Dave Kellett is the cartoonist of Drive and Sheldon, a co-director of the documentary Stripped, and a co-host of the podcast ComicLab. He has been nominated for a Hugo, various Eisners, various Harveys, and won a Reuben Award.
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Early years and education
Kellett is a southern California native. He graduated from the University of Notre Dame with a bachelor's degree in English and Spanish. While there, he produced the daily comic strip Four Food Groups of the Apocalypse for the student newspaper The Observer. He earned a master's degree from University of California, San Diego in Literature with his thesis, To draw in the crowd : the cartoon and the 'public sphere' of eighteenth-century England. He received the Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholarship, to attend the University of Kent at Canterbury in England (within the Centre for Cartooning and Caricature Studies). There, he earned a master's degree in History of cartoon art propaganda with his thesis, Philip Zec: Cartoonist in a Propaganda War.
Career
Dave Kellett is the creator behind the successful webcomics: Sheldon about a 10-year-old computer genius billionaire, and the sci-fi strip Drive. The author of twelve comic books, and the co-author of the Harvey-Award-nominated book How To Make Webcomics, Kellett regularly speaks around the country on the subject of cartooning in new media.
In 2014, Kellet released the comics documentary Stripped, produced with twice-Sundance-nominated cinematographer, Fred Schroeder. He has been a guest speaker at Savannah College of Art & Design, the Society of Illustrators, Ohio State’s triennial Festival of Cartoon Art, the Charles M. Schulz Museum, the San Francisco Cartoon Art Museum, Loyola Marymount University, South by Southwest (SXSW), San Diego Comic-Con, New York Comic Con, Emerald City Comic Con and more. His cartoons have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, The San Diego Union-Tribune, and dozens of others.
Kellett holds two master's degrees in the art and history of cartooning: First, at the University of California, San Diego; and then at the University of Kent, at its Centre for Cartoon and Caricature Studies, on a full academic scholarship from The Rotary Foundation. After working for Mattel Toys as the head writer and a senior toy designer for 8 years, Kellett pursued cartooning full-time in 2007. He started Sheldon in 1998 and Drive in 2009.
Awards & Honors
Hugos
2026: Nominated, Hugo Award, Best Professional Artist — Drive
Eisners
2020: Nominated, Eisner Award, Best Humor Publication — Anatomy of Authors
2012: Nominated, Eisner Award, Best Humor Publication — Coffee: It's What's for Dinner
2011: Nominated, Eisner Award, Best Humor Publication — Literature: Unsuccessfully Competing Against TV Since 1953
Reubens
2022: Nominated, Silver Reuben Award, Online Comics: Long Form — Drive
2015: Won, Silver Reuben Award, Online Comics: Short Form — Sheldon
2015: Nominated, Silver Reuben Award, Online Comics: Long Form — Drive
Harveys
2013: Nominated, Harvey Award, Best Online Comics Work — Sheldon
2009: Nominated, Harvey Award, Best Biographical, Historical, or Journalistic Presentation — How to Make Webcomics
CCI Film Fest
2014: Won, Comic-Con International Independent Film Festival, Best Documentary — Stripped
Additional Honors
1997: Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholar
1996: Finalist, Scripps Howard College Cartoonist Charles M. Schulz Award