Michael Jantze is an American cartoonist and illustrator, best known as the author of the syndicated newspaper comic strip ''The Norm'' . Born in Middletown,

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

, he grew up in

Normal, Illinois Normal is a town in McLean County, Illinois, United States. As of the 2020 census, the town's population was 52,736. Normal is the smaller of two principal municipalities of the Bloomington–Normal metropolitan area, and Illinois' seventh most ...

. He now lives in

Seattle, Washington. Seattle ( ) is a port, seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the county seat, seat of King County, Washington, King County, Washington (state), Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in bo ...

He attended

Goshen College Goshen College is a Private college, private Mennonite Church USA, Mennonite Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Goshen, Indiana. It was founded in 1894 as the Elkhart Institute of Science, Industry and the Arts, ...

and

California State University, Northridge California State University, Northridge (CSUN or Cal State Northridge) is a public university in the Northridge neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. With a total enrollment of 38,551 students (as of Fall 2021), it has the second largest un ...

, then worked as an art director, first in corporations and newspaper newsrooms and then at

ILM Ilm or ILM may refer to: Acronyms * Identity Lifecycle Manager, a Microsoft Server Product * ''I Love Money,'' a TV show on VH1 * Independent Loading Mechanism, a mounting system for CPU sockets * Industrial Light & Magic, an American motion pic ...

, while developing his strip.Jantze Studios - Being Normal
/ref> He taught animation and sequential art at the

Savannah College of Art and Design Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) is a private nonprofit art school with locations in Savannah, Georgia; Atlanta, Georgia; and Lacoste, France. Founded in 1978 to provide degrees in programs not yet offered in the southeast of the Unit ...

from 2009 to 2013. In addition to the comic strip, Jantze owned Jantze Studios, LLC, a studio focusing on character-based humorous entertainment for print and animation; clients included Joe Murray Studios, Fox Sports, LXR Resorts and Hotels, Hearst Media, and YouTube. Jantze Studios closed in 2016 when Michael went to Amazon Publishing.

References

External links

Jantze web siteMichael Jantze's archived comic strip The Norm2011 Talltale Radio Interview2013 Talltale Radio Interview
American comic strip cartoonists 1962 births Living people People from Middletown, Orange County, New York People from Normal, Illinois People from Ross, California {{comic-strip-creator-stub