Gallery 1988 Show: Player Two

As a kid I often found myself playing video games as player 2, usually either because the other kid was older or because I was (and am) pretty shy and non-assertive. Because of that I still to this day have a fondness for Luigi, the ultimate second player character. One of my favorites of the newer Mario games is Super Mario 3D Land, where they bring back the famous Tanooki suit power-up. If you play as Luigi in that game, however, the suit is not the familiar raccoon but rather a fox instead. For whatever reason I thought this was just about the coolest thing ever; I think because I'm such a Nintendo nerd and I'm fascinated by the design of Mario games. So here is my tribute to player two which comes to you in 2013, Nintendo's official Year of Luigi.

I should note that my show has closed now, and boy did that month go fast. But you can still buy prints from it at the Gallery1988 online store!

Gallery 1988 Show: Samwise the Badass

I'm a big fan of The Lord of the Rings films and books, and I've always wanted to take a crack at drawing Gollum. He's my favorite because he's not allied with the good guys or the bad guys, yet still plays a huge part in the story.

When I saw Return of the King for the first time I really enjoyed what a good job they did with the ending. It's a tall order to make three, three-hour-long movies and have the whole thing lead up to a ring being thrown in a lava pit rather than having a huge battle with big bad guy himself, but they pulled off in spades, and it's one of my favorite movie endings of all time. The music, the red glow of the color palette; it's all so great. I'm also big on science fiction and fantasy universes having their own rules, and I love the fact that the ring becomes too heavy for Frodo, and even though Sam can't carry it on his own, he can carry Frodo while Frodo has the ring. Kind of like how the Hulk can pick up Thor while he's holding his hammer, but not the hammer itself (and this post has probably just become to nerdy for its own good, so I digress...)

My show is up through June 22, so if you are in the LA area please stop by Gallery 1988 East! You can purchase prints of all the pieces at the Gallery's online store.

Gallery 1988 Show: Gotham City ComiCon

I was especially happy with this this piece because I felt like it was a simple idea that I personally hadn't seen done before: a flyer for a comic convention in a fictional city filled with actual super heroes and villains. It presented me with some unique challenges in terms of taking characters who already wear costumes, having them dress up as different characters, and yet still be recognizable as who they are. My biggest worry was that they would come off as just regular costumed convention-goers rather than the actual Catwoman, Poison Ivy, and Harley Quinn. I think the idea comes off well, though, with a lot of credit probably going to Ivy's green skin.

As far as choosing the costumes, I figured Harley wouldn't dream of dressing up as anyone other than Mr. J; Indy seemed like a good fit for Catwoman given the whip and love of treasure, and probably the biggest "ah-ha!" moment of the whole piece was when I figured out a creative way to make Ivy look like a Mario Bros piranha plant. I see a lot of girls at conventions now who have made these extremely clever hybrid costumes that combine the visuals of a specific character with normal clothes (I think the most prevalent idea is dresses that look like the Daleks from Dr. Who,) so I would love to see somebody actually try this piranha plant hair thing in real life.

My show is up through June 22, so if you are in the LA area please stop by Gallery 1988 East! You can purchase prints of all the pieces at the Gallery's online store.

Gallery 1988 Show: Codex

This piece is based on the character Codex from Felicia Day's web series The Guild. My girlfriend introduced me to the show, and she also deserves credit for giving me the idea for this piece when I was coming up with new stuff to include in my gallery show.

I know Codex doesn't usually carry a sword, and I knew going in that including the incorrect weapon might get me in hot water with fans, but I really thought it would be cool to emphasize the battle aspect of the MMORPG video games the series pays homage to; just to depict the character in bit of a different way. (If you look closely, I included her usual staff as an engraving on the sword as nod to the fact that, yes, the sword was on purpose, haha)

Also, there's this:

Felicia Day loved it and is framing one to hang in her office! This is just about the biggest compliment for this piece I could ever imagine, and an amazing thrill. A big thanks goes out to Felicia and her assistant Annie!

My show is up through June 22, so if you are in the LA area please stop by Gallery 1988 East! You can purchase prints of all the pieces at the Gallery's online store.

