with crooked fingers at first uncertainly, and then more clearly and expressively, until one acquaintance told him that such masterpieces should not be hidden from people. And persuaded him to send his drawings to a local newspaper. Since then, the name of John Callahan became more and more famous, and then he completely became famous.
In 2018, a film was even released based on his autobiographical story “Do not worry, he will not go far, ” which made his name famous throughout the world.
Biography
John was born in 1951 in the American town of Dulles. Rather, in this city his newborn was handed over to the child’s house, so he did not know his parents. His family is the adoptive parents of David and Rosemary Callahana, who owned elevators in Portland. In this city, John grew up and graduated from high school. He had five adoptive brothers and sisters. From an early age, he was a fighter and a bully, and then there is a traumatic situation, as Callahan writes in his autobiography: at a primary school age he was seduced by a nun of a Catholic school.
As a teenager, he already tried alcohol and skipped school with might and main. Parents could not cope with him, and the young man was left to his own devices: parties, bars, night clubs. He worked at casual jobs during the day and drank at night - such was his youth.
In 1972, the same accident happened that made John disabled. He and his friend were driving out of the bar, and the car crashed into a pole. The blow was so strong that both suffered a concussion and severe injuries.
Since then, John could only hold small light objects in his hands, and most often it was a glass of alcohol. Then he remembered that as a child he drew well, and with both hands he began to draw the first scribbles on a sheet. Gradually, this occupation captured him, especially since the cartoons turned out to be better and better.
Artist career
True, mostly his drawings were in the style of black humor, but they were so original that they were printed by the local newspaper Willamette Week. And then the editor-in-chief himself came to his house to look at the author of such sharp cartoons. So Callahan became a staff member of the newspaper.
In the late nineties, more than two hundred editions published his drawings, and then he wrote his autobiography. And then something incredible happened: the rights to the adaptation of the biography of the disabled person were bought by Robin Williams himself! True, he did not have time to shoot the picture, but the director Gus van Saint did it.
In 2000, Nickelodeon’s channel management decided to make a cartoon based on Callahan’s drawings, and he became executive producer of the Pelswick animated series. It came out from 2000 to 2002. So gradually the artist’s work gained recognition throughout the country.
