Can't you see them? They're everywhere!

HEY! LOOKIT THIS!!

Yeah, that's really sumptin, huh? Eh, not really, but I thought it was worth a share. Okay, here's the stats for those of you that care (and those of you that do, know that you are better than everyone for it).

Title: "Isn't This A Dream Come True?"

42" x 30"

Acrylic on parcel paper

Here's a picture for size reference

The child was based on a weird toy on my shelf. I found this thing at some strange roadside attraction on my road trip from Atlanta to LA. I'm pretty sure that the shop in question appeared from a gap in the tectonic plates that led directly to hell and the figurine is actually a manifestation of a child's tormented soul after she was denied ice cream on a family vacation to Palm Springs.

I've been trying to make an effort to start painting and drawing and just experimenting more. Basically just keeping it loose and fun for the sake of creating and not worry to much about the end result. I haven't been making much art at all this year and its already more than half over! My problem is that I feel if I'm going to paint or draw, it has to be absolutely perfect (to the best of my ability) and since I don't have the time to spend an entire day on painting anymore, I just start getting discouraged and frustrated and decide to skip the whole thing. Yeah, that's pretty stupid. So now, I'm just trying to force myself to spend a few hours everyday just doodling or gesture drawing and get myself back in a groove. That's basically what this was. Just having fun and not worrying too much about the end result. I painted this while listening to an old KROQ recording of an Oingo Boingo show from 1980. The piece itself isn't that strong, but I think the idea is pretty decent and I'd like to revisit it sometime. Maybe do a nicer more detailed painting at some point or maybe making a cleaned up drawing and try making screen prints. I think for now though I should just stick to this kinda stuff and try to develop more of a personal style rather than my usual schtick of 1930s style animated characters bleeding from the eyes or whatever.

Meet The Cretins

Here's a new painting I finished up last night.

It's 28x28 acrylic on (shitty) wood. I had some scrap wood laying around and decided to use it for a quick "eh, I'll kill a few hours on a Sunday" kinda piece. But the lousy quality of the wood and ruff, porus surface made it damn near impossible to get any kind of decent line quality. The original sketch seemed to have much more weight to it that got lost in the painting.

Here's a picture for size reference.

These guys are "The Cretin Brothers". The little one with the switch blade is Fink, and the big one is Runt. They kinda draw from the 19050s juvenile delinquent sorta culture. There's a bit of Ed Roth influence thrown in there (obviously). I first drew them for a T-shirt for my pals/black metal ska-punk heathens/freelance gynocologysts, Stuck Lucky

I've been thinking about developing these guys as characters to be licensed. You know, the whole creepy/cute, gothy-punky, Hot Topic-y sorta thing? I like those sort of characters, but they all seem to be girls (i.e. Emily the Strange, Ruby Gloom, etc), so maybe there's some room for boys. I'd like to do some more drawings with them and flesh them out a bit. Work in some personality. I don't mean to toot my own horn (at least not while anyone is watching) but I think these guys would make great looking vinyl figures.

I love lamp

Here's one 1 I figured I'd post for the hell of it.

I stayed in Los Angeles for the holidays, so on Christmas day I killed some time by making this while I watched the Jack Benny program.

Oh, how the wine talks!

“See, this is EXACTLY the kind of shit I’m talking about!”
8x10
Acrylic on paper.

Not too much to say about this one. I didn’t have anywhere to go for Thanksgiving, so I put away about 2 bottles of Merlot (along with a pack o’ ramen). After I was good ‘n stewed, I blasted the stereo and just started drawing. The nice thing about drawing while pickled on cheap wine is that I’m much looser with it and I’m more free with my exaggeration and poses. I painted this drawing and will be dropping it off for the December ’09 “Price Less” show at Hive Gallery. Details below. Painting this was actually kind of a bitch. The acrylic went on the paper terribly. I had to add several layers and I was left with visible brush strokes. I need to start trying out and experimenting with some new materials. Cel vinyl? Gauche? Anybody have any suggestions or advice? I did like using this paper since it took care of my usual problem of not having a background. Call it laziness. Call it lack of talent. Either way, I’ll cop to it.

"Everyday"

Here’s a new piece.



It’s called “Everyday” and its an 8”x8” acrylic on wood panel. Believe it or not, but rather than my usual meaningless cartoon eye candy, I consider this a personal piece, but I won’t elaborate on that. Anyway, it will be in the November Group show at The Hive Gallery.

The Hive Gallery Group show and Performances-

October 3rd, Saturday 8PM-12:30AM
$8 at door/ $5 for those dressed in Black and Yellow costume
Show runs November 7th-28th

PARKING: FREE street & loading zones/ $10 at immediate lot on lft. past 7th st.

Featured Artist 1: J.Shea
Featured Artist 2: Lee Anne Hale
Tall Wall Artist: Erick Rodriguez
Small Wall Artist: Henry F. Cram
Installation Artist: Akihito

Special Middle Room Curated show by: Wizard Sleeve Toys presents, "Feminality"
-female artists from around the country exhibiting various works (including Tara McPherson live painting and others)

Master Blasters of Sculpture Show featuring:

Steven "Wireboss" Darden
Red Rooster
Dave Kawano
Sea Bay
Ted Von Heiland
Salah
Randy Horton


November Group show:

Gaia Bracco / Carl Lozada / Gyorgy Bp. Szabo / Monica Martinez / Carol Powell / Ching Ching Cheng / Kelly Berg / Aimee Kuester / Big Toe / Laura Diamond /
Liz Brizzi / Carmen Luceno / Phil Ramirez / Michael Pukac / Francisco Enciso / Simone Shin / Jessica Ward and many, many more!!!

