Hanoch Piven

Upcoming workshops in NYC Area

2008-08-22T16:36:59+00:00

Hi everybody

I am going to have one workshop in NYC and one in NJ which are open to the public:

In NYC

On Thursday Sept. 11 at 10AM I will conduct a workshop at Materials for the Arts, NY's premier reuse center.
http://mfta.org/

Here's some info about it where you can also sign up for it.
FOUND OBJECTS PORTRAITS
http://mfta.org/event/show/found_object_portraits_147

Date: September 11, 2008, 10:00 am - 12:00 pm
Program: Fall 2008 Daytime Workshops

Location
Materials for the Arts
http://mfta.org/
33-00 Northern Blvd. 3rd Floor
Long Island City, NY 11101
Map

In New Jersey

On Saturday the 13th at 2 p.m.
at Ocean County Library, NJ
Toms River Branch
http://theoceancountylibrary.org/Branches/TR/tr.htm
Address: 101 Washington St., Toms River, NJ 08753

Sign up and more info here
Meet Artist Hanoch Piven, author of My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks!
http://engagedpatrons.org/EventsExtended.cfm?SiteID=2161&EventID=24135

Hope to see you there!

Brodner in Tel Aviv

2008-08-21T11:25:42+00:00

So it turns out that besides having my aunts fall in love with him, Steve Brodner made a big splash in Tel Aviv to the point that he suddenly appeared on a Tel Aviv wall drinking a Corona painted by the well known graffiti painter Rami Meiri.
(and it doesn't matter that painting was done 10 years ago - I guess he knew Steve was coming)

Lecture at The Society of Illustrators of New York

2008-08-18T17:21:10+00:00

Here's another event involving a Drawgerian to add to the already busy september schedule.

On Wednesday, September 10 I will give a talk at the Society of Illustrators of NY.
Even though it is unrelated to it, the talk will take place 2 days before the opening of the Politics 08 Show curated by the handsome Edel Rodriguez, which I'm so happy to be in.
That opening is on Friday the 12th.
(That same evening by the way, Leo Espinosa's show opens in Boston)

I will soon post about more workshops I will be doing in the USA during September.
Meanwhile here's the formal invitation to the SOI Talk.

Randy Pausch (1960-2008)

2008-07-26T09:19:43+00:00

I got up on a lazy Saturday morning opened my computer, Google came up, saw a link that said
In Memoriam: Randy Pausch (1960-2008)
Not knowing who that was I curiously clicked on it and was glued to the lecture of Randy Pausch for over an hour.
I'm sure I'm a way latecomer to this but in case some of you haven't seen it and want to spend a learning hour online, here it is.

Here's the lecture

Move over Blitt?

2008-07-25T07:27:45+00:00

Funny caricature in Haaretz today by Daniela
The caption says: "Hussein - you got confused!"

...and Maariv published the note Obama put in The Wall on its first page.

Ron Arad

2008-07-11T10:30:20+00:00

Ron Arad, one of so many sad stories in the Middle East,
is the subject of my column in the Israeli paper Maariv this weekend.

Arad (not to be confused with Ron Arad, Industrial Designer who shares the same name) is an icon in Israel after being 'missing in action' since 1987 (when his airplane was shot down in Lebanon during an attack mission against the PLO)
Captured by the Shiite Militia Al Amal in 1986, he was seen in captivity and letters from him arrived in 1987.
Nothing is known from him ever since.
This week a written report by the Hezbollah was given to Israel in which apparently it is stated that, according to the Hezbollah, Arad is dead.
Writer and "all around player" Ofer Shelach wrote a moving piece which accompanied the portrait.

This is one of the few portraits I have ever made in which no color tubes were opened.

Looking for faces in Barcelona

2008-07-06T09:03:29+00:00

In the last 5 months I have been very busy working on a TV program that will air next year in TV3, Catalonian TV.
It is the basically the same program I wrote about last year, when I was asked to do one chapter.

This year with the great crew of Una Ma de Contes, ("A Handful of Stories"), a program created by Manuel Barrios, and the recipient
of the Catalonian National Cultural Prize, we created 20 chapters for next season.
Last week I finished my work on them. The last chapter involved a day trip of a girl in Barcelona looking for 'found faces'
So we did a little segment where the girl is photographing faces with her camera.
Fortunately the city is filled with them, for example this great house designed by a contemporary of Gaudi, Catalan Art Nouveau Architect Salvador Valeri i Pupurull.

Here are Xavi the Editor and this chapters' director, together with his niece Elena ('our girl'), Ricard the camera man and Meritxel, the director's assistant.

Zeroing in..

Hopefully in not too long a time I'll be able to post parts of the finished program.

Sunny Side Up Foolishness

2008-06-27T17:06:55+00:00

That's the type of fan mail sometimes I get.

<<
Hanoch Shalom
I was making some sunny-side-up eggs a while ago and the result was... suprising. My wife said I'm being childish but I thought you might appriciate the foolishness more than her.
The photo is here:
>>

Keith

2008-05-28T06:12:30+00:00

Recently I received a great assignment to make a portrait of Keith Richards for Spin Magazine. Since at SPIN they work well ahead of time it seems like this was ages ago.
Devin Pedzwater the AD took a very active role in suggesting elements to use and I thought he was right on with his suggestions!
So 'together' we ended up with this piece.
(While I don't really find myself smiling when ADs start telling me the objects they think I SHOULD use for my illustrations in this case it worked just fine!)

Here's a detail of the facial features.

