So lately I’ve been doing a lot of freelance work for Rockstar, and having the TV on in the background has helped me keep my concentration and focus. Now that work’s slowed down, I’ve tried getting back into my sketchbook, and I find myself religiously watching the same programs I watched roughly a decade ago. This is adulthood I guess.
Here is TI cooking a lovely turkey dinner.
More after the jump.
So last night I spent a couple of hours at a Barnes & Noble with a friend, and in that period of time, I picked up Italian illustrator and comic artist Gipi’s book Notes for a War Story. I picked it up because it was there, and it had all the requirements to keep me interested for more than 5 minutes: the word “war” in the title, and a cast of characters that seemed to be exclusively male. I was pleasantly surprised that it’s an AMAZING book, and incredibly inspiring.
The artwork is amazing, and I generally have a terrible attention span for graphic novels whose artwork just doesn’t jive with me. But Gipi’s drawings are so deceptively simple yet so incredibly accurate; he expresses the emotions of adolescent boys so compellingly but manages to make it look so effortless in every panel. And it’s also just distinctively charming–it can go from adorable and cartoonish to manly and threatening in a second.
The story also has a lot to do with young men and the rites of passage they sometimes (misguidedly) succumb to in order to associate themselves with this myth of masculinity. Camaraderie during a time of war–it’s exactly the sort of thing I like to produce artwork about. In fact, a reviewer mentioned the influence of William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, which is a work that continues to impact the way I perceive masculinity.
It made me think a lot more about a personal project I haven’t really gotten around to thinking about seriously–a graphic novel about Samuel Butler Academy for (Troubled) Boys. Suffice to say, I think it might be time for me to consolidate my ideas and goals for characters…and maybe produce some sketches.
Lots of doodles! And plenty more to come, I’m sure.
Portrait of first man in space, Yuri Gagarin. Although Sergei Krikalev is my personal hero, Gagarin is still a fascinating figure. All over the former Soviet Union there are sculptures and monuments dedicated to immortalizing the young man who was essentially just following orders. The statues make him look less like a man and more like a superhero; it’s amazing. And this drawing is based on a press photo of him wearing what seems like ALL the medals and ribbons ever.
Playing around with GOLD paint. Also, the figure is referenced from a cosmonaut sculpture in Star City. It’s amazingly beautiful and stylized. I may use the sculpture as a reference for my thesis.
What can I say.
I like Star Wars. Star Wars concept art was what got me into drawing when I was a youngster. All I wanted to do was to draw cool character designs of aliens and jedi and stuff like Ralph McQuarrie, and Iain McCaig. I was obsessed with Doug Alexander Gregory’s Star Wars Roleplay book illustrations for a good while when I was 13 or so. They were just so dynamic and representational of unique visions of original characters that all I wanted was to be able to draw like that.
Since then, my idea of illustration as a field has broadened immensely, and I have very different goals sometimes. But I guess in a lot of ways, I can’ts seem to seperate my illustration from being so dependent on characters and storytelling because of my past influences (obviously, Norman Rockwell was also a huge influence on me). It scares me a little, since I feel like they’re not what the art world at large considers “SERIOUS ARTISTS.” But I do what I can, I guess, and I stay true to what I love.
I’ll be in Miami for the next two weeks (June 23 - July 5) visiting various loved ones that inhabit the vicinity, so this will most likely be the last drawing posts I’m able to make until after that. I’m taking my sketchbook with me, of course, and probably my tablet so I can get my MSPaint on, but I will be sans scanner and Photoshop.
But first, here’s something I did not draw–rather, I’ve seen it wheat-pasted in various locations around the city, and I had to document it because I thought it was rad.
It’s a film poster for the Will Smith movie Hancock, which–to those unfamiliar–is about a drunken and irresponsible superhero who causes massive collateral damage. Basically, a film I want to see (because my tastes in movies are nothing if not REFINED)–and this illustration caught my eye. It looks like concept art, but I don’t know who can be credited to it. I was just pretty glad to see this type of illustration used for a poster of a high-budget film, for once.
Now to some arts. Some sketches:
(inspired by the animated short “Meet the Sniper”–brilliantly stylized and funny)
Jing at drums
This next one is the final for a poster contest held by PostersForHumans.com. The theme was to parody an cliched poster genre, so I chose to parody vintage babe pin-ups…changing it to the sort of thing I’d like to see tacked up on walls.
So refreshing! I just want to drink it.
It was kind of a rush job since I overestimated the amount of time I had left in New York, but I’m pretty satisfied with it. Of course thanks goes out to SL, patient model, and Dan Allen for listening to me whine about it and giving me his valuable opinion.
I hope I win. I lost the ADAA contest, and a group gallery show I had lined up was canceled, so…I was kind of hoping for an opportunity to lift my drawing spirits.
The following is a new commercial for the Discovery Channel that basically sums up my feelings about the world, astronauts, and Mike Rowe in a pleasant song.
:D
