It's been a long time...

...and so, I finally got my holiday-themed piece, "Santa Dali" done for Dan Taylor's mini-comix "Pork Chop". I can't recall the last time I put ink to bristol board and crafted a little comix nugget, must be close, too damn close, to twenty years. It felt good to make marks like that, to play with ideas and words. The final piece is closer to an illustrated ramble than a true, traditional panel and speech balloon comic, but still laid down nicely. One thing I enjoyed was re-engaging with the physical act of art making. It is a renewal of spirit for me and connects me to the world in ways this old laptop and the intertubes never will. Is this the beginning of a new chapter in my life as a underground comix artist? We shall see. In the meantime, there's a little taste of my efforts. I'll post the final three-page story as soon as the printed edition hits the streets.

Zahdah.

OK HW

Dali Doodle

Another surrealist, this time the godfather of them all, Salvador Dali. I've always appreciated Dali's style, his ability to extend his brand through the decades. He was doing the personality as pop-art cultural icon thing a long time before Andy W. was even thinking about art. Dali was way-out there, but had the power of weirdness and high, natural talent on his side, so laid his particular flavor of gravity down and the world flowed around him.

I did this drawing as he needed to be part of my little sketchbook of surrealist, but also because I'm working on a short holiday-themed comix piece for a pub out of Austin, Texas called "Pork Chop". Let's just say that Mr. Dali figures prominently in the storyline...

OK HW

Another view of Oscar

Here's a better shot of the sketch of Oscar Dominguez sketch. I used a better camera with a bigger lens, so a lot more detail is there.

OK HW

I'm not dead yet...

Wow, where has the year gone? So, I've been lazy about posting. Acknowledge-move on.

Here is my latest sketch of a surrealist. This time, Oscar Dominguez, whom I know nothing.

I picked him because he had a great face, reminded me of Ernie Kovacs (he deserves a post all of his own), or at least a particular character that Ernie used to do.

I had to fight through my usual resistance to do this little drawing. The critic gets rolling right away keeping a running tally of all the "errors", "this is wrong",or "that doesn't work". The best advice I've heard for dealing with that evil little voice is to ignore it as you would a crazy person, and just keep working. I find that the "errors" are where all the life is in a piece of art work, where the humanity creeps in or as Leonard Cohen said, "The cracks let the light in". Amen.

OK HW