Waltz With Bashir

2008-05-16T07:18:30+00:00

Waltz With Bashir is an animated Israeli film by Ari Folman recalling his memories from the 1982 War in Lebanon. It premiered yesterday in Cannes Festival and the few scenes that can be seen online, as well as the passion and talent involved, promise very very much. Illustrator David Polonsky is the film's Art Director and main Illustrator and Yoni Goodman is the Animation Director.
Asaf and Tomer Hanuka also worked on the film as well as Michael Faust
Check it out.

Here Ari the director and the artists talk about their process.

Garbage Mountain

2008-05-12T11:51:12+00:00

Hiriya is a famous garbage mountain near Tel Aviv. Since the fifties and up until its closure in 1998, Hiriya served as a landfill. Since then it has been transformed from a waste landfill into the largest environmental center in Israel. There are already several recycling systems functioning there as well as a great Education Center in which visitors learn about thinking green, making compost, recycing, re-using stuff, etc etc...

Here's an article the NY Times recently wrote about Hiriya

a n y w a y

A couple of weeks ago I was invited to conduct workshops there using of course only their garbage.
This is probably the most ideal place ever (so far) for me to conduct a workshop. I added a new gallery about it.
Here are some pics below.

The building is beautiful designed by Weinstein Vaadia Architects

and decorated by Brigitte Cartier. Check out the objects hanging and Brigitte's Website.
Heavens.

Football!

2008-05-01T10:25:17+00:00

Avram Grant is the nom du jour in European Football today. Being criticized the whole season as being no more than the puppet of Chelsea's Boss, Roman Abramovitch, he managed nonetheless to bring Chelsea to the Champion's League Final and having a real shot at winning the Premier League as well.
Grant who is Israeli is the subject of my column in Maariv tomorrow.
I have asked Allan Manham who took me last year to Stamford Bridge to write about Grant from his perspective as a Chelsea fan.
Here's Allan's text. (written before last night's game)
This text wasn't published since the editors managed in the last minute to get Grant himself to write.

<<
So there we were, having won back to back league championships, reaching two European cup semi finals and excitedly looking forward to the coming season under our charismatic Portuguese manager and heavily bankrolled by our Russian oligarch owner who had transformed our prospects with his bottomless pockets. But that sort of spending power does also bring the possibility of acting on a whim.

Pity this sad supporter having watched Chelsea for the last 42 years, logging in daily to every possible news source for the latest on his club. “Mourinho leaves Chelsea and is replaced by Avram Grant!” How could that be possible? We had all heard about the personal friendship that allegedly exists between Grant, Roman Abramovich and his football fixer, super agent Pini Zahavi. But… How could a club with aspirations to be the world’s leader, replace the most charismatic manager it has ever had, with a complete nobody? A manager without a record. A man with no identity. A man with no discernible personality. But we are told, a nice man. A son who loves his father. Since when though, does that add up to the job description for one of the most coveted (and highly paid) jobs in football?

I can’t but help but think of that marvellous Hal Ashby movie Being There, based on the Jerzy Kosinski novel and starring Peter Sellers as Chance the gardener who lives his life in the Washington D.C. house of an old man. When the man dies, Chance is put out on the street with no knowledge of the world except what he has learned from television. After a run in with a limousine, he ends up a guest of a woman and her husband Ben, an influential and wealthy but sickly businessman. Now called Chauncey Gardner, Chance becomes friend and confidante to Ben, and an unlikely political insider. His raison d’etre is that he actually is very simple minded and has nothing of import to say, but this is interpreted by those around him as deep insight. "In the garden, growth has it seasons," Chance explains. "First comes spring and summer, but then we have fall and winter. And then we get spring and summer again."

Is Grant the modern day Chauncey Gardner, with his simplistic utterances and inability to communicate being interpreted as coming from someone with real vision and insight?

Die hard Chelsea supporters like me, even though devastated at the loss of our previous idol are like supporters everywhere. We are prepared to forgive all, provided it brings the success that we crave. And when Mourinho was so unceremoniously (and expensively) given the chop a mere few games into the season, we were forced, somewhat reluctantly, to give the taciturn Grant the benefit of the doubt, provided he delivered the crown jewels that Abramovich and the whole club craved, the European Championship? His mission statement- if that is not putting the mumbled words at his early incoherent press conferences too strongly- was that he was going to do it with attacking football! OK he has been hampered by a succession of injuries to key players, but still now there is no evidence of some sort of master plan. I have lost count of the times halfway through a game when he has made a seemingly inexplicable substitution and the crowd have chanted in unison, “you don’t know what you’re doing”

And yet and yet. On Saturday we played Manchester United with just the outside chance of winning the league championship, provided we beat them and win the following last two games of the season. But it should not have come to this. The feeling is that games have been wasted and we have lost just when everything was assured. Incredibly we scored in extra time in the first half, having played some of the most attractive football that we had seen during the season. The frustration of giving away that lead to a soft goal by the usually peerless Carvalho was, offset by the award of a penalty late in the second half and the legendary luck that alledgedly follows Grant around, worked this time in our favour. We have had no luck this season, demonstrated by a string of bad injuries to key players, but true football fans will happily welcome anyone who can change that sequence.
Is that to be Grant’s true gift?

And by some miraculous chance we play Liverpool at home next Wednesday 1-1 with home advantage and therefore as favourites for the first time to go all the way through to the final in Moscow in May. All will be revealed. Is Chauncey Grant the man, despite all the reservations? Does he have some special insight that only the privileged few are able to discern? As a supporter you can only go on hoping. And if we do are we then to be saddled with one of the most unpopular managers we have ever had?

>>

Allan Manham

Guest Artist 3

2008-04-28T18:01:06+00:00

Lavie who is 5 years and two months and lives in Tel Aviv sent me this picture of himself with a friend. Nice orange peppers!

