Corycatures-Caricatures by Cory

If you’ve ever wondered why caricatures feature really big heads and really tiny bodies, Cory Van Ieperen has a simple answer. “Because the focus is on the face,” he says. “It’s really a celebration of portraiture, but turned and made into something we can enjoy. The focus is on the face, and the little body is sort of a way of making a cartoon.”

Cory describes his work with Corycatures as just that, as “making a cartoon of a person,” but adds that the big heads help technically as well. “The head is big simply so you can get a likeness of somebody better when you work larger,” he says, “rather than draw a tiny little head and a tiny little body.” By going larger than life, Cory’s able to grasp the distinct features that define a person, blow them up and make the drawing instantly recognizable. And when it comes to assessing how to put their face on paper, Cory gives away his own trade secret. “When a person squints their eyes they can see dark and light shades easier,” he says, “so it helps to actually see more of an overall picture of a person’s face.”