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THE CURRENT SEASON: Remembrance Day
To honour this November 11th, I’ve decided to create an illustration for the occasion. — Throughout the day, I posted the work in its progress: drawing, inking and colouring. Above is the finished piece, and below you can see it in its previous stages.
— Thanks to those of you who have commented here and on facebook.
EXTRA EXTRA: It’s a Wonderful Life — 3 Covers hit the stand
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Three weeks ago I received a call from Toronto Life magazine, asking me if I could create three, yes three, covers for their upcoming issue. — How it works is, you have you’re “cover cover” that’s the one everyone sees when they first look at the magazine, and then underneath that you have your second cover, and underneath that a third. And the idea was that I could use these covers to create a three part story, which features a day in the life of some creative Torontonians — “Sounds terrific.” I said, “that sort of thing is right up my alley.” — “Great,” they said. “But there’s just one thing. We need it in exactly five days.”
Then if my life were a movie, Journey’s “Ask the Lonely” would have kicked in, and there would have been a montage scene which condensed 120 hours of drawing, colouring and dripping takeout food on my keyboard, into one moment of triumph; in which I conquer my demons, rise to the challenge, and kick some major illustration ass. — But in reality, I had to play that song again and again, and eventually got sick of it on the third day. The rest though, all happened exactly like that. — I hope you enjoy.
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PORTRAIT RADIO: Boo Are You?
November 5th can be scary too! – Just because Halloween was officially over days ago and now your pumpkin is silently rotting on your porch, do not allow yourself to give into the notion that the season for scares is over. — This Halloween episode promises to be worth the wait. So much so that we are willing to wager that if you allow yourself to sit back and enjoy the entire thing, you will actually forget that you are listening to your friend’s amateur pod cast, and feel as though you’re not wasting your time. And there is nothing scary about that.
CLICK ANYWHERE ABOVE TO PLAY
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AN ARTIST AT LARGE: “City Scape” Group Show Opens in London UK
Good News Everyone, I’m in this group show with Famous People. — Curated by Dalphine Ettingers, The LAVA Collective has put together a group show of predominantly North American origin, focusing on street art and urban culture. Big names like Shepard Fairey, Swoon, Dalek and Skullphone vie for attention with an exciting selection of emerging artists. Read more…
I’ll have 8 original drawings in the show, including these two below…
Pop Montreal 09, “Audience” & “Building” Ink and White Paint on Paper, 28″ X 18″
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DEPT OF QUEBEC CINEMA: “Lacrymal”
Poster for a Short Film
This is a poster I recently designed for “Lacrymal”, a short film by Montreal artists Xavier Hamel and Pierre-Alexandre Girard.
For those without their French anatomy books handy, lacrymal, is the French word for a glad in the body that produces what we call tears; and tears feature heavily in this story. The film, three minutes in length, follows the story of a girl who is always crying; a curse it seems, but a unique gift as well it turns out.
Lacrymal is currently in post production, and should arrive at Festivals next year.
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PORTRAIT RADIO: An Appeal to the Masses
Portrait Radio profiles people and stories, casually steals from NPR’s “This American Life” and does a not-so-bad a job of it.
Right now we are in the midst of putting together our upcoming episode for Halloween, an episode we are calling “BOO, are you?’ — And in thinking about scary stories that we might bring you for this season, it got us thinking about all of those classic Halloween characters that always seem to come back to life this time of year. Characters like the Vampire, the Witch, the Werewolf, Frankenstein. It got us thinking, what if we could find actual people who at one time or another found themselves or someone they knew, actually embodying some of the traits and behaviors of these classic characters? Not literally of course, but metaphorically. After all, aren’t these characters just archetypes of our own all-too-human qualities, perhaps the ones that we’re most afraid of?
What if for instance, there was someone out there who went around using people; who fed on the energy of others and then discarded them? Someone not unlike a “Man-pire”, say. Or what if there was another person who found themselves walking through life in a trance, devoid of human emotion and feeling, totally alienated from the world of the living, kind of like a Zombie? Or what if there was yet another person, this time one who felt alive, but suffered because it seemed like the world wasn’t seeing them, like it chose not to see them, as if he or she didn’t even exist?; kind of like, a Ghost.
— Well, it is in the interest of perusing that idea, that we are now asking for your help — yes, your help, — in bring us these stories to us. We want to know if you or someone you know has a story about a time when it felt like they were being a Ghost, or a Werewolf, or a Dr. Jekyll character, or maybe even a total Witch. If you would like to help us and maybe even be interviewed yourself, then please get in touch. Send us a message through facebook or through the website. There are only two weeks left until Halloween so there is no time to waste. And if you live far away and you’re out of Montreal, this is not a problem, we can (apparently) interview you through Skype and would love to talk to you. Thanks.