Holy Moses

2008-04-19T17:12:40+00:00

Tonight is The Passover (Pesach) Seder.
Yesterday in my column in Maariv I made a portrait of Moses. No idea why he looks that way except that it seemed right to me.
Thank god the gefilte fish box didn't open in the suitcase..

A great text by Kobi Arieli accompanied it, whose point was a small and often unnoticed sentence in The Torah, mentioning a quality Moses possesed which leaders nowadays don't seem to have:

"Now, Moses himself was by far the meekest man on the face of the earth."
(Num 12-3)

Happy Passover.

Hands Up

2008-04-14T20:43:21+00:00

Last week I visited Gan Shikma (a kindergarden) in Yehud, Israel to do a little Artist visit and Workshop.
I promised the kids they will all appear in my blog so here we are.

I try to visit at least 2 kindergardens a year. It is usually a lot of fun.
The kids, who watch my TV show, told me: "We saw YOUR HANDS on TV"

Mama I'm on the first page of the New York Times...

2008-04-06T14:40:31+00:00

Im in the middle of working on a TV series for Catalonian TV so this week I spend every afternoon and evening shooting, and in the middle of it all, a call from Aviva Michaelov from the NY Times Week Review with a job to do a portrait of General David Petraeus.
Only problem, it is due in 36 hours. Other problem: 20 of these 36 I'm busy working.
Somehow the job was done, and it was even a bit of fun and I got to go the the local G.I Joe store here in Barcelona to look for military paraphernalia. (US Army all terrain hat for 20 Euros!)

So I was more than happy to see that it also made it to the first page of today's paper even as a tiny tiny stamp....

Mahmoud A.

2008-03-23T08:41:37+00:00

This past friday celebrating Purim I 'hosted'
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the President of Iran
in my column in Maariv

My wife Janet baked great Hamantashen
or as they are called in Hebrew Haman's ears.
(Haman is the villain in the tale of Purim, as described in the biblical Book of Esther. The tale takes place in no other place than the Persian Empire - therefore, a certain relevance to the current Persian leader)

Purim is pretty much the Jewish Carnival when everybody dresses up and makes a lot of noise in both secular and religious environments.
In synagogues as the Book of Esther is read, every time the name Haman is mentioned, the crowd makes a lot of noise
with horns, graggers, etc...

The way the spread looked in the paper.
Dr. Yoram Yovel, a psychiatrist and novelist wrote about Mahmoud A.
In essence the article said that the guy is not necessarily crazy, he just thinks different than 'us Israelies'.

and yet some more guests.

2008-03-15T22:44:23+00:00

Ok this time the visiting artists are
the third graders at
Riverside Consolidated School
in rural New Brunswick, Canada

They made a A Simile Art Project
using My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks as inspiration
and I am letting it speak by itself.
Check out their great web page.

Guest Artists 2

2008-03-05T18:46:39+00:00

People have been sending me collages made with objects for over 10 years now.
Last week for example some guy named Leo Espinosa sent me some wonderful Object Drawings his two kids, Ben y Sofia made.
I don't know this guy and at first I said: Oh it is probably another one of those nudge dads always bragging about their kids but oh boy! his kids do make great stuff!

Guest Artist

2008-03-03T22:44:37+00:00

I'm starting a new category: Guest Artists!
Yuval who is 4.5 years old from Tsur Moshe, Israel
sent me this 'drawing'.

Obama in Israel

2008-02-25T13:15:35+00:00

Im sure the great people of the United Drawgers of America (note: not including Barry Blitt) won't mind that I comment on your Democratic party primaries frontrunner Mr Barack Obama in my biweekly column in Maariv, Israel.
The way the column is built is that together with the editors we ask somebody to write about the person we decide to portray.
The writer does not have an obligation to refer in his opinion to my illustration but on the contrary is welcomed to bring his own view of the subject.
This weekend we asked Israeli Knesset Member Dr Ahmed Tibi to write about the Obama phenomena from his point of view as an Israeli Arab.

I chose to address the big unknown that lies behind the charming and optimistic white smile. Funny enough we had in our home a smiling mask that my wife bought to our son last year in Brasil. It was a lucky coincidence how much that smile looked like Obama's.

Sorry no translation available..but in a nutshell Tibi wonders when something of this magnitude will happen in Israel. He is not even fantasizing about an Arab chosen as a prime minister but he doesn't even sees a non Ashkenazi-Jew Prime Minister any time soon... >So there you go....
(..ok Barry?)

Gore's back?

2008-02-22T07:11:53+00:00

It turns out Al Gore had a long lost cousin in Pakistan.

and yet more Castro

2008-02-21T08:25:37+00:00

This is one of the first collages I made. Suddenly I'm not sure whether it was done in 1990 or 1991. I was a student in SVA in NYC studying caricature first with Sam Viviano.
Then the following semester I continued the series I started to develop with Sam in a course with Guy Billout. I don't remember who of them was my teacher when I did that piece... I bought the fake cobweb in Gordon Novelty Store on Broadway, and smoke my first cigar (or at least the tip of it) . I have drawn many strong and powerful cigar smokers since then so I have become a small expert in smoking cigar tips.

TV

2008-02-13T18:01:17+00:00

One more (and last) chapter of Superstuff, my TV program on HOP TV, Israel or as it is called in hebrew: Hafatzim Mitlotzetzim

Good Bye Haaretz, shalom Maariv.

2008-02-08T09:14:47+00:00

2 kg of Salmon were needed to create the portrait of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. (in addition to caviar and cigars)
My studio smelled terribly once the old sketches started going rotten.
The stinky smell did put me in the right angry mood to work on this piece.

