Students & Faculty: We Are Floating In Space

Last week I received a call from the New York Times Op-Ed page (especially exciting as it had been a minute since we worked together) with a typically thought provoking and challenging piece. A favorite client for almost 10 years now, I'm almost always incredibly pleased with the finals from Op-Ed gigs. Blissfully this one was no exception.

The article (penned by the fantastic Claire Vaye Watkins, look her up) dealt with the issue of dwindling opportunities beyond high school for rural midwestern students: slighted by the standardized test bureaucracy and all but ignored by prestigious coastal schools, these students often take on enormous loan debt, turn to a salivating military thirsty for new recruits or simply self-short change their dreams and ambitions altogether. Though the writing was by turns poignant and humorous, the passages concerning the aggressive and almost greedy military recruitment practices were especially striking and seemed ripe with bold and graphic imagery. I produced the following sketches:

Though I believed the boot-on-desk sketch could be read as either specifically military related or taken as a more general metaphor for the trampled opportunities of these students, both editor and art director wanted something with a lighter touch that dealt with the remoteness and isolation of these schools. Also the headline had been added by this point, "The Ivy League Was Another Planet." Aha. Cue up Shatner, or you know what, and better yet,  Sir Patrick Stewart. There I said it. High school boldly going where etc etc... - engage (ugh)!

A quick gender flip for the student (credit where due: a subtle but inspired bit of art direction from Matt Dorfman), and voila, one of my favorite finishes to date for 2013:

Thanks to Matt Dorfman and the rest of the gang at the Op-Ed desk for the typically engrossing assignment, and as always, thanks for reading!

Undead Illustration #3: (Almost) The Cover Of New York Magazine

A little over a week ago I received a late email from New York Magazine asking if I had time to kick around sketches for a possible cover. That's a no brainer. The following morning I received the brief: it was a write up about a new mental health study that explores the possible and varying degrees of psychological trauma inflicted upon almost every adolescent American in the name of their basic education. Taking a slightly lighter approach to the art, I'd been asked to create "angsty teenage" typography that said "high school sucks!" and populate the negative space with scribbly doodles of a notebook variety. The designers at NY cobbled together the following comp for me:

As a high school slacker whose mind was often lured away from AP chemistry by his unflattering drawings of faculty members and, somewhat less-straight forward, Batman and Boba Fett in a variety of mundane everyday situations, the prospect of this job actually going through felt slightly incredible, and I had a brief visceral thrill at the possibility of getting paid for the very thing which I was told time and again would dash what little hope I had of any semblance of a career against the merciless rocks of some boho cum Reefer Madness like descent into a hazy drug fueled life of low level misdemeanors and rakism, these distracted doodles but the first tentative step down the proverbial slippery criminal slope perhaps culminating in some sort of anti-art after school special aimed at dissuading impressionable youth from the same treacherous path.*  I grabbed my copy of The MC5's Back In The USA and dug up some old high school notebooks for reference and inspiration...

I think those original Star Wars rereleases had just happened, this is probably early 96?

Yeah...

And I think this IS actually my chem teacher, sci-fi horror brain only slighty exaggerated if memory serves...

...and quickly cranked out the following sketches. Because time was short, I was advised to let the designers comp in some "doodly" drawings from my website until they were sure we had approval. I drew several versions of the words as quickly and loosely as possible, then started pairing up the more successful treatments of each.

Ultimately however, the editors chose to walk back the cavalier language of the original art direction and go with a more ambiguous, serious and i believe authentic actual high schooler drawing. C'est la vie. On the other hand  I can totally appreciate the Twombly black hole / physics class scribble-out action happening here:

Thanks to Tom Alberty for thinking of me in the first place as these were a blast to knock together even if they never came to full fruition. And as always thanks for reading! You can never hold back Spring...

*things were probably not that harsh or dramatic, I was just trying to get back to the 17 year old brain, maaaaan.

Every (Good) Illustration I Made About The 2012 Election*

Weeks later, we're still picking up the proverbial pieces. I'm sure I speak for a large number of folks the world over when I say the palpable feeling of relief that the election is just over has lingered well past the closing of the polls late on November 6. And now, as members of both parties, elected officials or not, begin to plant their fingers in their ears and run deaf and screaming headlong into the holidays, an increasingly unlikely Mayan Apocalypse and hopefully not off the "fiscal cliff**," here's a quick trip back into recent history, from the Republican primary through election night via a bunch of election related illustrations that I've scarcely had time to post - please enjoy:

Remember Rick Perry? A piece for Bloomberg View from Nov 2011 contrasting his general approach to that of eventual Republican nominee Mitt Romney.

