I Did This Piece For The Magnanimous Meg Hunt's New Endeavor Art For Japan, An Auction She Organized

The first thing I will tell you is: there's a zine I'm putting out called Damn Fine Coffee! A Twin Peaks Fan Zine.

The second thing is: the owls are not what they seem.

The third thing is: Damn Fine Coffee! debuts this year at SPX.

That's right! You may have been seeing some awesome work floating around for the zine I'm putting together: Damn Fine Coffee! A Twin Peaks Fan Zine. I will be at SPX this year where you can get your hands on it and feast your eyes on Twin Peaks homages by over 30 incredibly talented artists.

Damn Fine Coffee! will be going into production soon, and I'll be posting updates on availability, price, and the possibility of pre-orders (because folks have been asking, which is very exciting) here on my blog. You can also check out my twitter for quick updates too.

Here's the cover and a quick sampling of some of the rad work you'll find in the zine by Ping Zhu, Gant Powell, and Ryan Fortney.

The support and the excitement from everybody has been really encouraging so thanks and stay tuned!

it's happening #TalesFromAeaea

Here's a strip I recently completed for Benn Ray of Atomic Books' "Said What?" collection of over-heards. You can read more strips by various artists on the Mutant Funnies blog.

I had the pleasure of working with Francois Vigneault at Scout Books again, on an illustrated set of their blank mini notebooks. My theme was, fantastically, the cosmos, so I went completely indulgent with this and decked out the constellations Virgo, Capricorn, and Perseus in gleaming gold armor. My kind of project! This was a lot of fun and I'm psyched to have been paired with the talented Lisa Perrin whose beautifully illustrated set will be released in conjunction.

If you're in Baltimore a week from today, we will both be at Trohv in Hampden for a little release party for the notebooks from 6 - 8pm. Stop by, pick up a set and say hello! Event page here. Hope to see you there!

I had the opportunity to work with Meg Mateo Ilasco at Anthology Magazine recently for their 2013 Winter and Spring issues. Here's my illustration for their seasonal Screen Play article and a map (which I rarely get the chance to do!) for their feature on Oakland. These were both uniquely-proportioned layouts and so this was a fun exercise. Anthology is a beautifully designed and curated magazine, so if you haven't already, definitely check it out!

-

EDIT: I'd credited Anh-Minh Le as my art director initially, whereas Anh-Minh is the editor of Anthology. My mistake! 

Here's a little preview of a new assignment I'm working on, which is very vague, but I'm having fun with it, and will hopefully be able to show you the final product soon.  Pulling together some reference for this one, I discovered that the white ermine moth might be one of the prettiest insects I've ever seen.

Do you have any tutorials for painting with gouache? I really want to learn some techniques!

I did this process post on my gouache techniques a little while ago. It's a really fun medium but it can be tricky when you're first learning it. The biggest issue folks seem to have is that, since it's water soluble, you really can't work back into it too much, at least not at all like you would with acryllic. I tend to work very graphically with gouache so laying down flat areas of color next to flat areas of color suits me as much as does the medium. You can layer over it, it just takes a bit of practice until you nail your preference for applying your paint down.

Other tips! I find inking brushes work very nicely (I like Winsor & Newton 222 Cotman). Stonehenge brand paper has a great tooth for painting with gouache. Look for a yogurt-like consistency when you're loading your brush with paint. And, I always tell the students I do demos for this, but - for serious inspiration, if you want to see an artist who really kills at gouache and in a little more painterly style, check out Israel Sanchez (his work is fantastic).

Good luck! Have fun!

A new little piece for the New York Times Op Ed about disparity in taxes, which just went up yesterday evening. I enjoy suit-guy's ape-like arms. Thanks to AD Alexandra Zsigmond. You can read the article online here.

___

HOW DID I NOT KNOW PING WAS ON TUMBLR. FORGIVE ME, PING! I'm super late on the game, so everyone is following her by now, right? Because everyone loves beautiful things, right?

life is better with colors.

Bat boy!

This little cutie was the subject of another gouache demo given to illustration students at MICA. He's the finish of this work-in-progress shot.

I love him...