Love letters

I guess I never posted pictures of the Scrabble board I made for Sophia a couple of Christmases ago. The board is a collage of magazine clippings mounted on cardboard. The letters were hand-drawn in acrylic ink onto existing Scrabble tiles. (We don't keep score, so no numbers, but I did keep the color pattern of the board.) Note the Converse All-Star in the center square.

Still sketchin'...

...last Friday night, drawing in the galleries at the DIA (this is the bronze of Judith by Antonio del Pollaiolo), AND...

... at "Squat & Draw," a sketching event held at a house being rehabbed near the Detroit /Hamtramck border, with the art created being sold to raise funds for a NYC field trip for CCS students (photos by Ginni Reiter, top photo with artist and accordionist Sam Bates)...

...AND also at Specs Howard's Zombie Sketch Night, which I moderated. Video of the results to come soon.

Oh yeah, and I did another Optik ad, for the baseball Opening Day issue of Metro Times.

Sketchbook Crazy

Not one but two sketch nights in a row this week. Wednesday was the premier of Go Figure! at Green Brain Comics, with comic book-ish poses on display...

...and then it was Dr. Sketchy at the Scarab Club on Thursday, featuring the return of the lovely and multi-talented Hayley Jane. I could almost have spent the night just drawing hand studies, since she makes such interesting, delicate gestures with them. 

This was on top of spending the last couple days drawing comics for a certain paying client... more on that soon.

Poor Dawn...

Here's a cartoon I forgot I'd done, one that didn't make it into the "12 Days of Zombie Christmas" project I did for Tor.com. Gossipy zombies are the worst!

I remember when he japed

I've finally started up some sort of site, just a simple Tumblr page, where I can deposit and distribute my old mini-comics work (and possibly some new cartoons in the future). Take a look!

More museum sketches

Finally did some more drawing at the Detroit Institute of Arts the other day, British galleries this time. Marble and ceramic busts draw in pencil.

Rose-colored glasses

Another Optik ad, just in time for Valentine's Day. This one's for the Kubrick fans.

All the rage

A little while back I decided to try my hand at this rage comics meme I'd heard about via the series of tubes. To kill two birds with one stone, I did a rage version of a comics exercise I'd been meaning to try for a long time, something suggested by cartoonist, educator, and old friend Matt Madden in his book "99 Ways To Tell A Story: Exercises In Style." Challenge accepted!

Drawing on the walls

My mom always told me not to when I was a kid, but this month The Detroit Artists Market invited me to draw cartoons on their walls to coincide with their annual design show. The theme this year was "occasional tables," with several local creators contributing some unique furniture, so I thought about famous tables in art history and came up with these cartoons. (There was a fashion and jewelry runway show at the opening too, and cocktails - which you can also see in the drawings). Feedback's been good, seems the drawings are a big hit! The show's up until February 18, 2012. Many thanks to the folks at DAM for giving me the opportunity. (More photos are on my Flickr site.)

Just ghost to show...

Another Optik ad, this one for the Metro Times' Xmas gift guide. My Scrooge looks just a bit Patrick Stewart-ish, probably since that's the version of the story we listen to every year.

Return of the Living Dead Intellectuals, Parts I, II & III

Seems everyone loves an intellectual zombie! Lately my cartoon has been cropping up all over, for better or worse. First a co-worker pointed out that it's being swapped around several blogs (and horror fan sites, too). Then it showed up on the online version of the Yale University campus humor magazine, The Yale Record!

A couple days later, I got an email from musician Gorgorgathgorgorgor saying he'd used it as the thumbnail art for his zombiriffic electronic tune "Do The Shamble".

All cool and flattering and well and good - I'm truly glad so many folks get a laugh out of it! BUT...

...then the cartoon, or a lo-res fragment of it, was stolen and included, along with other swiped photos and art, in a collage created by the Loudon County, Virginia branch of the Republican party and sent out with an email to their supporters on Halloween. One of the images was a zombified version of the Shepard Fairey Obama poster, complete with bullet hole in the forehead. The perpetrators had their wrists dutifully slapped by GOP higher-ups, but only after the horse was out of the barn, of course.

So: The GOP used my work without my permission or that of my publisher Tor.com, and without giving credit or providing links; reproduced it in a mutilated, lo-res state (minus the punchline, even!); and utilized it in support of a party I strongly oppose on virtually every front. I dunno, I guess I expect better from people who claim to be so concerned about private property rights. Mmmmmmactually, no I don't, not at all. F-in' scumbags.

Mask of the Dead

Why dress up like a character from a movie when you can wear the whole movie right on your face? Here's the "zombie attack"mask I made to be auctioned off at the upcoming Hatchoween fundraiser.

Hatch-o-ween!

Here's the poster I came up with for Hatch's autumn fundraiser. Any money we make goes towards getting heat in the old police station we're renovating, so we can get our studios rented out and start bringing in some revenue on our own.

Rrrace fansss!!

Don't miss the Popps Packing Pinewood Derby, an auction and race of dozens of handmade toy cars created by local artists. Auction proceeds go towards creating a sculpture park on the border of Detroit and Hamtramck! Here's a look at my entry in the wacky races.

Dr. Sketchy Rides Again!

Sketchy started with an '80s aerobics theme last week, but these are from the cowboys-'n'-indians look that came up later in the night.

Happy 5th Birthday Detroit Sketchy!

Forgot to post these, from last month's fifth birthday celebration of Dr. Sketchy in Detroit. Had a whole troupe of wacky burlesque beauties to work from, plus a fire-twirler performing afterwards and cupcakes! Next session is this Thursday.

Movies in context

On the Facebook page for The Criterion Collection they're having a contest: Photograph one of their DVD covers "in context" - illustrating a scene from or the theme of the film somehow - and maybe win a prize pack of new releases. Here are my two entries, which I spent most of a Saturday putting together, for Orson Welles's documentary on art forgery "F for Fake" and Clouzot's nail-biter "The Wages of Fear."

UPDATE: My "F for Fake" entry came in second in the voting! (I lost to a "Videodrome" image.) My "Wages of Fear" image was among the top ten finalists too, for a few minutes anyway, but then it was removed, most likely because the judges didn't want two entries from one person in the final 10 (that's my hopeful theory anyway, and I'm sticking to it!). Anyway, I consider that a bonus victory, and I got lots of kind words from the Criterion fans, plus a free DVD as a prize.

So now that I've got the bug, the next art film-related project for me will be contributing to the very cool Fake Criterion blog!