The spectre of Florida circa 2000 as well as voter fraud and polling place catastrophe was raised by both parties as early as January of 2012. For Bloomberg View.

A favorite piece for the New York Times Op-Ed section about the art of spinning arguments and facts to reinforce any position. The New York Times, September 2012

A poster image for 30Reasons.org, a group of 30 artists and designers who contributed visual representations of arguments for re-electing the president. This was (loosely/abstractly) related to his stand on social issues, which for me was the single largest reason to vote Obama. 

A chart by Kim Bost and I as JMBOTRN breaking down the accuracy of some "non-conventional" national polls, including but not limited to a donut chain, 7-11 and bourbon distillery. For The New York Times, November 2012.

Finally, and you know, most importantly, which candidate would be best equipped to handle a zombie apocalypse? November 2012, Bloomberg View.

Though I'll miss the savory rapid fire illustration gigs like the above, again, regardless of party affiliation, I'll happily raise a glass to the election cycle's end. As always, thanks for reading!

*There were some stinkers too, but i'll leave that to intrepid googlers and schadenfreude aficionados.

**Hip-hop side project somebody? But make it cool. Please.

Seth Macfarlane For NYLON

I'm not always the best portrait illustrator out there, but for some reason whenever i do them for NYLON they turn out pretty alright. This one is Seth Macfarlane, creator of "The Family Guy" and professional bro behind Wahlberg CGI and dude humor vehicle ted. If i sound excessively snarky
about this right out of the gate, please know that it comes from years of childhood ridicule rooted in such late 80s/early 90s ted prefixed fare as "Teddy Grahams", "Teddy Ruxpin" etc, or public luminaries of the Bundy, Danson, Kazinsky and Turner varieties (i'll never forgive him for colorizing Casablanca). Gonna be damn near 100 outside today kiddies. For those about to rock...etc...

The (Questionable) Effectiveness Of The Death Penalty for Bloomberg View

Bloomberg View is a relatively new entity in the world of news opinion and commentary, but even in that short time they've become a favorite illustration client of mine (and I'm sure many other illustrators and designers as well). The pieces are almost always thought provoking, there's a lot of leeway in terms of available imagery and aesthetics, and I love the double edged challenge of the short deadlines and uniform scale for each piece. 

Recently I was contacted by the good folks at BV to illustrate a piece dealing with the (lack) of effectiveness of the death penalty in deterring homicides, and how both sides of the argument have based their cases far more on conjecture, faith and skewed figures rather than hard data. It's a great piece of social commentary and analysis and I was eager to respond with what I hoped would be an equally compelling visual. 

The problem inherent in many of these types of assignments, however, is (for lack of a better way to put it) "getting away with murder." Dealing with such weighty content, it's a slippery slope navigating between pandering via gratuitous overbearing illustrated violence (I'm rarely a fan) and something that comes off as too much of soft second serve, treating the subject too delicately or not seriously enough. Having been burnt a few times in the recent past on a few pieces related to congressional bickering (look out!), I initially opted to tread lightly, before being asked not to ignore the darker elements of the piece. That direction produced the following sketches:

I thought the deflating black balloon or death about to flicked off page by the giant hand of either bureaucracy or crime were shoo-ins, but somehow the skull profile/question mark ended up being the winner. 

This was exciting because A: it was far and away the easiest to execute effectively under the time constraints, and B: because there were a few hours to kill before the deadline it meant I could experiment with approach a little bit. After messing around with some ink and graphite washes with predictable and corn-ball results, i found that a clogged spray paint cap and documentation via a 2 generations old, grossly inadequate when it was new iPhone 3G camera did the trick beautifully. Some mild photo shopping later and I had 2 finals that I was more than excited about, as it's rare that I'm ever so totally, overwhelmingly pleased with something conceptually and as a drawing on its own:

Ultimately the inverted version won out. You can see it in context and read the story (and typically entertaining comments section) here: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-11/the-death-penalty-debate-represents-a-market-failure.html

Thanks for reading!

New One For Draft Magazine...

Here's a new one from my bi-monthly series for Draft Magazine, a story about an out of work writer who rides out some rough economic times by working at Upslope Brewing's cannery.

