An Oldie

City Levels

Ink on Arches

Just an old ink drawing that I did as a study for a larger painting . 

Cuckoo's Nest Drawings

Nurse Rached

Graphite, 9"x13"

Shock Shop

Graphite,8.5"x11"

The Ward

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

Mac

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

The Escape

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

Arrival of Mac

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

Chief Bromden

Graphite, 8.5"x11"

When I began the MFA program at the University of Hartford back in 2007 the first class I was enrolled in was known as the "Dream Assignment Class". This class was supposed to guide us along in the direction that we were going to head in for the thesis project, or at least get the wheels turning. This class was completely open ended and as the name suggests was to encourage complete creative freedom.

At first I thought I really wanted to do some Illustrations pertaining to Ken Kesey's , One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. We were supposed to show up on the first day of class with six potential compositions. So in this post I am including the six drawings in which I showed up with that day as well as the final drawing(Nurse Rached) I did during that week at Hartford. Similar to most of my classmates, my thesis project took a completely different turn from where things started in this class. I am thinking about going back and finishing all of these pieces in a digital format.. We'll see.

Random Quakers

Over the last few weeks I have been working on a project , which involves illustrating some old CT., folklore. For one of them I thought that I was going to go in the direction of one of the sketches below. I needed an image of a confused or out right crazy Quaker woman. So the sketches below are some of what I came up with, although none will end up being used for this particular project, I do enjoy them as stand alone drawings .

Crazed Quaker 1

Quaker 2

Young Quaker girl

with thumbnail of old crazed woman

Old Quaker Woman

Wagon Wheel Final

Wagon Wheel Rough
Graphite 8"x8"

The earlier Wagon Wheel post was a quick look at some of the preliminary drawings, thumbnails, and doodles I used to arrive at the final. This has been a fun project where I was given complete artistic freedom. When asked to create this piece , I was not given any real guidelines other than to make something fun and cool. Even though it is to be used for a rock climbing related business,(The Wagon Wheel Co-Opt), I was told that it didn't have to do much at all with climbing.

In some ways this is great to have this sort of freedom to create, and in other ways makes it tough due to all he directions in which it could go. We went through various concepts, such as a Pulp style cover, a simple shot of a camper, and a few others. In the end I came up with this final sketch. One might ask how does this relate to climbing, Hueco Tanks, or the Wagon Wheel ?

In my eyes it goes like this:

There is a climber who is in transit, crash pad upon his back, accompanied by his trusty canine companion. They are stuck in a city, that I hope resembles El Paso, which is near where the Wagon Wheel is located. In the air above is a dream bubble in which contains the thoughts of both the dog and the climber about how great getting to their campground at the Wagon Wheel will be. So included is imagery of their girlfriends awaiting their arrivals, one of their friends floating around with golf clubs, and of course an image of Hueco Tanks North Mountain in the back ground. Also they are both thinking about how much easier life would be if they had a jet powered camper to fly from climbing area to climbing area.

The final painting will be acrylic on panel with some digitally integrated items/text.!

Rickshaw Challenge

As all guys, I of course have a dream vehicle . For some it is a red Porsche, for others it might be an old school Camaro, or maybe a Benz or a sporty Beamer. For whatever reason we are born with inherited attractions to certain things ,whether it be a particular color, a flavor of soda, or a type of music. If you know me , or have had a good look at this blog and my art it should come as no surprise that my dream ride would be a pimped out Tuk Tuk or Rickshaw.

Ever since my first experience whipping around in one of these high powered go carts in South East Asia I have been obsessed with them. Not quite sure what it is about them that makes me so obsessed. Maybe it is the fact that they still embody the old school design relative to vintage vehicles of yesterday. In the modern world of today this style of design has been left behind. Except for in developing parts of the world, where this style still strives. Due to its small size, in large congested cities , old school Tuk Tuk's can be seen out maneuvering the most modern of vehicles. Perhaps my connection with this comes from growing up as the son of a guy who loved to drive old clunkers. When I was just a baby I was carted around in an old Chevy Vega, then an old Ford F 1-50, followed by a 1970's Bronco, a 1970's El camino, and in current times my Pop's still drives a 1970 Chevy Nova.

Vintage Chevy Vega

At any rate there is something I love about these three wheeled vehicles in which has driven me to create numerous pieces of illustration about them. I believe that in Thailand these little machines are referred to as Tuk Tuk's , whether they are powered by a motor or by a human. In India they are known as Rickshaws, and I am unsure of the name they go by in places like Cambodia and elsewhere, but different variations exist in many parts of the world. Tuk Tuks, and Rickshaws , etc. come in many styles and colors, and are commonly decorated to suite the drivers tastes. In this post I have included some paintings that I have done illustrating Thai Tuk Tuk's found in and around the Capitol Bangkok. Also included are numerous photo's in which I took of various Tuk Tuk's throughout Thailand and Cambodia, and an example of the Rickshaw found in India.

