The Gorilla Chef digital painting is what I gave my wife as her Valentine’s Day Card. Here is the one she made me:
As is our new tradition, she always features our cats in all of the cards she makes. That is Zoidberg driving the back hoe, and Leela is riding in the shovel. This also commemorates the shitloads of snow we got the weekend before Valentine’s Day. Good times.
I finished this year’s Valentine’s Day card in the nick of time, minutes before my wife arrived home from work yesterday. It is a digital painting featuring two of her favorites: A gorilla and our cat Leela.
I feel a little bad not including our other cat Dr. Zoidberg, but he was too fat to fit in the bowl. I let both cats audition for the part by putting the bowl on the counter, and just letting them play around with it. Zoidberg could get his head and a paw in there, while Leela was able to get her whole self in. Here they are posing together for the reference photo that I ended up using:
And here are details of the painting.
My wife and I are involved in this 12-week exercise program affiliated with MIT called Getfit. It is designed to motivate you to exercise by giving you weekly goals in minutes. They also provide a bunch of little events and such to encourage participants to interact with each other for support. One of these events is a contest to design the annual Getfit t-shirt which is given out to all participants after the 12 weeks are completed. As a guy who designs t-shirts professionally, I figured I might as well enter:
Today, I was notified that my design was not chosen as a finalist. From what I’ve been told, this should not have been surprising news. My design, while meeting all the contest requirements, was just a little too wacky for the conservative-minded committee that chooses these things. I think they should reconsider their standards. I say, if you are going to give out a free t-shirt to promote your event, why not make it the kind of design that stands out? In fact, I will do my part to help them reconsider by vowing to re-submit this exact same design (with different year, of course) EVERY YEAR until it is not only chosen as a finalist, but actually wins the contest. Full disclosure: this year isn’t actually the first time I submitted this design…
My wife teaches biology at MIT, but in her spare time knows her way around a set of colored pencils. I always say she’s a much better artist than I am a scientist, and the proof is in this X-mas card she made for me.
This drawing commemorates the time my cat Zoidberg was working on a painting of Macho Man Randy Savage, and I came along and stepped all over it, then ran around the house yelling and making a mess like the greased-up def guy on Family Guy. It is based on a true story.
Here is the X-mas card I made for my wife this year:
As usual, my card to my wife needed to include a primate. It is becoming difficult to figure out news ways to include them, but I like this one. I like the idea that instead of elves, Santa just has a team of monkeys slaving in his workshop. There are details I would have liked to include but just ran out of time before X-mas. Next December, this will be the card I print and make available for the public to purchase, and around that time, I’ll go back in and finish it. In case it isn’t obvious, this is a digital painting. I hope ‘all like it.
After a year and a half of doing nothing but digital paintings, I thought it was finally time to once again pick up a real paint brush and get my hands dirty. Here’s a painting I did for my friend Jeff. It’ a portrait of Macho Man Randy Savage.
I can’t take all the credit for this. My cat Zoidberg made a contribution with some paw prints, and it was my wife who suggested that Macho Man should be holding something. I figured a Teddy Bear was a perfect fit. I didn’t know Macho Man in person, but I doubt he hated Teddy Bears.
I have awesome musician friends in a band called Underwoman and the believers. Currently, they are climbing up the rankings in a contest that could land them recording studio time with a Grammy Award-winning producer. Basically, this stage of the competition involves straight-up social media hits on pretty much all the major outlets, and even some older ones you may not realize exist. Anyway, check out this beautiful song. Then, go to as many of the following links and like or follow or whatever the specifics call for. Thanks, y’all! We artists have to stick together.
LIKE:
1. Underwoman and the Believers on Facebook
FOLLOW:
3. https://twitter.com/
4. https://soundcloud.com/
5. https://vimeo.com/
FRIEND:
6. http://www.myspace.com/
You guys are awesome, thanks in advance for voting n’ stuff!
Here is this year’s b-day card to my wife. As usual, it features a primate. He is running a marathon on rollerskates, sporting the same number that my wife will be wearing this November when she runs the New York Marathon.
I was really bummed that I didn’t get as much time as I would have liked to work on this. I wanted there to be spectators with signs, as well as other runners in the composition. Also, I think the monkey could be cuter. Anyway, I was busy drawing caricatures of all the personal trainers at my gym. It was a fun project, but I wish I had more time for other stuff. Anyway, this b-day card was done quickly, so I guess that means I am getting a bit faster. I suppose I better get started on the X-mas card now if I want it to be any good, though. I can probably only dedicate 5-10 hours per week to art these days, now that I’m starting to get more personal trainer clients.
It took me all summer, but I finally finished my latest digital painting:
I know that Wimpy doesn’t sound like Edward G. Robinson, but that’s the voice I imagine him to have when I look at this painting. “Those burgers are mine, see! Let go of ’em, or else it’s curtains for ya!” And if Wimpy is Edward G. Robinson, then it’s fun to imagine Peter Lorre as The Hamburglar. “You stupid fat man! I may have brought a knife to a gun fight, but I doubt you even know how to use that thing!” Whoever wins this dual, I think it’s safe to say that sometimes crime DOES pay.
I’m pretty happy with how the gun came out. Drawing mechanical objects and props isn’t my specialty, but I think I pulled it off OK this time.
It’s been a long time since I posted, and that’s because I’ve been busy trying to finish this:
I am not exactly sure why I did this, but I think it sums me up as a person. It is not all that polished of a digital painting, but it is as tight as I’m ever going to get. The subject matter is typical American life in the 2010’s from the prospective of innocence. I don’t really know what that last sentence means. Anyway, there are details in this painting that I’m hoping people find and appreciate. Here’s a partial list:
Let me know if you see any other details you like. I believe this is my most important work so far. I’m hoping this painting can change the world at least a little bit.
