Here’s an illustration for last week’s Portland Mercury. For those not from Portland, there is a restaurant downtown called Greek Cusina, and they have this giant purple octopus climbing out of their second floor corner window…
They are currently suing the city over some fire code issues. I love being able to draw fun stuff like this for money; it’s wonderful.
I got back from the Alternative Press Expo late Sunday night/early Monday morning. I spent the weekend in the clouds as it were; on the left, there was Vancouver BC’s Cloudscape Comics collective, manned by Jeff Ellis and Jonathon Dalton, and to the right the brothers Dayton, Brandon(not pictured) and Damien of Whistling Cloud.
Here’s my table setup on the second day. People really dug my new blank journals with my old screenprints as covers. I only came home with a few of those, so I’ll have to make more, and they’ll be up in the store soon too.
I also brought more prints than I usually bring to shows, which is good because they were a big seller for me. It sounds weird to say it, but I feel like I could go back to APE next year, and not bring any comics at all, but just fill my table with printed matter and stationery goods and do just fine - if not better - because there would be more of a focus to my table. Between comics, t-shirts, prints, to-do lists, journals, buttons, and moustache wax, I felt like some people were a little confused as to what exactly they should be looking for from my table.
This woman came by on Sunday fully decked out in Mighty Boosh merch, most of it homemade. I demanded to take a picture of her homemade Boosh bracelets, featuring even minor characters! There’s a shot of her other wrist on my Flickr.
Highlights of the weekend: Green Monk by table neighbor Brandon Dayton, Wuvable Oaf #1 and the Wuvable Oaf Kitty Undies t-shirt from Ed Luce, and Tiger Bee by Katy Wu.
Also, KRK Ryden bought the last copy of Baby Otto Volume 1 that I brought, which was cool; it was his last purchase of the show!
I got a ton of compliments on my moustache (many from women with their boyfriend/husband, who had to turn around as they were walking away to secretly mouth their approval at my stache!). San Francisco is an amazing city, but way too clean-shaven for my tastes. A message to the heterosexual men of San Francisco: grow some facial hair, it’ll do you some good!
Sorry for the kinda bad photo, the official ones will be better, but I’m excited. A friend and I are launching our own line of moustache wax under the brand, Man’s Face Stuff! He’s a natural perfumer and amateur scientist and has a fabulous moustache. Neither of us were happy with the hold, waterproofing, or scent of the various waxes we had tried, so why not make our own? He started making wax as a birthday present for me last year, then I came by to help him during future product testing, and eventually became a partner.
For a start, we will both have a signature scent, his is not formulated yet, but “Gin and Tonic” is mine, and then of course we have classic unscented beeswax.
These are two samples for an upcoming show, the wax isn’t officially for sale anywhere yet, but if it’s something you might be interested in, let me know.
Indigo Kelleigh, Les McClaine, Jon Siruno, and I share a studio space on the east side of Portland called Tranquility Base. We are currently looking to move studio locations soon and some of the better spots available would be more than big enough to accommodate another person (or two). We’re just four illustrators and cartoonists looking for some good studio space for around $100 a month, and we’re looking to make it five (or even six), now wouldn’t you like in on that?
If you’re an artist in Portland looking for some studio space, let me or one of the other guys know and we can go from there, OK?
Hey, I realize I haven’t posted any new comic projects as of late, but Baby Otto #4 is in the research stage, and I have a short one-off book in the early stages as well. Anyways, I’ve gotten better at getting my comics out to the world a bit more recently with the help of a distribution rep. Some of my books are carried by Global Hobo Comics Distributor now too.
All of my books are, of course, still available from me, but if you happen to live near some of the shops below, they should be for sale there too, unless they’ve sold out.
Minneapolis, MN - Big Brain Comics (been a while though, so they might be gone)
New York, NY - Jim Hanley’s Universe, and Forbidden Planet
Berkeley, CA - Comic Relief
State College, PA - Comic Swap
Baltimore, MD - Atomic Books
Portland, OR - Floating World, Reading Frenzy, Tender Loving Empire, Powell’s (Burnside and Hawthorne), and possibly Cosmic Monkey and Guapo
Maybe more? That’s all I can think of right now.
And just so this post isn’t completely devoid of pretty pictures, here’s this week’s Weekly Print piece. Only 49 more to go!
