Build your Own Labyrinth with Matt Madden
You can make creative breakthroughs thanks to the paradoxical power of using creative constraints. Comics, literature, and beyond…
Welcome to the Labyrinth of Constraints
Learn how self-imposed constraints can unleash your creativity and help you overcome hesitation and anxiety about making art.
When: For 6 weeks starting Saturday March 21, 1PM to 3PM Eastern / 10AM to 12PM Pacific
Where: Online via Zoom
Level: Beginner to Intermediate
Cost: $329
Materials: There are no specific materials required. This course is designed to use whatever you have at hand
20% discount to Saw Members enrolled in Comics Flow. Go to the SAW network to learn more…
What’s Involved:
Starting March 2026.
Week 1 - Saturday March 21, 2026 1-3pm Eastern / 10 am - 12 pm Pacific
Week 2 - Saturday March 28, 2026 1-3pm Eastern / 10 am - 12 pm Pacific
Week 3 - Saturday April 4, 2026 , 1-3pm Eastern / 10 am - 12 pm Pacific
Week 4 - Saturday April 11, 2026 1-3pm Eastern / 10 am - 12 pm Pacific
Week 5 - Saturday April 18, 2026 1-3pm Eastern / 10 am - 12 pm Pacific
Week 6 - Saturday April 25, 2026 1-3pm Eastern / 10 am - 12 pm Pacific
Calls will include live instruction, time to work on exercises and feedback on work.
Class videos, audios, chats and transcripts will be saved and archived for the duration of the course and 4 weeks afterwards.
There is a small Mighty Network component for this course. Sharing in the Mighty Network will be encouraged but most instructor feedback will be in the live classes.
Comics from Constraints
Do you think you could make a comic where each panel only shows an extreme close-up of a hand? Or where each panel zooms in closer to a single object? A comic you can read in more than one direction?
Many great works of art begin from wilfully perverse constraints or rules such as these, from Georges Perec's famous novel written without the letter 'e' to Al Jaffee's Mad Fold-ins.
"Build Your Own Labyrinth" is an online laboratory where you will surprise yourself by creating comics in response to seemingly impossible (or simply absurd) rules that will push your creativity into unexpected new areas. But don't be intimidated: working with constraints is playful, like using your crossword or jigsaw puzzle mind in the service of art. You will lose yourself in a lucid trance of "deep play" and when you emerge, you'll be amazed at the directions your engagement with constraints has taken you.
This course initially ran in a four-week version and it was so popular that the students DEMANDED it run for more time! So we've added an extra two weeks to work on an independent project with feedback and encouragement from Matt and your classmates.
By the end of the workshop you'll have a handful of experimental comics under your belt but, just as importantly, you'll have a firm grasp of a radical and all-encompassing approach to creativity that you will continue to explore in your future work.
Watch Matt's Friday Night Workshop here
And view his Substack about constraint-driven comics HERE.
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Matt Madden
Matt Madden is a cartoonist and translator who has also taught in art schools around the world. He known for his playful and inventive comics like the metafictional romp Ex Libris and 99 Ways to Tell a Story: Exercises in Style (Penguin), a comics adaptation of Raymond Queneau's Exercises in Style which led to his initiation into Oubapo, The Workshop for Potential Comics, in 2005.
In 2013 he was named Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Government. He has also done translations from the French and Spanish, including Aristophane's The Zabîme Sisters (First Second) and Edmond Baudoin’s Piero (New York Review Comics). He wrote two comics textbooks in collaboration with his wife, Jessica Abel, and the couple were series editors for The Best American Comics from Houghton-Mifflin Harcourt for six years.
From 2012 to 2016, the whole family lived in Angoulême, France, while he and Jessica did residencies at La Maison des Auteurs. They are currently living in Philadelphia, where Matt is working on new comics and offering his services as a comics mentor/coach when he’s not looking after his kids or playing guitar.