In 1995 when I was still living in NY a meeting with the editor of the Weekend
supplement of Haaretz newspaper in Israel, Dov Alfon
led to the creation of my monthly column in the supplement.
O.J. Simpson was the first object of the column.
(I wrote about it in the past here.)

A month later Israeli PM, Itzhak Rabin was assassinated and by 1996
when I was back in Israel, the column was mainly dedicated to political figures of the Netanyahu government.
The column ran for 5 years until I got really tired of it and decided to take a break.

Today when I am starting a new column in the Israeli paper Maariv it is
a good opportunity to thank Haaretz for their amazing support to my work
throughout the years and their gutsy decisions to use it so prominently.
Haaretz has been indeed very meaningful to the development of my professional life.

I wish Maariv and myself a great road together.

Maariv's front page today.

My new column in Maariv, today.
The column will host every two weeks a writer who will
write his/her views on the person portrayed to the left.

This week Rino Tzror wrote a powerful text about slick Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

"Peasleecott" Award

2008-02-06T05:11:10+00:00

I am proud to be a recipient of the prestigious Peasleecott Award
given by the six 2nd and 3rd grade classes at the Marguerite E. Peaslee School, a K-5 elementary school in Northborough, Massachusetts.

I'd like to thank my editor Annie Kelley, my agent Sally Heflin and my dear wife Janet for putting up with all the smelly stuff around the house needed to win this award.

Thank You very much sweet (and oh so smart!) children of Peaslee.

Peace.

Carnaval Again!

2008-02-03T22:13:51+00:00

this post gives me a feeling of a small tradition starting...
it is carnestoltes (carnival) again in barcelona
and first of all NO I did not make that poster...

Again Ana's school had a parade. This year the theme was the 4 seasons.

and just like last year. the symbolic burning of the carnestoltes figure. this year the figure represented
all which pollutes the environment (I guess such as symbolic figures which are burnt in schools in carnival ceremonies)

Bugs!

2008-01-29T23:44:14+00:00

This past year is definitely a year with new and different projects for me.

5 months ago I was contacted by the Rabin Medical Center in Israel, to help them develop a campaign which, through the use of art would create conscience among medical stuff to keep viruses and bacteria away (by making sure they wash their hands repeatedly).
At first it seemed a very difficult subject to deal with. I wasn't sure what would be the right tone to use.
Gradually with the help of a nice group of people (mainly artist Roy Mordechay and the Artish Group) we created an interactive campaign to place in the hospital lobby.

The campaign consists of an instalation of bacteria sculptures.
We made the sculptures with Roy, and the idea was to show that the most trivial objects that exist in the hospital, from computer keyboards to door knobs, carry bacteria.
The 'bugs' are not happy, they are in trouble since they are behind a fence made out of a chain of clean hands. they have been 'caught', 'stopped'. (that was my usual answer whenever somebody would ask me: "isn't it going to be scary to have large bugs in the hospital lobby?"
These bugs are the stars of the campaign since they appear in posters all around the hospital reminding the staff to wash their hands.

The second part of the campaign is an interactive part. We printed large canvases of hands which have the bugs on them. (they were their digital versions which my dear wife Janet designed with me)
Each staff member in the hospital received a small 'clean' hand and was asked to sign and personalized it and then glue it to the large canvas and cover a bug with it. By doing that they were not only symbolically stopping a bug, but what's more important, committing themselves to be more careful and cautious in their daily routine work.
The idea is that only if everybody in the hospital signs in and joins forces the fight against bacteria will be successful.
Designer Michal Suday and copywriter Narda Ben Yaacov also took part in the campaign.

So here are some pictures.

TV Program starts airing in Israel

2008-01-20T09:48:08+00:00

My HOP TV program starts airing today in Israel.
The program is called in Hebrew ????? ????????
(note to Zimm: can't I write in Hebrew in Drawger...?)

ok it sounds like Hafatzim Mitlotsesim which means something like... Objects Joking Around

Aliza Dayan Hamama created the program with me.
Ofer Inov (who shot the movie Beaufort!) directed and handled the camera.
Lea Berkovitch did the animation
Lilach Avramovitch brought the great props
Ganit Nevet and Yael Yatsiv produced.

and it was a big pleasure working on this with them all.

Here's the opener of the program.

Here's one whole chapter. I like the chapter with the fruits because it is so open. It is all there. You're eye just has to choose where to go, what fruits to use to make a face, an animal, anything.

and here's a TV report about the program from Israeli TV which is in Haaretz website.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/946089.html

Artists Against the War

2008-01-04T12:31:35+00:00

Adding one more image from the Artists Against the War show,
here's mine
I created a new piece for the show and sadly, with the rush to send it from here, making sure none of the toy weapons I included looked suspicious or were made of metal (so no custom or security officer would be tempted to stop or open it in the US border), I never managed to take a good picture of it. This is the best one I have.

The hair (and nose) are made with some broken and some limbless plastic toy soldiers .

Judging by the images online It seems to be an AMAZING SHOW!
Make sure to check it out. I am also happy to be one of three Israeli artists in the show, together with the great Tomer Hanuka and Koren Shadmi.

2 Giulianis 19 years apart

2007-12-28T17:18:44+00:00

When a monthly publication commissions a portrait it can take forever between the time you (me) finish the portrait and the time you (me) can show it in Drawger. So this is a Giuliani I did a while ago for the cover of the current January issue of The Progressive.

