Cannibal Flower

Cannibal Flower is coming up again:

Horrorwood Recap

First of all, thanks to everyone who made it out to the show! It was great to see everyone, and get a chance to catch up a bit with the people I hadn't seen in a while. There was a bunch of good work, including a really well-rendered Hellraiser piece and an awesome piece of the clown from It that looked like he was in a TV... lights and glass and things... sort of hard to put into words. But, that's why if you have a chance you should head down to WWA to see it all for yourself!

Good Evening

Here's a mid-progress shot of my piece for the Horrorwood show, coming up on the 16th @ WWA Gallery:

Cannibal Flower Wrap Up

Here I am at the Cannibal Flower this past Friday in front of my piece. If you'd like a chance to see any of the work, it should be up until this Friday. The space this time was really great. Lots of room, plenty of light and ventilation. On top of that there was an abundance of great artwork, performances, music, and people. Looking forward to the next show!

Here's another photo of the painting in better light and without any dummies in the foreground.

Cannibal Flower Tomorrow!!!

Cannibal Flower 13th Anniversary Show

317 N. Westmoreland Ave. 90066

Friday, Sept. 27 8pm-2am
$13 w/o RSVP
$10 w/ RSVP @  http://www.artdontsleep.com/2013/09/13cannibalflower/
$8 w/ RSVP and food donation to L.A. Food Bank
$6 w/ RSVP and costume

Here's a little slice of the painting I'll have in the show:

Horrorwood 2013

I'll be participating in the Horrorwood show again. For some reason the gallery decided to move the date away from Halloween, but if any of you are looking for some residual spookiness as a reprieve from the Christmas cultural onslaught, come on down.

Cat Nap

Here's a piece I recently made for a show called Sound and Vision in Venice. While I was varnishing and snapping photos my cat, Hobo, decided to check out the space behind the painting. That's his butt.

A Light in the Darkness

This piece was entered into WWA Gallery's I Belive in Unicorns II group show in February of this year. It recently sold to a mysterious buyer whom the gallery informed me wished to remain anonymous. Anyone who knows me and my work might question why I would enter a group show about happiness, rainbows, sunshine and horny equines. When WWA initially contacted me about submitting a piece it wasn't actually planned as another Unicorns show. Originally it was slated as a tribute to Bob Ross; a landscape painter, philosopher, and unofficial Jedi master. Unfortunately this show would have stepped on the toes of another gallery with the same idea to use that theme, so WWA had to switch things up. Although this piece is thematically a departure from my greater body of work, I still had some fun trying to represent happiness within a world of darkness.

Can Flow?

Cannibal Flower 12th Anniversary show, me and my piece:

Here is some recent work from the show at WWA and a little illo from Nerd Night:

"Chimera"

"Mother's Nature"

"The Sea Witch"

A quick sketch of Chester Fields, one of my friend's characters:

Welcome to the "Welcome to the Freakshow" Show

So I'm finally done with the paintings for Welcome to the Freakshow. WWA Gallery will be hosting my artwork alongside others for a month or so starting this Saturday. Here's a little preview:

And Now, Here's Some More Stuff

First off, here's a book cover I worked on for a non-existent author. He was pretty quiet, but I could tell that he really liked the illustration I came up with for his non-existent story:


Here's an oil painting I did for a show with The Upper 600s, a great creative collective that puts together some awesome art shows. Unfortunately this piece didn't sell, so if anyone is interested, shoot me an email:


And finally, here's some character design stuff from my Red Engine class:

Horrorwood

Here's a preview of what I'm submitting for WWA Gallery's Horrorwood show, opening October 15th. The show's theme, as the name suggests, is classic Hollywood Horror. The pieces should range in subject matter from Bela Lugosi to Freddy Kruger, and I'm pretty excited to see what the other artists have come up with, especially my fellow 'Illust' crew members Dalva, Buerli, Cooper, Nigel, and Jules!

Venice Grind

Through September my artwork will be featured at a cafe called Venice Grind, located at 12224 Venice Blvd, near Centinella. I'll be putting up some old stuff, some new stuff, and some stuff that was old, but that has been worked on since the last time it was displayed:

The Big One

"Three Wishes"
24"x36"
Acryllic on Canvas
$500

Here's another piece left over from my show at The Hive. While I was making it, I was thinking a lot about how dreams and aspirations keep us going through all kinds of discouraging, disheartening, and somewhat maddening events. Our wishes are huge and powerful things in our own worlds. They can be the light at the end of the tunnel, a nagging voice in the back of your head that makes you feel terrible for not doing more, or they can be a playground to frolic and dance around in.

Just look at how many opportunities we give ourselves to wish, all the rituals and ceremonies that go along with wanting something specific to happen. Every birthday we blow out the candles, when I go through tunnels I hold my breath, and there are countless forms of shooting stars, dandelion seeds, wishbones; all of them are a kind of magic spell we use to try to make something happen, or at least to remind ourselves of why we're working so hard.

A wish is a powerful thing, deeply personal and often secret. Most importantly, given how often we must succumb to the circumstances of our existence, wishes are one of the few opportunities in life we have to define ourselves, and choose who we are.

Happily Ever After

New work:


The Crane Who Caught the Moon
3"x5"
Acrylic on paper w/ cut paper

While working on this piece I was thinking a lot about happy fairytale endings. I was also looking at a lot of Yoshitaka Amano and Japanese woodblock prints. I really like framing the image with paper like this. It's something I'll definitely be doing again.

Small World

This piece is one of the ones I sold during my show at The Hive. I really like how the tree turned out, and I want to do more with treehouses in the future. This is also the first time I've mixed pen and paint in a while, which I think I may incorporate into my next big project.

Shaking her Tail with a .22

Here's what I painted for the upcoming Cannibal Flower. It should be a great time, and I'm looking forward to seeing The Color Turning play! I definitely recommend that anyone that can make it come out this weekend.

Ta-Daa!!

Here is the finished painting for La Luz:

Deadline Deluge, WIPs, and Some Little Ones

I'm going a little crazy right now. I have four deadlines coming up before the end of the month, and my schedule gets tighter and tighter as the days pass.

First, I sent off a couple entries to Spectrum 17 today. I've been entranced by their collections of fantasy art every year since I found out about it, and they've continually given me the inspiration or kick-in-the-pants I've needed. This is my first attempt at getting in, and as an upcoming artist I certainly don't expect any gold medals, but hopefully the work speaks for itself, and I at least show Spectrum's prestigious jurors what I'm capable of. Anyway, here are the pieces I decided to enter:




Now, I have to focus on finishing my submission to La Luz de Jesus's Kitschen Sync show, and send a photo of it in by Friday. In a situation like this, with such a tight deadline, I'll often switch my drawing process from traditional to digital practices. This means photo comping and paintovers and all those neatzo quick tricks that many digital artists make use of:



The following Sunday, I have a deadline with ArtOrder for a creature design contest. The idea is to re-imagine a creature from D&D's Monster Manual called the Assassin Devil; a being that can use shadows as a cloak or a weapon. It's a really fun project, and I'll be glad when I can get back to working on it after Friday:



Finally, I have been invited to provide a piece for Cannibal Flower, at the end of this month. Cannibal Flower is always fun, and The Color Turning, a band I like, will be playing there as well. I haven't started anything for it, however, so instead, here are some small pen drawings I did for The Hive show: