(painting) It's Begining To Look A Lot Like Christmas

 First things first I need to apologize for the images below.  No matter how I turned the photos they upload like this.  If you strain your neck I know a great chiropractor.
So having a limited budget this year I have decided to make my own gifts.  First on the list is my mother.  What do you get your mother?  I had found a box of used wall tile on my way home from work one night and snagged a few.  Using India ink I illustrated Santa, Frosty, Rudolph, an angel, the baby Jesus, and a Christmas tree.  That's one person down and ever so many to go.

 

(digital illustrattion) It Was A Graveyard Smash

Happy Halloween

(comic) The Weather with Dan & Martha

Oh that Dan, such a punny guy.  How does Martha put up with him?  Not only do we get to once again peek in at the domestic lives of Dan and Martha, but also we see more of their lovely apartment.  Before this comic it seemed apartment 312 was only one windowless room with wood paneling on the walls, and the closest thing to furniture being a green phone on an end table. Now they have themselves a living room with a window and laundry in the apartment.  If utilities are included in their rent they are set, even if porn producers work down the hall.

(digital illustration) Cody Cupman Is Back

 A little while back I introduced the character Cody Cupman and all the wonderful things he does (http://guidentheway.blogspot.ca/2010/05/cody-cupman.html).  After creating those paintings I continued to think of more and more things that make Cody Cupman Cody Cupman.  I moved all the scribbled ideas onto a few pages of my sketch book and began selecting ones to move forward with.  These are the first four chosen.

(comic) Squirt and Bernie

There you have it folks, Squirt and Bernie in it's entirety.  Who knows what they'll get up to in their next exciting adventure.

(ramble) Strawberry Milk; Friend or Foe

A few years ago, in the early stages of my intolerance of lactose, I had written a short essay to procrastinate writing actual essays for school.  I recently found it on a hard drive and figured it was good enough to share.  Enjoy.

It has been years sense my last encounter with strawberry milk. I think I was seven at the time. Anyway it has been so long I couldn't remember if I liked it or not so I purchased the carton.

First I examined the exterior packaging. Pink mostly with some red and white. There is a soccer player with a green striped jersey. The exterior can tell you a lot about what is on the inside. Under the pouring spout are the nutritional facts such as 115mg sodium, 0g fiber, etc. The other side tells you it is pasteurized and lists the ingredients, nothing important. The carton also tells me I have 500ml of 1% partly skimmed strawberry milk.

I spread the cardboard flaps peeling the diamond shape a part. I lift it up to make contact with my lips and allow the first few drops of liquid to flow into my mouth. This first taste left my uncertain so I dove in for more. Pink deliciousity.

I begin drinking quick as I approached the subway when I remembered my problem with milk. If too much milk enters my system the results can be disastrous. By the time got on the subway I felt it brewing. I tried to push the feeling in my stomach out of my mind as I made my way closer to home. The milk bubbled as it mixed with my stomach acids. Will I make it? I leave the subway and light a smoke. It helps.

By the time I get home my stomach problem had dwindled to gas and all seemed well. Most milk would have sent me to the bathroom for hours. This leaves me wondering: is strawberry milk my friend or my foe.

(comic) Squirt and Bernie Preveiw

 The other day, while I was clearing out some space on my external hard drive, I came across a project I started working on a few years ago.   I had colored the 1st page and started on the second when something made me completely forget about this comic.  So I finished the second page and decided to give you people a taste.  Squirt and Bernie is a story about a squirrel who sells weed for the beaver mafia and the consequences of being arrested by the police bears.  It's going to be a fun ride.

(video) Bee vs Spider

The other day I stepped outside for my morning coffee and cigarette and was distracted by a slight buzz along my fence.  When I looked closer I saw that a bee had caught it's feet in a spiders web.  I set my smoke down and ran inside to get my cell phone.  By the time I got back the spider had come to claim his catch.  I hit record on the video function and enjoyed the rest of my cigarette.

The music is from The Venture Bros: The Music of J.G. Thirlwell 

also available on youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWvfCbXvAlI&feature=results_video

(animation) How I Became Footicapped

This animation may seem a tad religious, but it's more autobiographical than anything.  When I was a kid the school thought I was showing signs of being dyslexic.  So they ran a bunch of test on me.  Nothing invasive, just looking at pictures and word problem type stuff.  When everything was all said and done, they told my mother "your son isn't dyslexic, he is left handed."  I looked up past the ceiling and thought to myself 'what a clever joke.'
Instead of animating that story I decided to go farther back, right to the source.  Here is How I Became Footicapped.
     

 

If anyone couldn't figure out what footicapped is just think

handicapped people have "problems" with their legs

therefore people "problems" with their arms are

footicapped   

(animation) Danger Due To Holes

Along my route to work there is a section of construction.  All over the fence barrier are signs warning the public of various dangers; some as simple as "danger due to construction".  Out of them all  my favorite was "danger due to holes".  What if instead of warning you about holes in the ground they were telling you about holes of a different variety.

(event, photography) Toronto's 1st Ninja Parade

 

Just over a month ago Toronto had it's first Ninja Parade.  Unlike the zombie march, where people dress up and participate, the ninja parade was more spectator oriented (although dressing up was not discouraged).  Martial arts masters Ayumu Ishikawa, Daichi Takahashi, Hayato Shimabukuro, and Isamu Yamamoto flew in from Japan to oversee the other ninjas involved in the parade.  They arrived a week in advance to see some sites and get to know the parade route.  

The day came, and over the coarse of an hour and forty-five minutes ninja descended from the rooftops at Dundas and Shaw.  Each ninja took an average of fifteen minutes to maneuver between traffic and pedestrians along the parade route, all while showing off their stealth tactics.