It is the second time I draw Giuliani.
The previous time was almost 19 years ago in 1989 when I was a Freshman in The School of Visual Arts and Rudy was running (and losing) for Mayor against Dinkins and Koch. (the time of Eighties NYC, Donald Trump and homelessness). In what seems to be a previous lifetime I was at the time studying with Harvey Kurtzman and made this cartoon for the students newspaper of SVA.

Is this what is called sophomoric work or what?

Perez Loves YOU

2007-12-20T08:26:15+00:00

As an illustrator you get to learn about many new and surprising
world phenomenons like the existence of Perez Hilton.
Found out about him two weeks ago when the call came from
Entertainment Weekly to do his portrait.
I loved that pink purse so I kept looking for a way to use it.

Football (Soccer) is global

2007-12-01T22:35:26+00:00

Im in Israel watching live on TV the Barcelona 'derbi'. The two Barcelona City teams playing each other. In this picture we see an Argentinian, a Mexican, an Islandian, a French, and a guy from the Ivory Coast among others shown on Israeli TV, photographed by a guy born in Uruguay and posted on a website which a guy from North Carolina created, so that a Colombian living in Boston will see it. As of 00:33 AM, Barça and Español are tied at 1.

Kim Jong delivers

2007-11-30T21:08:34+00:00

A couple of weeks ago I got news that
my illustration of Kim Jong Il was chosen to be
on the cover of the new Lurzer's Archive book
The 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide.

It obviously makes me very honored and happy, specially
considering the fact that in the previous book of this series
Anita Kunz, the Illustration Queen herself, was on the cover.

Upcoming TV Program

2007-11-15T12:51:16+00:00

A bird being made for the TV program in Israel. It will air soon on HOP Channel in Israel.

Its not a cooking show.

Ok what's the best part of making a TV show?
Your HANDS (!) have to get make up on them!
(oh boy, white does not suit me..)

Vegansexuals

2007-11-12T10:48:13+00:00

Continuing the vegetables theme in my Blog here's a recent illustration I did for Rolling Stone.
Apparently this is the new cool sexual orientation: VEGANSEXUALS.

For the uninformed, vegansexuals are vegans who will have sexual relationshops only with other vegans. (its good they sent me the article so I learn what the hell are vegansexuals)

To explain it in Drawger terms. Lets say Kroninger is a vegan AND a vegansexual, Staake is a vegan but Edel is not a vegan since he regularly eats all this Cuban arroz con habichuelas y pollo. (chicken! not cool) So Kroninger will not be sexually attracted to Edel based SOLELY on the fact that Edel is NOT a vegan. (He might still not be atracted to Staake but thats besides the point we are dealing with today)

I hope this helps.

Eggplant

2007-11-02T21:38:03+00:00

One eggplant with a nose.

Halloween!

2007-10-30T16:53:32+00:00

Was it John Cleese who said you have to embarrass yourself once a day, so after Bob's Staake's great image this morning, here's my Halloween Witch who just quickly happenned today on my table.
I'm working on 52 images for a TV show, which I have 2 weeks to make.
This is really new for me to be working on such fast pace. It is like sketching quick poses in life drawing.
I will be posting some soon.
So the witch might be one of them.

Angela

2007-10-23T06:58:24+00:00

Last week I was asked to illustrate Angela Merkel who according to Newsweek Europe is concerned in all her actions only about being reelected, very careful before every step she takes.
So I brought in a pocket calculator to her mouth, labeling it EuroCalculator.
While it might not be the greatest shape for the mouth I felt it created a strong communicative image.
The editors liked the idea and ended up using the verb 'calculating' in their headline.

I love it when the relation between publication and illustrator becomes a dialogue and not the monologue of instructions illustrators often have to endure from art directors (who in turn get their share of orders from the editors)

So every time a sketch or idea of mine ends up influencing a headline it obviously makes me happy...and gives me the feeling that sometimes editors actually even listen to illustrators.

I was just reminded of a great cartoon of the late (and very influential to me) Doug Marlette which depicted in an accurate way that relationship and also the certain gap in perceptions we all might have.

Sculptures !

2007-10-19T11:20:14+00:00

At the beginning of the month I took part in a new kind of project for me.
I was invited to Shoam, a small village in Israel to participate in their "Muses Festival".
In adition to conducting some creative workshops in the Festival, I was comissioned to create 3 sculptures to be shown in the Festival and remain in Shoham after that.
A local dump yard provided me with all the junk I needed and place to work and 12 female highschool art students joined me.
This was the first time I created free standing sculptures, and, needles to say, in a junk yard collecting junk with 12 women is the good life for me!
So the nice thing about it was the idea of working and creating with what was there. Nothing was bought or brought, from the outside.
We spent some hours gathering stuff, and a whole day putting it together. By the end of the second day we had 5 statues standing. What do they mean? No idea, but it was a lot of fun.

Simmons and Groucho

2007-10-12T11:29:05+00:00

I have been busy and away from the studio.
Will hopefully post something about it soon.

Meanwhile a couple of illustrations I recently made for
Stanford Medicine Magazine

First one is a portrait of RIchard SImmons
and the second one a story about Hollywood cutting on smoking in movies.

more soon.....pant pant

School Library Journal

2007-09-19T20:55:35+00:00

A recent job for School Library Journal. It is about how boys have a hard time been quiet at school. The system of sitting down quietly while studying might just not be the right one for many. I was happy the editors gave me the ok to go with an upside down figure. since I thought it suggested the idea of going against the norms. (this is my daughter's Tamagotchi there..shhhhh)

Meow

2007-08-23T22:56:07+00:00

I can only be jealous of the speed in which a Staake works.
Me? It took me over 8 months to do my book on cats which I'm now making the latest
adjustments to. So my status on it is: almost done and ready to go on a well earned week vacation.
Here is one of my favorites: the persian cat.