Resident Artists:

Sensei / Nathan Cartwright / Mary Spring / Greg Gould / Walt Hall / Temple of Visions / Sarah Winkle / John Dang / Jinx / Danny Dunbar
/ Feminine Oddities / Shrine / Sonik / Ichae Ackso / Leyla Akdogan / Stephan Canthal / Paul Torres / Laura Diamond / Chris Donham
/ The Little Red Writer / Randy Kono / Sara Hedstrom / Alex Schaefer / Macsorro / Patrick Haemmerlein / Alan DeForest / Bethany Pratt
/ Wasmi / Radhika Hersey / Amanda Sage / Federico Hudson / Yuki Miyazaki / Sophia Gasparian / Ink Pen Mutations Press


Performances by:

Aftergloam
Michael Nhat
Kronick
Ruthann Friedman
Sirah
DJ Jorge
DJ Robin Royce

And MoRE!!!!!

Show Sponsored By: U-1 Toys (Toy Production/art direction) and A-R Product Inc (casting and resin materials)

BURLESQUE BY: Feminine Oddities { www.feminineoddities.com }

The Chickens are revolting!

Here's an album cover I just finished up for my good pals, The Radioactive Chicken Heads.

The design for this was based heavily on Chinese and Russian propaganda posters. Those posters have such great design and graphic appeal! Most of the influence was on the Chinese side. Specifically, the Mao Zedong posters (which my good friend Liz is responsible for turning me onto!).



I went with a more Russian font so it could read. I wanted to give the poster and aged and weathered look. So I added some shadow around the edges and some texture to give it more of an old paper look. For the "distress" marks, I just lifted them off of an old Mad Magazine softcover collection from '66 with Photoshop. If you look carefully you can see the how the marks match.


Incidentally, this book belonged to my Dad when he was 16.

Oh, and for those of you not familiar with the Radioactive Chicken Heads, the character that we chose to feature on the cover is Sgt. Psychlopps.



To learn more about the Radioactive Chicken Heads, check them out on myspace at http://www.myspace.com/chickenheads or, visit your local library

15 years later, and Green Jello still suxx!

Today Green Jello's first album in 15 years hit the stores and I got to create all of the artwork. Hey, look! Here it is!



Bill (aka Moronic Dicktator) and I wanted the cover to look on par side by side with the previous albums illustrated by the talented Kim O'Donnell (aka Sadistica). We think it's a pretty good fit. What do you think?




I wasn't able to add highlights and shadows like I had wanted to due to time restrictions. Each of their albums is also a comic book and each song tells part of the story or introduces the characters. I loved reading the comics and drawing the characters in my notebooks in school and would wonder what would happen next in the story. The last album, 333, came out in '94. I never coulda guessed that 15 years later I'd be the one drawing the next one. It was really fun to get to work with Bill on this. I was such a huge Green Jello fan back then. How could I not be? Animated music videos of modern retellings of fairy tales, songs about deranged cartoon breakfast cereal mascots going on homicidal rampages, and sentient fecal matter with a nasty temper. Seriously, a shitman! I thought that was the funniest damn thing when I was 13, and honestly, it still makes me laugh (hey, I'll admit that my mind is stuck on a juvenile gear). Here's an old drawing I made of the Green Jello logo (the Euck Ship) I found in one of my notebooks from middle school. If you look carefully, you can see Beavis on the other side. I really shoulda paid more attention in school.



This new album has some familiar faces to Jellowood and also introduces some new characters, which I got to design. New to the Jello roster is Spice Boy, The Rock 'N Roll Rabbi, Stabby the Clown, Geek Girl, and Ed the Magic (and profusely sweating) Dragon! There are also guest appearances by some of my very best pals, The Radioactive Chicken Heads and the abnormal Mike Odd (aka Goat Boy)

This new album picks up right where the last one left off, which make since it was actually recorded 15 years ago. At the end of 333, Karkus Supreme (the robot/man on the left side of the 333 cover above) had just eaten Shitman and was on a deadly rampage with the rest of the bad guys. The cover to the new album is supposed to be the next panel in the story. We see Karkus crashing through a Halloween party at the 3 Little Pigs mansion in the Hollywood Hills and kidnapping Cheri Tomato of The Radioactive Chicken Heads. The arm crashing through the wall and grabbing her is supposed to be a reference to the original King Kong. Pretty much everything on the cover and comic book inside are references/homages to our favorite movies and cartoons (Hey, what's a Green Jello album without a couple of lawsuits, right?) as well as references to previous Green Jello songs/characters/videos/stories for the real die-hard Jello fans (like Kemp and Sherm the Germ!). Oh, also, since Halloween was a bit of a theme on this album, that's why the Euck logo was changed to a jack-o-lantern on the cover. The story continues inside with an 8-page full color comic book. I'll post the first page and go into a bit more detail tomorrow.