In the last few days, I have received both a large box of black and army green t-shirts as well as some different screenprinting ink for fabric that I’ve been wanting to try out, just white and red at this time. I threw this little mockup together based on a few things people have requested on t-shirts, or I have thought about putting on t-shirts, or just plain took out of my sketchbook as a basic idea that would get finalized later.
My question(s) for all of you reading this are:
A) Would you even realistically purchase a shirt from me? (Probably in the $15 range)
B) If yes, which of the designs below would you be most interested in purchasing? Or if there is another design you’d like to see too, speak up.
The two shark designs might be a hassle to print, but I think I could pull it off if this new ink works the way I want it to. Also I don’t have blue ink, nor do I have blue shirts for the “KILL” shark, but I threw it in there because I received a few requests for it on a shirt and would not be disinclined to purchase the required shirts and ink if that one’s a winner.
I’m in enough of an experimental screenprinting mood right now that I might even do a few of these many designs anyway, or would do a pre-order to do a specific design if someone definitely wanted one.
So I haven’t really done any work as a sock designer as of late, but two of my older designs finally got released by Sock It To Me. I’d been waiting for these luchador socks to come out for WAY too long but here they are and damn they look good! Go on and buy yourself a pair right now! Sock It To Me also just put out my bike chain design too.
Also, 24 Hour Comic Day was this last weekend. I went to the event at PNCA not really knowing what the plan was, but bringing enough stuff to work on a new comic, Baby Otto #3, or a new kid’s book/comic idea I just thought of in the shower a few day ago. I got settled into a table at the PNCA library and knew I was not feeling inspired enough to come up with 24 pages of something on the spot, so over the next 17 hours (taking many many breaks for food, coffee, and general wandering around), I completed all the pencils for The Life & Times of Baby Otto Zeplin: Volume 3. I’ve never worked this way on Baby Otto before, usually after it’s totally written and thumbnailed, I pencil a page then ink it before penciling the next page, but I think this new way is a better way to work from now on. I’ll start posting pages by the end of this week, I just want to make sure I have a little buffer first.
Also I voted today*, and I feel great about it. Now I’m off to get some more work done!
*Oregon does mail-in voting only, in case you were curious how I voted this early
This is me at about 4:30am, headed to Portland airport and SPX. This last weekend I took a trip out to Maryland for the Small Press Expo. It was such a great time, and I got to meet so many new friends, many of whom I had only known through their comics or the internet. I put up a handful of pictures in this Flickr set. I traded for or bought a huge stack of comics and came back to Portland happy and re-inspired to work on my own stuff.
Here’s a sweet robot with a moustache drawing I got from Nedroid. I AM rad.
This coming weekend, my roommate Meghan and I will be taking part in the first Portland Art Open. We will be opening our apartment to the public on Friday night and all day Saturday and Sunday, and turning our apartment into our own personal gallery space. We’re in the process of cleaning and taking down our various knick-knacks and other works that usually adorn our walls and will soon be hanging our work.
If you’re in the Portland area, you should totally stop by and hang out for a bit, we’ll be holed up all day and could use the company if no one else shows up. We’re trying to sell some things too, but honestly we’d just like to have a good time and have people show up. If you check out the link above you can get more information as well as check out the other artists taking part.
Our address is 2315 SE Stark St. We’ll be open these hours:
Friday: 5pm-9pm
Saturday: 11am-6pm
Sunday: 11am-6pm
Are you an artist in the Portland, OR metro area? Are you also perhaps in need of a shared studio space? Les McClaine, Jon Siruno, and I are losing our current studiomate at the end of the month and we are on the search for a replacement. The space is a bit messy in the photo, yes, but we’ll tidy things up if it’ll make you feel more welcome.
Our studio is in a building near 19th and E. Burnside (mere blocks from Columbia Art Supplies for all your art needs). With four in the studio, rent is $93 and change per month, plus a small amount more for insurance. I don’t have the square-footage calculations right now, but depending on some re-arranging possibilities and the space needs of any new studiomate, there may be a chance of fitting two new people in the space.
A mini-fridge AND a microwave? What luxury is this?! You could soon be heating up your Hot Pocket right next to those Jonny Crossbones original pages! Think about that!
This is the desk of our exiting studiomate. It will be leaving soon, but most of the space seen in this photo (but not my bike) would be yours, if you’ll only join us…
If you have any questions, or are interested in coming to see the space in person, let me know.