Fire fire

2007-08-15T22:29:52+00:00

Haven't been too much around Drawger lately. Summer in Spain is full of festivals and fiestas. If usually it doesn't seem like anybody works in here, now it is clear that nobody works in here. It is actually tough to concentrate on anything around here.
This week is the fiesta of our neighborhood, Gracia. The fiesta consists of decorating the streets, drinking in the streets late at night, dancing and listening to music in the streets and parading around the neighborhood shooting, burning and lighting fireworks. Yes there is an obsession with fire and explosions here. If you don't believe here are some pictures from a parade that went under our balcony this afternoon.

Here they go....

The Spanish Civil War? nope. FIESTA.

And then the real fun began

The Dragon came

and the Dragon left.

This is our street.

Art after Wartime

2007-07-17T16:56:53+00:00

In Israel more soldiers or ex-soldiers are requesting help for emotional problems due to a war related episode. A special army unit headed by Dr Ofir Levy treats and helps anybody who is experiencing PTSD and approaches them for help. What was before unheard within the Israeli society is now becoming a bit more acceptable and people are more open about it.

Last week, I spent a whole day in that unit and alongside my friends, the Art Therapists Orna, Yehudit, Shani and If’at and a group of professionals from the unit, we held a Drawing with Objects workshop. 32 guys ages 24 to 81 participated in the day, many claiming not to have done art since kindergarden.

It was a day full of creativity, fun, pain, tears, laughs and long monologues,

All my respect and love to the caring team of professionals in that unit and more important to the participants, thoughtful men (and young guys) who are hard at work trying to reconstruct their lives in that crazy place the Middle East is.

Here are a few representative images which are a small sample of all the interesting work made there.

(I'd like also to thank Lundbeck-Israel
for their generous help in putting that day together.)

Lemonade Mouth

2007-06-28T16:37:06+00:00

I love stories about teenage nerds, about underdogs who win at the end…so when 2 years ago I got the assignment to illustrate the cover of Lemonade Mouth, and I read the manuscript, I immediately took a liking of it. The book, a young adult novel about a music band of high-school nerds, by Mark Peter Hughes, really encourages young adults to ride their own wave, and to accept that being ‘freakish’ can be just fine. So the book has been out for a while and Mark is now engaged in eccentric yet admirable behavior, by driving with his whole family across the USA promoting the book. That’s the way his characters would have behaved. Hats off. I wish the whole family a fun trip and a succesful one. Here are some pictures he sent me and here’s a link to his Blog where he will report from his journey.

He will also be reporting about his journey on NPR 's All Things Considered.
(thanks Cathie for pointing that out)

A proud dad bragging.

2007-06-23T18:37:57+00:00

As some smart drawgerite said what’s the point of a blog if you don’t brag about your kids?

So… Jakub my son finished Middle School.
The whole class sang and played rock versions of What a Wonderful World and of Somewhere Over the Rainbow which they prepared with their great music teacher. Jakub and classmate Nuria were chosen by their classmates to give a speech and they ended it with a poem they co-wrote. Boy were we proud! (I'm measuring my praise here cause Jakub might read this and beat me afterwards..)

The whole class sang and played music. Jakub played drums...and this is it for Middle School.

Rubbish!

2007-06-13T15:34:43+00:00

I love working with Richard Turley from the G2 section of The Guardian. First of all because he sounds like Hugh Grant so I feel like I'm in The Diary of Bridget Jones. But even better, he always has ideas that push me into doing things I wouldn't be doing otherwise.
A couple of months ago he had me designing candy letters and this time he asked me to write a headline with garbage, sorry make that 'rubbish'.
So I made letters separately and we put them together digitally.
Here's the article specially for Nancy.

each letter looked something like that...

or like that..

O h and I also made the cover for the G2 section. I guess every illustrator needs to make his own version of The Scream.
Here's mine.

TV

2007-06-07T17:42:40+00:00

Last week I did a really fun project.
I participated in the TV program of Catalunyan TV called ‘Una Ma De Contes’ (A Hand of Stories)
The idea of the program is that while a children story is being told, an illustrator draws it. Manuel Barrios the program's director has directed close to 100 chapters of Una Ma de Contes, working with illustrators, musicians, food artists and even a magician.

So early in the morning I packed 5 bags of …stuff and there I went to the studio
And ‘drew’ the story with my objects.

The story was about a knight who doesn’t like to fight who rides a very belicose horse.
They meet a dragon lady who is really NOT into behaving like a dragon and spends most of her time taking naps.
While I was working I had to keep my head back so that it won't appear on screen and look at a little monitor to see how everything looked from above.

So the knight and the dragon lady really hit it off. (I actually suspected the knight was gay but go figure..)

Luckilly there was a punk princess around who really wanted to get into trouble
So she and the horse ran away to look for action, battles etc.

There is no unemployment in Catalunya. Everybody works for public TV.

Who says I don't know how to have fun.
Here, with Xavi the editor, we are dancing Putting on the Ritz

EXIT WOUNDS by Rutu Modan

2007-06-06T08:15:41+00:00

Amazingly talented Rutu Modan has been on the vanguard of a great generation of Israeli illustrators that came out of Israeli Art Schools in the last 10-15 years.
Part of the Israeli Comics "Comune" known as Actus, she now wrote her first full length graphic novel, published by Drawn and Quarterly.
For the non-initiated, it gives a good glimpse of contemporary Israeli life.
It is a very sweet story beautifully drawn. Very reccommended.

Exit Wounds.