"Pro-Wrestling Cyclops, The Workplace And You": Undead Illustration #3

Last month* i contributed two illustrations to Institutional Investor. Though the above sketch wasn't used (the finals will be posted as soon as the piece publishes), i just rediscovered it while cleaning up at my studio and felt it was worth a post. The story was on "Market Volatility Becoming The New Normal." Draw your own conclusions.

*Yes, this job was executed during the same period of prolonged fevery illness as this guy.

Animals for the New York Times, With A Quick Word On Researching Your Reference...

Last month i completed the above illustration for The New York Times Travel section, about discounted safari vacation packages. Seemed simple and straight forward enough, i was super happy with the final, and actually arranged to trade the mandrill to a friend of mine for a piece of his own artwork to be decided at a later date. This assignment however, marked the first time i ever had to significantly alter an illustration based on poor photo reference research.  It's been about 2 years since i've taught at an art school but were i in the classroom presently, this would be today's lesson. Here we go, do as i say, not as i did:

The brief for the piece was pretty simple: Safaris are being discounted more heavily than usual due to the depressed economy, and while still expensive, they are certainly significantly less so than they've been in a long while. The client's direction was essentially animals and discounts. Done.  Above is the original sketch... i've used tigers A LOT  in my illustrations in recent years (i've been trying to cut back) but this seemed as good a place as any to trot one out without it seeming like forced illustrator bullsh*t circumstances ("doesn't this guy do anything but paint tigers? c'mon...") as well as expand my usual cast of non-human players for possible allegorical usage later. A quick editorial tweak of the "language" in the piece and the below final ensued.

The problems begin here. A failure to glean from the article that it concerned only African safari tours allowed for the inclusion of the tiger, as my father, the son of a prominent veterinary pathologist succinctly pointed out much to my shame, "There are NO tigers in Africa," a sentiment echoed with increasing snark and indignation in the comments section of the piece on the Times' website (to be fair, i was in the throes of a sinister sinus infection and suffice it to say, "medicated"). Additionally, some intrepid commenters took issue with the bird, which, while there's no way i'll even pretend to describe it's specific phylum, was definitely culled from a Google image search for "safari bird." Ugh. A toucan it is not, but sometimes there's no accounting for taste, artistic license and so on. The last thing i wanted to do was embarrass a favorite and loyal client though, so the switcheroo from tiger to lion and "toucan" (ugh) to mandrill was made. A printed explanation later and all was well, minus my own embarrassment.  Earlier sketches made with the mandrill in more provocative poses such that scrutinous viewers and safari enthusiasts would have absolutely no problem identifying the animal via its specifically tinted posterior have been consigned to my sketchbook and studio visits. 

Moral of story, kids: read the damn article carefully, especially when under the influence of Thera-Flu. And make sure your photo reference corroborates - even if you're going waaaaaaay out on some weirdo limb, better to ground at least a toe or 2 in fact, especially when you're drawing for the world's largest news organization. 

A happier ending: this week i made the below drawing for the Times Op-Ed section, applying some allegorical animal grist (vulture) to a modern Goya-worthy disaster (Arizona). Buried in the comments is praise for the draftsmanship in the illustration, which you'd correctly guess i seldom ever receive. Redemption? Sure, but at the end of the day it's just another lunatic buzzard screaming from a top a picked-clean bison skeleton in the Arizona desert. 

Thanks for reading!

David Sokol Feature For Bloomberg Business Week Or "Yes, I Will Make Your Magazine Feature Look Like My Zines, Sure."

Once in a weird while you get called for what literally qualifies as a dream job - the kind of gig that you play out in your head every now and again that you know the odds of something like that actually going down are completely slim to nil. But once every election cycle or so (and i swear there must be a ancient and deeply uncool Aztec calendar for predicting this sort of thing somewhere in the seldom seen Stonecutters-esque subterranean vaults of the Society Of Illustrators), one of these assignments dings over your email and reminds you why you spent so many hours making endless revisions to that fascinating spot series about the evolution and mysterious disappearance of the spork for European mini mag Blaine Westway Presents: CUTLERY. That having been typed, somebody please, if you're out there, i'll draw yer sporks, actually sounds kinda cool...

