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Two art- and design-related things.

Thursday, July 23rd, 2009

1. After seeing Marty the Sock Puppet Portrait-Maker, I was reminded of an artist I saw a few years back named Travis Louie. I don’t know much about him, except every time I see his work it makes me feel good all over. He’s famous for doing black and white slash sepia-toned Victorian-style portraits of people that aren’t quite… right. This wouldn’t work as well if Travis didn’t have such excellent painting skills. He really captures the misty quality of those early photographs. And he captures it with horns. And fangs.

I’ve really been wanting to make vintage-looking work lately (see failed attempted at pirate tugboat and sea monster) and after seeing the sideshow posters at the Meadowlands Fair and remembering Travis Louie’s work, I’m going to try my hand at something in between the two. I don’t want to talk too much about it, mainly because I’m not really sure what I’m going to do, but keep an eye peeled for stuff of this ilk.

2. A few years ago, I was paging through a Martha Stewart Weddings magazine and I saw a great cake covered with little ferns and mushrooms made of marzipan and buttercream. I absolutely loved the little forest elements and decided someday, if I ever get married, I will have a cake similar to that. The other day, while perusing one of my design blogs, there was a link to something on Martha’s wedding site and I thought, well, since I’m here, I should see if they have that cake I liked. And they did! I was so very happy.

I don’t particularly like how squat the cake is, or how rounded the edges are, but the forest elements continue to be awesome. While I was looking at cakes there, I saw this forest cake as well. I am a sucker for branches (I like them in flower arrangements and wreathes and paintings and jewelry, just about everything) so, sho’ nuff, I liked this cake.

I would now like to amend my earlier statement: If I ever get married, I would like the branch cake, but with fewer branches and with moss and ferns and mushrooms and a couple snails and ladybugs and a few birds on it. Because it will be my special day, and if I want a cake that resembles a compost heap in the middle of the woods, I can have that. Thank you.

Posted in My Art/Design/Business, New York, Random Art Bloggery, Teh Intarwebz | No Comments »

Marty the Sock Puppet Portrait Maker.

Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009

I was walking through Union Square this past weekend, and they had a wee art show but I was meeting Z. for lunch, however afterwards I made a point to check it out. I saw one small booth that caused me to laugh. It was for sock puppet portraits, but what caused the tittering was that underneath the primary sign was a secondary sign saying, “The Ultimate Gift of Love”. That was it. I now had to purchase some portraits. I got to meet the portrait-maker, Marty. This is Marty.

Marty has maybe the best hawker thing going. The sock puppets, while lovely, are not anything revolutionary. What makes them oh-so-special is that each one has a name, and a tale to tell, and a MySpace page. (As Marty said, “Even though MySpace is an all-but-defunct social networking methodology, it is still the place for sock puppets.”) I chose three nerdy portraits (Shock! Surprise! So out of character for me! Sarcasm!) which I will share with you now:

– Charles Darwin (from the “Three Guys Named Charles” series, the other two are Charles Dickens and Charles in Charge)
– Herb Bloomquist (a professor of something-or-other)
– Harold Speculex (an accomplished scientist and a model-plane enthusiast)

I must say, going to their MySpace pages and learning them is fine and dandy, but it is so much better to have Marty explain their life stories to you face to face. I believe he’s rockin’ the art booth scene in Union Square on the weekends all summer – if you get a chance, go check him out.

And here’s his site: www.martystuff.com

Oh, and here are pictures of my wee sock portraits:

Posted in New York, Random Art Bloggery, Teh Intarwebz | No Comments »

A post. With chatting. And charting.

Wednesday, July 1st, 2009

This past weekend I went on my first business-related trip, to Orlando. I hear there’s some kind of amusement park there, but I wouldn’t know, because I was driven directly from the airport to the Dolphin Hotel Resort and Conference Center of Gigantitude. Seriously, it was a big big building, like the size of the entire Palisades Mall. To walk from your room to the conference area required thousands of steps to be taken. On my ride to the hotel I saw many pine trees covered with Spanish moss, some egrets, bog-type things and housing complexes. That’s it. The only way I knew I was near Disney-anything was when I saw people in the hotel wearing Mickey ear hats. Did you know there’s a variety of ear-hats? I saw someone wearing a pair that was covered in pink fluffy material and had a veil in the back, because apparently this woman was on her honeymoon or something wedding-y like that. Here’s the sad thing, though: the veil wasn’t white. It was an unpleasant shade of light yellow-brown, like it had been soaked in tea. An even more depressing possibility is the veil-n-ears were fifty years old and the lady wore it all the time, all delusional and out-of-touch. “I’m a bride today!” “Yes, yes, Grandma. We know, today you marry Pop-Pop and drive around in the turquoise convertible Chevrolet. Whatever you say.” I would like to talk to the marketing guy who thought that was a good idea. “Well, we could have a white veil, but everyone does that. Let’s make a color that looks like someone tinkled on it, that’ll really complement the faux pink fur.”

So, due to the fact that I was there for work, I saw nothing, not even the fireworks, so I can’t tell you anything about my trip that’s interesting (the hotel has carpeting! And complimentary soap! You can get room service if you want!), but in a semi-related point, I make a great many charts of various things here at my place of employment. That means I am always on the lookout for new and awesome ways to express information through charts. I’ve found a few ones on my travels through Ye Olde Internette that I will share with you now. They are from a website called Good.

And not from Good, but a personal favorite of mine:

Posted in Charts, Random Art Bloggery, Stuff, Teh Intarwebz | No Comments »

Say it ain’t so.

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009

I found this wonderful blog entry on The Sneeze.

http://www.thesneeze.com/2009/how-to-tell-if-your-state-sucks.php

In short, it says that if you are on a state website and within one click you see a picture of a hot-air balloon, the state is mega ultra lame-o. And I laughed and enjoyed that, but then I decided to check the New York State website, you know, just to make sure. And then… sadness.

It’s peekin’ off there on the right, but it’s undeniable. Hot-air balloon on New York tourism website = New York sucks. Plus the name “Letchworth” isn’t helping at all.

Posted in New York, Teh Intarwebz | No Comments »

Oh, that can’t be right.

Saturday, June 13th, 2009

People, I present to you… The Sashimi Tabernacle Choir.

http://www.evilmadscientist.com/article.php/sashimichoir

Posted in Random Art Bloggery, Stuff, Teh Intarwebz | No Comments »

I’m starting to think of everything like those Facebook quizzes.

Wednesday, June 10th, 2009

Celebrities I look like:

Judah Friedlander

Eugene Mirman

Opus the Penguin

Things I Don’t Like That Everyone Else Seems To Like:

Torchiere Lamps

Parmesan Cheese

NPR

Posted in Stuff, Teh Intarwebz | 2 Comments »

Maybe something I should make a piece about soon.

Tuesday, June 9th, 2009

First, a thoughtful spammy message brought to you by the caring folks who sell prescription drugs over the internet:

Generate love inefficacy can be caused neurologic, viscera the vascular, medicamentous and neighbourhood saloon reasons which are the imperative shadow erectile dysfunctions. There is a unconscious method more commonly, at which hopeless with erection be up to to ditty’s feet.

I can’t even FATHOM what this means. But for some reason, it’s really really intriguing. I can tell you, if I ever become a superhero or a Nordic warrior, I want to be Viscera the Vascular.

So, my mom told me about this poem by a French man named Jacques Prevert. She translated it for me, and it is delightful and would make a wonderful series of pieces, or a small book, or something like that. I’m going to give it more thought and try to figure out how best to illustrate it.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

The Song of the Snails Who Went to a Funeral

Two snails went off
To the funeral of an autumn leaf
Their shells were black
Crepe draped around their eye stalks
They go off in the dark
On a beautiful autumn night
Alas when they arrive
It is already springtime
The leaves that had died
Have all resuscitated
And the two snails
Are very disappointed
But here comes the sun
The sun says to them
Do take the trouble
The trouble to sit down
Have a glass of beer
If your heart so desires
Take if you please
A bus ride to Paris
You will see the country
But do not keep on mourning
I’m telling you that
It darkens the white of the eye
And makes one ugly
The stories of coffins
Are sad and not pretty
Take back your own colors
The colors of life
Then all the animals
The trees and the plants
Begin to sing
To sing out loud
The true living song
The song of summer
And everyone had a drink
And everyone got tipsy
It’s a very beautiful evening
And the two snails
Made their way home
They were very moved
Because they had had lots to drink
They staggered a wee bit
But up there in the sky
The moon watched over them.

Posted in My Art/Design/Business, Stuff, Teh Intarwebz | 1 Comment »

Two artists I think are very cool and I want to share with you.

Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009

Since not much is going on other than work in my world right now, I thought I would take some time out and tell you about two artists I am very fond of. One is Jeremy Fish. He is an illustrator/painter/designer who seems to know no bounds. I can’t really pinpoint why I love his work so much, but I think it has to do with his incredible use of a very limited palette and his excellent brushwork. Also, Jeremy Fish’s marriage of the cute and the creepy is great. No one else in my family likes his work, mainly because he uses skulls so much, but I live alone and need to take no one else’s opinions into consideration, which is why I have one of his pieces on my wall.

Here’s the logo to his website:

A pic of the man himself in his studio:

An album cover for Aesop Rock:

A magazine cover for Juxtapoz:

A hotel room Jeremy Fish painted (I must stay there one day):

Some pics from his Rome exhibition:

And, apparently, he even designed a marital aid:

He is also famous for designing skateboards, shoes, pillows, vinyl figures, etc. You can check out his work on his website, silly pink bunnies.

The other artist I wanted to share is Pete Fowler. I learned about him when I went to Kid Robot for the first time. I fell in love with his vinyl figures, and that was the beginning of my collection. He does these computer illustrations of woodland-dwelling oddities that look like they belong in a suburban basement with wood paneling and brick-colored shag carpeting, so much are they a throwback to the late ’60s slash early ’70s. I just find his work charming and delightful and sweet and eccentric.

Here is a flyer he designed, I assume for the series of vinyl characters “Pets and Their Owners” (which I really need to get):