My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks (2)

2007-05-20T07:39:03+00:00

With all my recent traveling, I couldn’t get myself to post some more images from my new book which is finally out and selling. (I received some good news from the editor that they are already reprinting some more, which seems not to happen with most children books - only one out of my previous 4 made it beyond the first edition and sends royalties).

When my first book came out I was all emotional about it, feeling deeply disappointed when it didn’t become a best-seller. Now I take it less personally. My understanding of the children publishing world is that editors ‘shoot’ in all directions hoping that something will catch. Once in a while something does catch but it is usually quite impossible to predict…unless it is a book by a celebrity, which is then supported by a huge marketing campaign, a CD version read by the celebrity etc…

Anyway, My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks developed from an idea by editor Annie Kelley tells the story of a girl who must add ‘stuff’ to her drawings to make them …just right.

Back Home

2007-05-09T02:16:23+00:00

After 15 days of being away from my family, my studio and my ‘day job’, I am more than happy to come home.
So many great images in my head (and camera) of the last two weeks and of the10 or so workshops I gave in Costa Rica, Guatemala, Washington DC and Baltimore.
Hopefully I’ll be able to post more pictures soon.

Meantime here is my favourite family from those who attended the workshops in Port Discovery. Papa Steve was so into it that he ended up making 2 images himself.

And here's Samantha with the 3 faces the family made.
(note the intentional Silence of the Lambs reference in the middle one...)

If you're in Baltimore..

2007-05-03T12:42:55+00:00

I will be doing workshops in Port Discovery Museum
on Sunday May 6th from 1 to 5 PM.

If you're around come say hi!

Here's more information about the event.

Port Discovery is located at
35 Market Place
Baltimore

I'm adding this one answering Carl's question re how does the junk get collected. I forward a list and start pushing everybody to get as much stuff as possible.
Here's the way they collected stuff for my recent visit to the American School of Guatemala. The director there, Mrs Ettie Zilber did an amazing job of getting everyone to contribute and they now have junk for the next 10 years!

Bush in jail in Costa Rica

2007-04-26T00:29:04+00:00

I just finished two days of workshops for children in the Museo de los Niños in San Jose, Costa Rica, where a show of my work is being exhibited.
The museum is in this amazing fortress, which used to be a jail until 1979.
After having being empty for some years it was renovated as a Cultural Center 13 years ago. The building houses the National Gallery and the Children Museum.

The inside of the building is kept in very much the way it was, so there are cells with bars where the artwork is shown.

So check this out: W Bush shares a cell with Clinton and Liz Taylor....

oh oh..look who else shares the cell...

The kids were so warm and wonderful. I will soon post some of their great work in the galleries.

It is night time now and the guard locks all the cells.
Good night W, Clinton, Liz.

The Ken Smith Chronicles continued

2007-04-25T13:03:57+00:00

Here continuing the thread started by Adam McCauley celebrating an AD we illustrators loved to work with, Ken Smith, from Time magazine.
It was always challenging, exciting and scary (36-48 hours deadline) but above all calm and friendly.
Here are some of the pieces I did for Ken. My all time favourite is the Unabomber. and boy we did have one big failure: I couldn't get Forrest Gump to look like himself...so Ken ended up executing this other idea he had in his head: A Forrest Gump color by numbers portrait.

Boris Yeltsin 1931-2007

2007-04-24T05:02:48+00:00

The wave of Russian immigration to Israel in the eighties and nineties brought many Russian food stores. In one of them, in Shouk Hakarmel in Tel Aviv I bought the Russian cold cuts used for Yeltsin's face. It ran in Haaretz in 1999

(here are more Yeltsins by Tim O'Brien.)

Make it four, O'Brien

2007-04-11T19:53:02+00:00

Never thought Ill post this one until today
following Staake's and Edel's and Richard and..MArk and Adam...post (hey there's more than 4 there!)
here's one of my childhood heroes, Erich Von Daniken who had me believe every word he wrote...and since then I was DONE with Science Fiction.

The cat came back

2007-04-05T18:44:55+00:00

Part of why it takes me so long to do a book..I come to the studio, hate the cat from yesterday, try another way to do it.
Also Janet, my dear wife, a real cat connoisseur, gave a hard time about not addressing that Devon Rex cats are famous for their curly fur texture.
(so this post is to show Janet I do listen to her..)

Thank god a frog stopped by to save the day...

A cat's a cat and that is that.

2007-04-04T20:56:30+00:00

Inspired by Mr Staake here's an image from my book in progress...actually what I was working on today.
The book is about cats....and this is a Devon Rex, a very energetic and athletic cat called sometimes a "cross between a cat and a monkey"

'Short'

2007-03-31T09:18:46+00:00

A couple of years ago I was offered to participate in a documentary film about short men by Edan Alterman, a well known Israeli actor, comedian and all around talented and funny guy (who happens to be..short).
Even though been short has had a big effect in my life, in the development of my personality and probably a HUGE effect in my artistic development, I declined to participate, and I don't remember even why. A couple of days ago I stumbled upon the finished film in Edan's blog.
It is very touching and I am sorry not to have participated in it. In the film a teenager who is short says the smartest line: "I know when I'll be a grown up everything is going to be ok and height won't be that important anymore, but I want to be taller NOW, when it matters" That sentence carries the pain of the short male teenager which is stronger than any rational and logical existential thinking.

Height is still an issue in a funny way in our household since Jakub my 13 year old son is now way taller than me. (and of almost everybody else in his class, in adition to being a real hunk) I am obviously SO happy he is not going through the same pain I went as a teenager and yet every now and then I find myself telling him: 'dorothy' beware: while you are basking on your popularity, the 'short', the 'nerds' and all the other non-popular in the social periphery might be just working harder than you and eventually they'll get their 'revenge'.