The hired photographer, Brian Muller, had fallen ill shortly after the parade ended, and was hospitalized and then quarantined for two weeks.  His widow has finally allowed me to see the pictures taken and after going through the nearly four hundred pictures, these are the most promising.

 

Photos by 

BRIAN MULLER

1983-2012 

(painting) Another Painting For Mr. Fuks Birthday

Last year my roommate Alon was very specific in his birthday artwork request.  This year he gave me no feedback when I asked him about it.  Seeing the he is Jewish and into motorcycles my first idea had him sitting on a chopper spinning the back tire on a Nazi's head while blowing more away with a machine gun, there might have been a sexy lady on the back of the bike.
As I started to sketch that idea out a conversation we had before Christmas flooded back to me.  "You know what you should paint me, Deadpool and Wolverine, you know from marvel comics.  But I want Deadpool holding up Wolverines head after a crazy fight or something."  I had already gotten him a gift, and was thinking of breaking it into 8 pieces to get into the Chanukah spirit.  So I told him it was too late and then completely forgot the request.  That is until I was sketching his present.
I turned the page and began loosely laying out the image.  The next thing I know he is saying goodbye off to New Orleans for a week.  Now i had enough time not only to paint the painting but frame it, wrap it in a ribbon, and have it waiting for him when he walked in the door.

(painting) Image Orgy for the Art Historian

My latest painting is called Image Orgy for the Art Historian. It contains 75 pieces of art history going as far back as 1425.  I decided to paint it on a glass frame I rescued from the behind an art store. I started with the black outline on the front of the glass, and then flipped the glass around to paint the paintings.  To do that I had to paint the dark and light tones before painting the mid range.
Here is a list of the paintings, try to find them all:
Masaccio, Holy Trinity, 1425
Botticelli, La Primavera, 1478
Da Vinci, Mona Lisa, 1503-6
Michelangelo, ceiling of Sistine Chapel (Creation of Adam), 1508-12
Titian, Pope Paul III, 1543
Naizen, Arrival of the Portuguese, 1593  
Caravaggio, Conversion of St Paul, c1601
Rubins, The Miracles of St Francis Xavier, 1616-17
Rembrandt, The Nightwatch, 1642
van Ruisdael, Windmill at Wijk, 1665
Fragonard, The Swing, 1767
David, The Dead Marat, 1793
Kiyonaga, Interior of a Bathhouse, c1800
Gericault, The Raft of the Medusa, 1819
Goya, Saturn Devouring one of his Children, 1820-3

Millet, The Man with the Hoe, 1852-62
Monet, sketch for The Picnic, 1865-6
Manet, The Execution of Maximilian, 1867
Homer, Long Branch, New Jersey, 1869
Eakins, The Gross Clinic, 1875
Muybridge, Galloping Horse, 1878
Renoir, The Boating Party, 1881
Manet, a Bar at the Folies-Bergere, 1882
Degas, Ballet Rehearsal, 1874

Seurat, Bathers at Asnieres, 1883-4
Gauguin, The Vision After the Sermon, 1888
van Gogh, The Night Cafe, 1888
van Gogh, Cafe Terrace on the Place Du Forum, 1888
Toulouse Lautrec, Jane Avril au Jardin de Paris, 1893 
Munch, The Scream, 1893
Morbelli, For Eighty Cents, 1895
Cezanne, Cardplayers, c1890-5
Matisse, The Joy of Life, 1905
Rousseau, The Snake Charmer, 1907
Braque, House and Trees, 1908
Munter, Boating, 1910
Boccioni, The City Rises, 1910
Nolde, Masks, 1911
Schmitt-Rottluff, Die Brucke membership card, 1911
Kirchner, Berlin Street Scene, 1913
Kandinsky, Improvisation NO30, 1913
Leger, Contrast of Forms, 1913
Malevich, Suprematist Composition, Black Tropezium and Red Square, 1915
Duchamp, Fountain, 1917
Popova, Painterle Architectonic, 1917
Matisse, The Moorish Screen, 1921-2
Hopper, Automat, 1927
Rivera, The Making of a Fresco, Showing the Building of a City, 1931
Dali, The Presence of Memory, 1931
Orozco, American Civilization - Latin America, 1932
Magritte, Le Viol, 1934
Moore, Two Forms, 1934
Bonnard, Nude in the Bath, 1935
Picasso, Guernica, 1937
Miro, Head of a Woman, 1938
Kahlo, The Two Fridas, 1939
Mondrian, Fox Trot A, 1950
Pollock, Autumn Rythm, 1950
de Kooning, Excavations, 1950
Newman, Vir Heroicus Sublimis, 1950-1

Rouault, Ecce Homo, 1952
Rothko, Green on Blue, 1956
Johns, Three Flags, 1958
Stella, Tuxedo Park Junction, 1960
Warhol, Twenty-five Coloured Marilyns, 1962
Hockney, Man Taking Shower in Beverly Hills, 1964 
Raushenberg, Retroactive, 1964
Lichtenstein, Big Painting No 6, 1965
Nauman, Punch & Judy (Kick in the Groin/Slap in the Face), 1985
Martin, The Gate 1985, 1985
Koons, Rabbit, 1986
Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991
Lijun, Group Two NO , 1992
Rauch, Ubung, 1999

(painting) Boobscape commission

I was approached one night after work by a friend of mine, Sean.  He told me he wanted a painting for his bedroom door.  He wanted a Boobscape.  So I set off to making him a small one to see if we were on the same page.

He told me it would be facing out into the apartment so he wanted the boobs of the Boobscape to be toned down.  I then cut the sheet of paper to the dimensions he gave me and got to work.

 After I was Finished I had to cut the Boobscape in half because of the style of his door.