Who Dat?!

 Don't be skeerd!  just a funny little monster stencil!  Making some demonically cute kitchen towels that can also double as a halloween costume in a pinch...   limited edition created with a one time use hand cut stencil!

ART WORKING

art isn't all fun and games i'm sure you know...
day jobs, night studio hours and now the season is here for weekend festivals and markets.

the hard part is the physical labor but the fun is not just the reward of selling art.  the reward really is the completion of the circle which may come as some surprise. ...  creating work is a personal thing but when strangers see it and react that is a shared moment that a visual artist doesn't always expect.   unlike a singer or musician or dancer who practice to perform, art is (at least for me) a singular experience but i am realizing more and more that the finish isn't the moment the art is hung on a wall and complete but rather when someone else appreciates it.

this past weekend i've noticed that the people who respond more greatly to my work are either young or young at heart... and they squeal literally with glee and the humor (and occasional horror).  the real grown ups who have lost touch with adventure and magic can sometimes be reminded what they're missing and will walk away surprised and for a moment young again.  and that's a pretty good reward for any artist.

live / work ..... the artist's life

a brief tutorial on how to make art in a small apartment:
eat in kitchen becomes a print studio! chairs become drying racks, drying line full of prints become window shades, and you can keep an eye on that friendly stray cat while you work…
use what you’ve got to do what you want, you don’t need a fancy studio or big press to make good art, you just need to want to make it happen...

 

 

 

lets talk about teeth

i am noticing that i have some strange thing for teeth... i like teeth... i always think about the teeth of a creature in my artwork, i like going to the dentist for a cleaning...  i like animals with teeth...  so here is a post about teeth--some of my art and toothy photos i've taken..  enjoy!

How to design a poster...

i’ve recently agreed to do a poster for an upcoming event (florida bookstore day) which has nothing to do with vampires but everything to do with poster design so… i searched for nosferatu posters as a bit of reference to see how different minds approach the same creative task… shown here are a few of the results that i found. …  as many styles as there are artists to make them... i've posted an assortment below

so not sure that my image search really helped me much in my quest for how to approach this particular design problem... i'll be illustrating a book that i haven't read yet but i'm curious about trying this new project

meanwhile i can enjoy looking at how other artists have created designs for a movie that is so visually stunning (in my opinion) it deserves equally fantastic poster art!

True Bugs

i'm a fan of stink bugs, assassin bugs, and here in florida we have the leaf footed bug--they're true bugs, not insects and i think they're cute.  a couple of years ago i spotted a leaf footed bug (called that because of the flaring bell bottoms the wear on their back legs) on the fence in my yard.  it reminded me of stink bugs growing up which i was sort of fond of... i liked a lot of crawling things as a kid, roly-poly pill bugs, praying mantis, daddy long legs ... i still do i guess.  i just did a quick search of my image libraries on my computer and found a lot of bug/insect/creepy crawly inspired art so here are a few, enjoy! and if you see a bug don't squash it!*

  

PS also in addition to being a 'bugs are beautiful' post, i think this goes to show that art can be about little things, things that are seemingly insignificant but that really are what make life magical so don't always be so caught up in giant concepts or ideology when nature is right there waiting to inspire you. 

* THE EXCEPTION TO THE NO SQUASHING RULE: Palmetto bugs! if you see one of those i encourage you to squash the snot out of those suckers YUCK!!!!!

Sad but True...

Another news story has inspired me to make some art...   the latest, a story about a young bear that gets hooked on people food...  "Bear falls through skylight, eats cupcakes."  Of course it ends badly for the bear as is often the case when people and wild life cross paths.

Previously (in 2012) I made this piece inspired by another animal tragedy "Alligator bites hand off of tour boat guide" .  The insult to injury in that story is eventually the guide is charged with having fed the gators for the benefit of his business.

 

 I doubt people will ever be satisfied with their urge to sprawl and consume every parcel of land for their own use leaving nowhere for wildlife to be wild. Encroachment and using animals for entertainment are serious concerns.  Maybe someday we'll all learn to coexist. Until then I guess I'll keep immortalizing these stories in images.  Long live Cupcake.