Thrown to the Wolves

Year 3, semester 2: We're past all of our first projects now and I've already been doing a lot more media exploration than last semester. With mixed results, to be sure, but the results are interesting.

Conceptual illustration for a found article, rendered in scratchboard and digital. Tell me that new NDAA bill doesn't scare the shit out of you just a little bit...

Character study for Figure Illustration, painted in acrylics then tweaked ( a lot) digitally. Features a character from a short story I wrote last year called Idle Words. Shoulda pushed the gritty on this one...

Character study based on the obituary of Helen (Bobbie Nudie) Cohn. Super interesting lady who, along with her husband, created the memorably sparkly and garish outfits for Roy Rogers, Hank Williams and Elvis Presley. Rendered in ink, coloured digitally.

Without Further Ado... MADAM BAUHAUS!

Commentary forthcoming. For now, enjoy my first completed comic story in a few years, my first full color adventure! And have a happy new year!

Ruin Cathedral

I've talked a lot about the challenges of the Storytelling and Environments class so I won't  anymore, just to reiterate that the more challenging the class, the more promising the results tend to be. Here is the 14 week project which required us to draw the same setting at various points of the day. A bit of an homage to Monet's Rouen Cathedral studies, I call them my Ruin Cathedral Studies. These are digital.

These last two were created by studying the work of masters Franklin Carmichael (water color) and Egon Schiele (naturally) - (Acrylic).

"At Least They Didn't Steal Our Dinosaur Drawings!"

That's what a seven year old Nick said when he and the family returned home to find that they had been burgled. Jewelry? Replaceable! The VCR? We could get by. But the dinosaur drawings? Thankfully those burglars knew nothing of fine art.

The above pic was my last assignment for Information Illustration, a great class that was fun and challenging, especially when it came to organizing the vast amounts of info on each poster. I freaking loved drawing dinosaurs again, reminded me of my love of drawing them as a kid. Tried to forego some of the outer lines on the dinosaurs, (a la Charlie Harper) letting the colors, values and patterns define the shapes. It was partly successful and I'll be trying more of that soon.

I'm sure I've mentioned this before but my Storytelling and Environments class was pretty brutal. Backgrounds are something I haver definitely skimped on over the years but this class forced me to work on landscapes and interiors, developing my skills with composition and color and in the end, I made some huge strides. This was my last project, a very moody peek into the world of two 70s hippies who fuck with black magic and unleash some unholy horror that takes shelter in the basement. I can;t help but imagine Shaggy and Scooby getting in way over their heads with some real serious evil.

This whole story was based on photo ref of my own apartment building so I can't help but feel the evil demon fetus watching me as I wait for my laundry to finish up.

Coming very soon: more environments and the long awaited debut of Madam Bauhaus: my first full color comic story!

Oh, and if I don't see you, Merry Christmas!

Sketchbook Bonanza

Haven't shown off any sketchbook pages in awhile. This is a combination of the last bits of my summer sketchbook and my current first semester book.

Lots of figure work, trying to mix it up between photo ref and pulling wonky shit out of my head.

Not much else to say I suppose...

How are things with you?

To Hell With Conventions!

Hey, it's my birthday, but I have a gift for you!

Because I'm a rule breaker,
foundation shaker,
a loose cannon who gets results,
with or without his badge and his gun.

I'm 29 now.

This is the main character for the graphic novel project we're currently working on in Figure Illustration. Her name is Madam Bauhaus and she is inspired by a photo I found of a Bauhaus actress in costume.

It struck me as very bizarre and weird and super inspiring and I knew that I would have to use her as a character one day. She is basically the personification of the utopian ideals of the Bauhaus school. She runs around with a hammer and a bag of brass tacks, kicking ass in the name of progress. She is alluring and off-putting, like the dream of Utopia itself. Which has recently become the running theme of my work thus far.

I got really carried away with texture, experimenting a lot with collaging real materials and scanning them, as well as adding half-tones and such. I want to far and didn't pull it back enough so the images are a bit too much. But it was very fun to mess around. I'll be doing more collage for sure. Lesson learned. Moving on.

Extra-curricu-killer Activities

So I made a solemn oath that in exchange for not working a part time job while going to school (which I firmly believe at this point would be the death of me) I would start submitting my work to gallery shows and taking part in art events around Calgary. I have thus far kept my word and have enjoyed the results though I'm definitely feeling the vice of time constantly closing tighter on my nether regions.

This first piece is my first official submission to a gallery show:

Saint Portenta: Our Patron Saint of Possibilities

Acrylic and ink on wood panel, touched up in Photoshop for online viewing, this piece involved lots of research into the symbolism of Catholic paintings, specifically the Saint Portraiture. Because I am not a Catholic, or anything for that matter, I took a crack at what a Humanist Saint might look like. It is filled with symbols representing the potential of humanity as well as the destruction of our pre-conceived notions of good and evil. It was fun to get conceptual and do some research while applying what I've learned from my years in the design program.

(Detail)

This piece was displayed at the Low Brow art show in the Resolution gallery ( a beautiful space with a super nice owner and staff). Overall it felt great to have a piece in the show but as a critic I felt much of the show lacked concept, taking the idea of Low Brow as an excuse to paint pretty ladies with nothing to back it up. But there were some stellar pieces for sure and the opening was crazy busy.

And here are some process shots for my second year as part of chalk walk. It was tons of fun in the sun yet again, and I pulled in third place prize this year for this child-like chalk rendering of the Egyptian Book of the Dead. I really messed up the proportions on that central figure though. Geez, that looks awful. Aaaanyways...

Just finished a butt-load of storyboarding work for a client and started the graphic novel project at school. Can't wait to post the result.

Madam Bauhaus, comin' at ya.