If I need to connect all this to illustration..I must say that I have always noticed the high percentage of short illustrators and caricaturists. Does anybody know of a caricaturist who was the quarterback or the captain of the high school team?

Here's 'Short', the film, it is in Hebrew with English subtitles. http://www.notes.co.il/alterman/27320.asp

More reports on Workshops

2007-03-30T11:22:16+00:00

Since I am now preparing more workshops, allow me to indulge and include one more clip from the Cancer patients workshops I held this past year in hospitals throughout Israel. This news report shows the opening of the exhibition which was held on top of the Azriely Tower, the semi-tallest building in Tel Aviv. You can see different people (non artists in their daily life) talking about their creations. For the non Hebrew speakers, the speakers are explaining why they chose this and why they chose that. That is in my eyes, the beauty of these workshops: after people work they LOVE talking about their creations. It helps people bringing out stuff. HOT TV report by Idit Haberfeld

Giant Steps by Michal Levy

2007-03-25T08:10:43+00:00

Still enjoying the remarkable and creative people I met at Kinnernet last weekend.
Michal Levy for example is a Saxophonist and Graphic Designer. Here's a beautiful visual interpretation she made for John Coltrane's Giant Steps.
In the camp Michal premiered her new animated short which is even more stunning.
Please take the 2 minutes to watch this beauty. Believe me you won't regret the time spent there.

http://michalevy.com/gs_download.html

Kinnernet 2007

2007-03-17T22:38:17+00:00

I spent the last three days in the Kinnernet UnConvention, which is a gathering of 300 hundred techno-geeks, artists and "just-plain-fun" people which takes place on the shores of the Sea of Galilee (the Kinneret in Hebrew) in Israel.
The event included so many fun events all originated by the participants: from Power Tools Car Racing to "Hummus 1.0: The right way to eat your Hummus" Workshop. Robots, gadgets, jugglers, BBQ's at 2AM etc etc.
The event organizers believe that 3 days of fun and collaboration of creative people in a really nice place, will get amazing ideas going.
I came back charged with energy and humbled by the amount of smart people I saw there.

photo by Deb Schultz

In the conference each participant is supposed to show and present something. I created a 'live' portrait of Yossi Vardi who established the event 4 years ago.
It was the first time I made a live demonstration....which made me realize the power of ...rehearsals!

Photo by Yaniv Golan)

..and this is Yossi Vardi made in 1 minute. (remember: rehearsals!)

Photo by Yaniv Golan

and then I gave a workshop...and look what these geeks made:
a head whose ears open and close!

photo by ZeN workshop

My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks

2007-03-13T10:14:28+00:00

My new book My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks arrived yesterday fresh from the printer!
I would like to thank my editor wonderful Annie Kelley who came up with the smart idea of a book about visual and linguistic metaphors.
Published by Random House' s (semi) new imprint Schwartz & Wade Books, it will be out in May.
(don't you worry, Ill remind you :-&...)

What ?!?

2007-03-12T14:13:02+00:00

This guy is part of an illustration I just finished about connectivity .
Such overeacting character.

Ana draws with candy...

2007-03-09T01:26:40+00:00

2:30 AM, just back from watching The Lives of Others. wow!
Watching such a perfect story makes me optimistic....
so I dont know why it made me think of Ana's recent candy drawings...
here they are...maybe its the optimism.

More Ha'aretz

2007-03-07T07:00:42+00:00

Almost ten (!!) years ago, Haa'retz newspaper in Israel in which I had a regular column, decided to use my work in their advertising campaign. The newspaper had recently started printing in color, and wanted to get rid an (unjustified) image of an old fashion B&W newspaper for old people. So billboards were put up in town and TV ads were made. (by Shachar Segal, one of Israel's leading commercials directors) oh and the idea was conceived by ad man 'Mr' Mordi Amar. This specific one departed from my illustration of Arie Der'i. Der'i was the interior minister of Israel in the Netanyahu government. A very skilled and powerful politician and the leader of Shas party, a religious sepharadic party which emerged in the nineties, Der'i was accused and convicted on several corruption case and served in prison for some years. This ad ran while the trial was going on, has a sepharadic-tune prayer for forgiveness as soundtrack and you can see my face for a second there blowing the red paprika away from the tie.

J.D King & The Coachmen in Barcelona !

2007-02-28T15:37:54+00:00

Arrived safely yesterday and is playing to the enjoyment of the Piven family.
thank you JD!

Ronaldinho !

2007-02-26T13:17:48+00:00

A lazy monday morning, grey jobs to deal with, still with a slight hang-over from a visit to Camp Nou to watch a good Bar�a game last night (3-0 against Athletic) So if J.D does the music clip thingy, I might as well do the football clip thingy. here's Ronnie + Samba.

Carnaval !!

2007-02-16T17:50:55+00:00

Ana's class dressed as a 'Balanced Meal' today for the Carnaval (called Carnestoltes here) school parade.
The teachers in the school design every year different costumes. This year the theme was foods.

London Calling

2007-02-15T09:38:59+00:00

A quick overnight job for The Guardian about British lads eating more and more sugary stuff. (even fruits are getting sweeter)
Every now and then a call comes where everything goes the right way and there is wonderful trust and good energy with the AD (Richard Turley who sounds like Hugh Grant in this case) and even a really rushed job goes well.

and it was even more fun to write the headline with candy...love those colorfully wrapped 'generic' candies. I got them in a Japanese store in... Sao Paolo

Seen in the house

2007-02-13T08:28:42+00:00