Disney Fan Art in under 2 hours

I recently came across a really great blog called 'Planet-Pulp'. Each month there is a theme posted, and then the artists involved post their art, based on that theme. If you are familiar with 'Art Jumble', it's kind of the same thing. Only instead of weekly topics, it's monthly. And I think they are more selective about their artists. I submitted a request to join, but haven't heard back yet, so who knows.... Oh well, it doesn't matter. I decided to play along anyway. Especially since this month's theme is 'Disney Villains'. I wanted to pick a Villain that wasn't one of the more popular ones, and for whatever reason, I happened to think of Madame Medusa from 'The Rescuers'. Once I started sketching, I knew just how it needed to look. And she is right out of the 1970s, which is so awesome.

My goal with this piece was to keep it simple, and to time myself on it. I have the problem of spending way too much time working on a piece, even ones that should be done rather quickly. So this one was done in about an hour & 40 min. I could have spent more time on it. I actually had some great ideas about making a diamond patterned background and maybe adding her pet gators. But maybe that will come some other day. This timing exercise was inspired by Shane at 'Horror Business' and his Poison Ivy post.

Since I'm on the topic of Disney, I'm going to continue on here a bit. I love Disney, or at least the Disney that I grew up with. And I love Disney fan art. It's very interesting to see different artists, who work in different media, take on established cartoon characters.

I've been wanting to pick up this book:

I found out about it awhile back, and put it on my Amazon shopping list. Today I found this great video of someone flipping through their copy, and now I think this book will be moving up on the list.

In the meantime, if you want to look at a LOAD of Disney fan art, go to deviantART. There is good stuff, there is bad stuff, there is bizarre stuff. Search 'Disney Fan Art', 'Disney Retro', or type in the name of your favorite character or movie. Heck or for that matter, just type in anything you like, and see what comes up. I discovered Andrew Barr's work for the first time while searching 'Manos: Hands of Fate' and found Leigh Young by searching 'The Young Ones'.

That website is my favorite time waster. (Even though I have my own page there, I don't update it very much). And I'm on there everyday, because I signed up to follow this 'BBC Sherlock' fan art group, and they post like 300 things a day. So I have to go through every day and weed out the ones I don't want in the watch folder, or it will get out of control!

Maybe you'll get another Disney Villain out of me before the month is over. Right now I've got to work on some other things. Definitely go check out Planet Pulp's Disney Villains!

Gallery 1988's 'Is This Thing On 2: The Weird Year' & Me!

Impolite and...

So last week I mentioned that I was going to have a piece in the upcoming group show 'Is This Thing On 2' at Gallery 1988. I decided to do Sir Simon Milligan & Manservant Hecubus from the sketch comedy show 'The Kids in the Hall'. Its funny, because I had thought about drawing these characters awhile back and then kind of forgot about it. This show presented me with the perfect opportunity to go forward with the piece. I did spend some time rewatching a bunch of 'Kids' episodes that I hadn't seen in many years. It gave me lots of other ideas of characters I could have done for this show, but I ran out of time.

So here is a pic of print #1, in it's frame before I shipped it off to California:

The show opens tomorrow (3.9.12), and will be hosted by Weird Al! I wish that I could attend, but I'm a long ways away from L.A. My art will be there though, and that is super exciting for me. Ever since G1988 began doing 'Crazy 4 Cult', I've dreamed of being a part of one of these shows and now it's finally happening.

And I leave you with the first appearance of Sir Simon Milligan & Manservant Hecubus:

Do not avoid the puppies of purgatory....

New 'Monsters & Mates' piece

I got another of my 'Monsters & Mates' pieces done. This is #4, and it's from 1932's 'The Mummy'. So I'm now down to the last piece, 'The Wolf Man'. I have no idea if that one's going to come together or not. I've been doing sketches for it on and off for months and nothing looks good. Well, maybe it will come together soon. Doing these has been fun, so I will probably expand this idea a bit further. Maybe do 'Dracula's Daughter', 'The Black Cat', 'The Mummy's Curse'. Or maybe use this same style, but get into the Hammer films. I also thought about doing a series based on Val Lewton's films. I just don't know. I've got tons of other stuff to do, so we shall see which path I decide to take. That is, after the dreaded Wolf Man piece is done.

I'm in Galleries...

Hey everybody, I just wanted to share some exciting news with you all. First, I'm going to have my debut at Gallery1988 in the upcoming group show 'Is This Thing On? 2: The Weird Year'. The show opens next Friday. If you live in or near L.A., you should check it out. I bet it's going to be amazing. I'll be posting my piece for the show here on the blog very soon.

AND, I've got myself a little 2'x6' patch of wall at a new local gallery called 'ZaPow'. I feel right at home there, since their focus is on illustrative, comic, pop culture art rather than 'fine art'. It's an amazing place and I'm so thrilled to be part of it. Right now I'm selling my prints, but I'm thinking of expanding and doing some original cut paper pieces as well as some greeting cards. And for those of you who like my Halloween art, I plan to have some of those printed up around the end of August, to sell at ZaPow during Sept. & Oct.

I took a couple of not so great photos, but you get the idea. To get a better look at their space, check out their website.

Awkward...

Wow! Three posts, three days in a row! I can hardly believe it's true. Here is an new entry in the 'Monsters & Mates' series I've been doing. The Frankenstein Creature & The Bride. I was so thrilled with the Dracula piece, that I couldn't wait to start on another of these. Overall, I guess I'm okay with the way this one turned out. I was working on it late last night & this morning, and was in serious danger of beginning to hate it. There reaches a point when I'm working on something, that I find stuff I don't like, and I try to change it. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. If it's not working, that usually means I need to go back to the sketch book and re-draw it. I actually started working on this last Sunday. I did the bodies, but decided that the faces I did, weren't working, so I re-drew them. This looks tons better than my original, but I'm still not sure I did enough adjusting.

Well, it is what it is. I can always draw it again.

Re-vamped Harley Quinn

Awhile back I joined a blog/group called 'Art Jumble'. The idea behind is that once a week, a new topic is announced, and artists are invited to submit art that falls under said topic. I contributed a few times, but not nearly as much as I would have liked. I really wanted to begin doing it with some regularity with the turning of 2012. But for reasons unknown to me, the moderator (or moderators) have not updated the topic at the blog for months now. I did want to start doing the monthly challenge over at the Classic Horror Film Board again, but I also wanted to do some other things that were pop culture related, but not necessarily horror. So I began to search around for something that was similar to Art Jumble. What I found was 'The Weekly TAB (Themed Art Blog)'. I've been a member for about a month now, and I finally got my first piece done, right at the last minute. The theme was DC characters re-vamped, so I went with Batman villainess, Harley Quinn. I had several ideas sketched out, and I would have liked to have done more with it, but I was just trying to get in on this topic.

I've got some exciting news to announce soon, and more art on the way. 2012 started out slow, but I'm trying to make up for lost time. Be back soon...

May the Force be with you and stuff...

I was recently commissioned by a friend to do two Star Wars pieces for him to have signed a con he was attending. This would be the third time that I've done SW pieces for him, and I realized that I never actually posted them here. So here is some of my Star Wars pieces.

Chewbacca & Darth Vader, 2012. These two pieces are the most recent.

Luke and Leia, Mid-2010. The matching twin set.

Lando, Early 2010.

So there you have it! Every Star Wars piece I've done to date. May the force be with you...