posted: June 30, 2009

As the Climate Bill gets watered down, here's some environmental work I got to do in the last few weeks that illustrates what individuals can do to make a difference. Although of course individual action will never be enough, we need collective action.
Which is what drives me nuts about global warming, even if you deny it, there are PLENTY of other reasons to change the way we use energy.

Like your carbon footprint, being a vegetarian is the biggest way to reduce your water footprint, which is a bigger deal out here in the dry West.
For Mother Jones, art director was Carolyn Perot.

And probably the second biggest way to make a difference is to have your own garden. Not to mention the health benefits...

"Locavores" for Boston Globe Magazine, art direction by Grant Staublin.

And for "pennies" a day, you can use solar energy.


"Solar Energy Getting Cheaper" Los Angeles Times, art direction by Derek Simmons.

posted: June 18, 2009

Sure I'll work for free, but only for blind clients. I was asked to do some artwork for a shirt/poster for a race that some blind charities including the National Braille Press sponsor. It's called the Vision 5k, where blind and sighted participants run side by side, which is nothing new,  but the unique part is that sighted people can take the blindfold challenge, where you team up with a sighted guide and run the 5k "blind". Talk about a creative way to raise money and build an awareness for the visually impaired! And of course I was immediately intrigued about the visuals, so I agreed.

Ironically I had read a biography of Louis Braille a few months before. He injured his eyes while doing leatherwork with an awl, a fact that so unnerved me, I wear safety glasses now when I'm cutting frisket with x-acto blades (just a side note to any other paranoid artists out there with sharp tools).

Here's the initial ideas I sent them. They liked the blindfold wings.

However it need to be vector for the T-shirts so I dusted off my adobe illustrator and sent them this version. All good... well not exactly.

However a few weeks later this is what comes out. Not exactly what I intended. This highlights the importance of having an good art director on the other end policing, like in Edel's Starfish Project. But hey it's the National Braille Press, I can't be too hard on their designers right? At least it was for a good cause.

posted: June 11, 2009

Got to take a stab at Stalin, in an illustration for today's NY Times book review of "Secret Speech" by Tom Rob Smith, author of "Child 44" which is soon to be movie. Art director was Nicholas Blechman.

The novel is set during the process of de-Stalinization, set off by Khrushchev's secret speech in 1956, during which some of the hunters and executioners became the hunted and executed.

In the illustration I wanted to show the Stalin driven murders and the cycle of revenge afterward.

I'd actually had a similar idea for some personal work I've been meaning to do on the bloody history of communism. In those sketches Stalin moustache's was a grim reapers scythe which I simply switched to a knife to better fit this assignment.

So I was thrilled when Nicholas gave me the job and ended up picking that idea.

Here's the sketches, I spent a bit too much time on them, but sometimes when I'm really loving a subject I can't help myself.

Naturally I had to base my drawing of one of Stalin's posters, but as portraits go the best I've seen is this one by Ernest Hamlin Baker on the right, which is much revealing of the true Stalin.

Preliminary drawing, the likeness at this point is still bad.

A photoshop color study. I ended up pushing more distance between the figure and the background in the final, but I'm still unsure which is better, closer and flatter or a bit more atmospheric space.

posted: May 14, 2009

Yesterday I got a message that Susan Levin was laid off from the Boston Globe. Which saddened me greatly, she was one of my favorite art directors. She had a gift for pushing me to be better, and thanks to her I have some of my favorite pieces, a few of which I've posted below. Her passion for excellence was always inspiring.

I know some of you all have worked with her also, drop a note for her if you have.
Here's to you Susan! I'm sure you find a new place for your talent to keep flowering.

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