Gallery 1988 Show: Milkman Jake

This piece is a reference to an episode of Adventure Time where Jake dresses as a milkman to infiltrate and negotiate a hostage situation. I thought the design of Jake in his milkman getup was great, and the unexpected subject matter of the episode was hilarious to me. (If you watch Adventure Time you know that most episodes are very fantasy-oriented, so a hostage situation at a convenience store is not something you immediately expect to see.)

I tend to spend a lot of time on each drawing I do; I play around with them and add lots of stuff here and there until, without realizing it, I end up with what I like to call a "complicated" drawing. I knew that time-wise if I wanted to have enough pieces for this show I would need to take on some simpler works, and this drawing was the beginning of that effort. And to be clear I don't mean to say that a "simpler" drawing is worse or less important, I just think I have a bad habit of thinking a drawing isn't finished unless I've spent a lot of time on it. Even now that all the work for the show is done I've been trying to take on some more simpler stuff, which can actually be harder, yet make for some cooler images.

My show is up through June 22, so if you are in the LA area please stop by Gallery 1988 East! You can purchase prints of all the pieces at the Gallery's online store.

Gallery 1988 Show: Skee-ball Girl

There isn't much to this piece, just a simple pin-up for the sake of doing a fun drawing. I thought the repetition of a bank of skee-ball machines would make for cool imagery, (plus a skee-ball pin up was something I had never seen before,) and then from there I just had fun with it by adding things like the sash made of tickets. It actually took quite a bit of playing around with color and things to figure out how I wanted all the details to look, and probably the biggest challenge was making sure the girls didn't get lost in the background.

I thought this piece might get lost among the other more complicated drawings at my show, but I was really happy that a few people let me know how much they liked it.

My show is up through June 22, so if you are in the LA area please stop by Gallery 1988 East! You can purchase prints of all the pieces at the Gallery's online store.

Gallery 1988 Show: Inherit the Wind

This piece is based on Inherit the Wind, one of my favorite movies of all time. I could go on all day listing quotes from the film and explaining why I love it, but I'll spare you all that and offer a shorter explanation for those who haven't seen it: It's based on the famous 1925 "Scopes Monkey trial" where a high school teacher was arrested for trying to teach the theory of evolution to his class. The movie only draws inspiration from the real-life events, and all the characters and scenarios are fictionalized. The bottom line of the story is that neither religion nor science is on trial, but rather the right to think (though simplifying the message this much is a disservice to this amazing piece of cinema; go watch it!) Thinking for yourself and making up your own mind about things is a value that is very important to me, hence why I love the movie and its clever messages so much.

As far as the style of the piece, main character Bert Cates is played by actor Dick York, who you may remember from the TV series Bewitched. That show had an animated intro where its stars were shown as cartoon caricatures, so I thought it would be fun to draw York as he appeared in that intro, and then use the same style for the rest of the piece as well.

My show is up through June 22, so if you are in the LA area please stop by Gallery 1988 East! You can purchase prints of all the pieces at the Gallery's online store.

Gallery 1988 Show: Itchy and Scratchy Land

First off, I need to say thank you, thank you, thank you to everybody who stopped by the opening of my show at Gallery 1988 last week. It was an amazing time and I consider this show to be one of the highest points in my artistic career so far. I've admired Gallery 1988 and the artists that show there since I first became aware of them in college, and to have my own show there is a dream come true. I also need to thank the Gallery as well, as they are some of the best folks I've ever worked with.

Now, onto the work from the show! The first piece I'm posting is Itchy ans Scratchy Land, where I made an old Disney-style map based on the theme park from the classic Simpsons episode. I watched the episode numerous times and took tons of notes and screen captures in order to make the piece as accurate to the show as possible. I find the design of the Disney park maps fascinating, and this seemed like a good excuse for me to draw one of my own. Please click on the image for a closer look!

My show is up through June 22, so if you are in the LA area please stop by Gallery 1988 East! You can purchase prints of all the pieces at the Gallery's online store.