Bkk, Tuk Tuk Ride
24"x48"
Acrylic on panel

Tuk Tuk Driver
5"x5"
Acrylic on Panel

Tuk Tuk Sketches
Graphite on paper

Indian Rickshaw

Thai Tuk Tuk Taxi Bus in Ayutthayah

Cambodian Taxi Tuk Tuk

View of Angkor from Tuk Tuk

Bkk Tuk Tuk

Bkk night Tuk Tuk

Bkk Tuk Tuk 2

Bicycle Tuk Tuk , Chiang Mai

Southern Thai Style Tuk Tuk

Aonang

Currently I am trying to assemble a team to participate in something known as the Rickshaw Challenge, check it out at: http://rickshawchallenge.com/

If all goes well we plan to partake in the event this coming July. It seems like a wild, fun way to see India. So far I have a few friends on board and it looks like it is going to happen. Hopefully I am going to create a blog dedicated to this endeavor, as well as have a benefit art show to try and help fund things. I believe that a lot of the money that in which it costs to participate goes to charity in India, something that makes it more appealing to me as well.

Below are a few fun videos, one in which I slapped together quickly from some old footage, and another of someone doing some Rickshaw stoppy stunts!! Enjoy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAwenLnBnLs&feature=related

Thai Tuk Tuk Ride 2007

New Compositions

  Recently I traveled to San Francisco with my MFA group. Each time we travel to a new place we are required to create a piece of art work that somehow relates to our trip. So the top image is a sketch for that assignment. I wanted to do an image of one of the many street performers that are throughout the streets of San Fran.. I did not want to just create an image of the performer simply standing in the street, nor did I want it to be just a close up portrait of a random performer.  It is important for me to capture more than just the person but I wanted to capture a feeling of the wild streets full of people, trolly cars, wild pastel buildings,  and whatever else. The image of  downtown San Fran will be painted within the reflection of the trumpet which will lend itself well to creating an image  of the windy streets of San Fran and also the distorted style I enjoy working in.

The second image is for my Forth thesis painting and depicts my interpretation of Tonsai Bay in Thailand. Tonsai bay is an amazing place, for a rock climber and artist like myself it is a paradise for sure. Mornings are spent climbing many of the limestone formations that shoot out from the beautiful blue sea. When it gets to hot in the afternoon one can relax on the beach and take a swim. Once it cools of again in the afternoon it s time to climb once again. Rest days are spent painting on the beach.When the day is over most spend there nights in a bungalow located within the jungle in hills close to the beach. Bungalows in Tonsai cost anywhere from 10 dollars to 500 dollars in the fancy resorts on Railay.

I usually go for the 10 dollar deal of course, which has always been just fine. When living in a bungalow you are sharing space with spiders, goats, gecko's, snakes, centipedes and of course the Thai oversized tree rats known as monkeys. Although these little devils are quit cute and fun to watch they can be quite nasty. My friends bungalow was ram sacked by a bunch of these cheeky little creatures on a few different occasions. Inside it looked like a bomb went off. Everything was thrown about, electrolyte drink mix, cereal, climbing gear, bananas , you name it , and they even stole a few things. Rumor has it that a friend of mines Ipod was stolen once by a monkey raid.

I myself have had a few run ins with them as well. My bungalow had an outdoor bathroom.

Perched a top it many a mornings was a rather big monkey. If I came near him he would hiss, show his fangs, and once even tried to pee on my head. So needles to say I at times was not able to take care of my business until he was done with his.

There have been other reports of climbers being attacked while climbing , and also rumors of monkeys dropping rocks done from the cliff on top of people at the local bar that sits below the cliff. As nasty as they can be I still certainly get a kick out of watching them, and after all they were there first. 

So the illustration is going to be of a climber being heckled by a few monkeys.

One will have a camera and the other may have an ipod, in which maybe they looted from some poor saps bungalow.Both will be laughing/snarling as they heckle and drop things upon the climber. The bungalows below will have some signs of the modern world, such as a radar dish or cell phone tower.We of course in the year 2009 are beginning to see more and more development in remote places such as Tonsai. So I hope to make a bit of reference to that by depicting the monkeys with the camera and ipod, and technology  in other areas of the composition.

This is a theme I hope to explore more of. Globalization and its effects on remote places.I hope to question what things will be like in 50 years from now. It makes me question or not if places like Tonsai will be able to with stand its high number of visitors amongst its fragile jungle environment.