Anyhow - in late April i received one such email from Richard Turley over at Bloomberg Business Week. Much and justifiably lauded since its relaunch last year, the new Bloomberg prefixed version of Business Week really is quite the wonder in this age of protracted panic about the future of print based media. Strictly from a design and illustration standpoint, they've been a complete joy to work for as i've seldom been hired for freelance projects where my role in the process and what i could bring to the table seemed so thoroughly and specifically considered. For this project, i was asked if i'd like to illustrate and embellish a feature story about David Sokol, the should've been heir to Warren Buffet currently suffering from a snowballing fall from grace that had finally started to captivate national news attention in spite of the best efforts of all parties involved not to make a scene. Richard had a copy of an older zine of mine called "Health & Science Center" and asked if i could apply a similar treatment to the pages pertaining to the Sokol story. Some images of the printed zine:

With this aesthetic in mind (black line on red background, hand lettered titles, xerox battered photos) i set about attacking sketches given the rough layouts and some photo options:

Originally the story was to be titled "The Latest Temptation of David Sokol" and the only real direction i was given was to avoid direct Biblical imagery to the best of my ability. Also, Buffet was to be shown as "protected" or "sheilding" himself from the fallout. Upon further reading of the story, Sokol was cast as a more ambiguous character than the initial headline suggested, portraying him as a generous philanthropist capable of ruthless and even bullying behavior in business deals, an honest and devoted family man very much in line with Buffet's own public persona but whose behind the scenes actions don't necessarily place him above a few minor crooked deals even though the actual financial gains would be a pittance to someone of his net worth.  

Given all of this i started thinking about the work of Max Beckmann (a long time favorite of mine who often painted from a personalized mythological vocabulary) and Rauschenberg's "illustrations" of The Inferno, works that communicated universal weighty themes by reconfiguring and recombining, or updating mytho archetypes. Corrupting black cloud ripped from Japanese woodcuts is certainly obvious enough, but i was really happy to get the accidentally toppled trash can full of vipers through. As for Buffet, couldn't resist giving him Odin-esque lightning bolt eye-brows (and for the record Thor was a great, stupid popcorn movie, way to make those Kirby costumes look totally believable) as well as a brickwall, moat, and psychedelic forcefield. Ultimately the 70s muscle dude bouncer and the dog got cut, but there was a lot happening in that shot already. With sketches approved, it was off to a 12 hour scanning and drawing marathon that ultimately incorporated scans from my sketchbook to fill in the margins and add to the zine-like feel. Finals and print version below:

Thanks again to Richard and the rest of the gang at Bloomberg for what was definitely one of the most fun and rewarding projects i've ever worked on!

"Super Flu": Undead Illustration #2

Last week i was contacted by The New York Times Magazine to do some illustrated type for a piece on fighting the super flu, a strain of the seasonal menace that's adaptable and resistant to conventional antibiotics. Over a few days i came up with 3 treatments, all of which i was pretty excited about and ultimately the client as well. Unfortunately, just as the art was approved the story ended up being cut altogether, so no ultra gross microscope type to ruin your Sunday brunch next week i'm afraid...
That said, it's always super fun to both flex the Ed Ruscha-worshiping part of my brain and work for the Sunday Magazine, as they're pretty much responsible for a large chunk of my career. Werd. Type treatments below, the bottom version is what would've appeared in the magazine. 

  

 

Panda Bear's "Tom Boy" for NYLON

Last month i got a call from NYLON magazine to do a full page illustration of Panda Bear from Animal Collective to accompany the review of his forthcoming solo album "Tom Boy." Not terribly accustomed to being called for portraits, i was thrilled that the direction was pretty open ended, the only real stipulation being that the piece feel "painterly." It having been a while since i sunk my teeth into some gouache, this was exciting. 

I was very familiar with Mr. Bear's "Person Pitch" album from 2007 and was given a one-time use preview stream of "Tom Boy" to listen to while working on the illustration. From what i could assess from that one listen, the new record dialed up the melancholy undertones and slowed the tempos a little from the previous release. More than ever, the music reminded me of a bizarro world post-Pet Sounds Beach Boys, which in turn set me scrambling through my record collection for the Beach Boys comp "Endless Summer," one of my favorite illustrated LP covers ever. I've attached a jpg below - how cool/creepy are the weathered Wilsons hiding in a psychedelic surf jungle?

Using this as inspiration/homage i concocted the following sketch. The other conceit of this design was that it would grant maximum leeway in terms of nailing the portrait by obscuring a lot of the face with psychedelic flowers. 

This was then translated to the final below:

Coming off the Fashion Week process and some design related work i've been up to, it felt really great to do something of the "hands dirty" painted approach again. Thanks for reading!