AN ARTIST AT LARGE: Puce POP! — Thanks for your Support
— Thanks so much to everyone who came out to see and buy some posters. Your support is really appriciated and it was great to get the chance to speak with so many of you. — Thanks!
PORTRAIT RADIO: The Graycale Rainbow
Listen and Learn: Host Jack Dylan shamelessly rips off NPR’s “This American Life” and does a not-so-bad a job of it. CLICK THE IMAGE TO PLAY.
In this episode I talk to Jim Holyoak and Matt Shane, two artist who created a project where for one month they would live, eat and sleep, inside of an art gallery. The gallery’s walls were cover floor to ceiling in paper and brushes and inks set up in the middle of the room. The final touch: The public, anyone who wanted to at all, could come in, pick up a brush and join them. — Also featured in this episode, music by Montreal’s Shortpants Romance and Think About Life.
– FINISSAGE: Fri 02/10/09at 5pm as part of Art Pop
– Shortpants Romance: Thur 01/10/09 at 3pm at Barfly as part of Pop
PORTRAIT RADIO: “Posterer” Life on The Streets
Talk POP! - Host Jack Dylan shamelessly rips off NPR’s “This American Life” and does a not-so-bad a job of it. Click the image to play.
In this episode we talk to a man who’s name cannot be revealed because the job he does is illegal. — That job, “Poster-er”: As in the person who actually goes around and puts up all of the posters on street poles for so many of the music show here in Montreal. For five years now he has been doing this job and over the course of that time he has put up literally thousands of posters and collected as many stories. Life on the streets has forced him up against the police, the cold, rival posterers, and even the homeless at times. This story is one of the funnest and truly unique shows we have even brought to you, we hope you enjoy it.
DEPT OF OPPROBRIUM: Q and Sports and I
Some of you may have caught my letter yesterday (see below) on CBC radio’s Q, where I (ever so gently) criticized the shows producers for the creation of a new segment devoted to sports. –
I would like to apologize to any listeners I may have offended with my remarks. My aim was to question the show’s producers for the decision to create a new segment devoted to sports, which I believed was a bit of a stretch for the show’s traditional mandate. After all, the sports section in any newspaper is kept separate from the Arts and Culture section and there is no shortage of play for sports news in the media.
My main mistake, I realize, is that I came off as speaking on behalf of the entire Q listenership; that by claiming that they were like me - skinny armed, fine boned, daydreamers, with the reflexes of a koala bear – I may have inadvertently offended a not-so small portion of the audience who appreciate both sports and the arts.
Let me be more clear: it is I who doesn’t really appreciate both sports and the arts.
I should have mentioned of course that there are plenty of artists out there who love and follow sports, as well as athletes who paint; and that I myself like to play, on occasion, what could be called a reasonable imitation of soccer, tennis, or road hockey.
Still though, if the reality remains as it seems – that the jocks and their admirers still outnumber the wimpy and the disinterested, and that the sports-fan’s voice is still the loudest one in the room – then I am glad I spoke up.
Our numbers may be smaller than I had imagined but I know that there are more than a few like me out there. Those of us who must continue to feign interest in draft picks, who will lose our friends each year to another playoff season, and who are forced, all through life, to make excuses as to why we never caught the score of last night’s big game.
I know that there are more of you out there my non-sports fans. I want you to know, that the next time you’re standing in right-field with the crowd roaring, and a mysterious white object drops from the sky beside you and snaps you out of your thoughts, just remember that though you may be outnumbered, you are not alone.
P.S. Keep the segment Jian, if it ever goes I know that I will be blamed for it.
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For the Record: The aired version of the letter — Which was edited down from the original.
Consider for a moment that most of your listening audience has likely spent much of their lives actually trying to avoid sports — their artistic limbs and day-dreaming minds not being attributes that lend themselves well to a game of tackle football.
Long after the wasted hours in mandatory gym classes, this audience was probably more inclined to watch a rerun of Seinfeld than catch the latest game on TV. Perhaps because sports broadcasters, as a rule, tend have that very distinctive Sportsman voice –the one that’s too loud and reminds you of that guy who flushed your wallet down the toilet in seventh grade.
We, your average listener, are Lit students and cinephiles, introverts and cat-people!
It’s not that we don’t like sports per say, (personally speaking I do own at least one pair of tennis socks), but it’s just that we’re probably not the types of people who actually read the sports section or follow sports news.
OK, maybe it’s wrong to keep the cats and the dogs separate. Maybe if we’re brought together we can start to understand each other and save a few wallets in grade seven. Perhaps you’re trying to forge a better world by getting both sides to work together. But then again, maybe that sort of thing just doesn’t work.