Monster Creeps

This is my piece for the upcoming art show Monster Creeps, a tribute to the films Night of the Creeps & Monster Squad.

I was only vaguely familiar with the movies when I got the invite for the show, though I knew of some friends who had fond childhood memories of Monster Squad. After watching the movies and doing some research I came up with this piece, which will make absolutely no sense to anybody who isn't familiar with the films, hah. (So don't worry if you feel like you can't quite get the joke in this one.) So far the other artwork I've seen for the show has been comprised of amazing group shots and epic posters, so I thought I'd do something a little simpler and lighter in tone.

The show happens Saturday, August 6th at Dark Delicacies in Burbank, California. I believe I read that the director, Fred Dekker, will be in attendance and that a screening of Monster Squad will follow the reception.

Trace Cherokee Logo

On the 29th of this month country music legend and Seth Martin & Friends star Trace Cherokee will be performing live at the V Club in Huntington, opening for bluegrass band The Good Ol' Boys and a Girl.

Trace won't perform on just any dingy old stage, so we're in the process of building him some set pieces, including a large version of this logo I designed. Trace has sort of been the breakout star of our SMaF show and I am incredibly excited that he'll actually be going on in front of a live audience.

For a taste of his music, you can check out this YouTube clip of Trace and the Stenders performing "Mountain Woman" on local talk show Up Late.



Now, to pull back the curtain for a second, and I know this will sound biased since I'm involved in this puppet show and all, but I'm still amazed at how great this song is. I mean, not just as a parody of country music...it's actually a really, really good song. I can listen to it over and over and still be blown away that my friends made it. I can say these things because I bring exactly zero musical talent to the table, and things like this are really the work of Michael Valentine, Ian Nolte, Kyle Quinn, and Bud Carroll and his band.

I've been told that Trace has been writing and practicing for some time now and I can't wait. I mean, when was the last time you walked into a bar and saw a puppet on stage?

You can check out Trace's Twitter here...

and the Facebook event for the show on the 29th is here.

Dr. Sketchy's Update

Here are some drawings from the last few sessions of the Dr Sketchy figure drawing and burlesque show in Charleston. The image above is from a session themed after our Festivall arts fair. I don't get to draw in a "realistic" style too often so I'm really happy with these considering how out of practice I am. Honestly I think attending Dr. sketchy just once a month has helped me shake some of the rust off.


The most recent session was roller derby themed, featuring girls from Huntington's own Jewel City Rollergirls.


One of the contests was to draw an opponent for the girls to face off against, and since my brain is always full of cartoons I immediately thought of the lummox character from Ren and Stimpy.


This drawing was the first time I made an effort to render the models in a full-on cartoony style. I've wanted to do it at past sessions but when the pose clock is ticking you feel pressure to just draw exactly what you see and get all the shapes on the page. I like the realistic drawings, but this was a fun exercise and I might throw in a couple like this at each session from now on.

Turtles Print

Ever since I debuted this Ninja Turtles piece for the Shell Shock show I have been getting a ton of requests for a print, so I am very happy to finally offer one!

The print is 11.7" x 16.5" and costs $13.95. You can buy it here at my Splitreason store.

Thanks to everybody for expressing so much interest in this piece!

Crazy 4 Cult: The Book

The Crazy 4 Cult book is here! This volume collects artwork from the first four years of Gallery 1998's annual cult movie tribute show. It's arguably the most popular show at the country's most popular pop culture gallery.

It's hard to say what this book means to me, both professionally and personally. I know my friends and probably some of you readers out there have heard this story a thousand times, but I feel I need to repeat a variation of it once again:

Not only was I one of the first in my family to go away to college, but I decided to study art. In West Virginia. That doesn't mean it was a bad school by any means, I love this place, but WV is far from being an art hot spot. Most know that art is a hard field to make money in, but I've never wanted to do anything else. I loved my college experience, but the cartoony stuff I did wasn't really considered important by most of my professors. If I wanted to be a successful artist, I had to do the kind of art they wanted me to do, and I would have to move out of the state.

Then I found a book called I am 8-Bit. It was a collection of artwork from Gallery 1988's retro video game themed exhibition. I was in awe of this book. I couldn't believe that all these amazing artists were receiving recognition and getting published for doing artwork based on old video games. It was one of my favorite subjects, but it was also a subject that was mostly taboo in the world of "real" art. The book gave me hope that the work I was doing wasn't a waste of time, but at the same time I felt like I would never be able to break into such a scene. These were art superstars, after all. I mean, they were in a book.

Now, for some crazy reason, I am also in a Gallery 1988 book. Thinking back to the I am 8-Bit book and the events that led to this I really can't believe how cool it is. It feels like I've come full circle, and I could not be happier with how my passion and my career have combined and given me so many amazing opportunities, accomplishments, and experiences. I'm not trying to hype this up as something huge; lots of artists get published every day, of course, and in much greater capacity. I'm just trying to explain how this means a great deal to me personally. And all I had to do was pay for and listen to the advice of experts in my field, then do the opposite.

Now that I have that part out of the way, I need to express how amazing this book is as a collection of artwork. When I attended Crazy4Cult last year I basically wanted a print of everything I saw. Every piece was incredible and all of it very much appealed to my sensibilities, me being the pop culture junkie that I am. Now with this book I own a copy of so many great pieces from artists I've come to be familiar with in the last several years. And for just over $20, that's really a steal. You can order a copy here!

Thanks to everybody who read this far, and to everybody who supports and encourages me by reading this blog!