HALLOWE'EN!

HAPPY HALLOWE'EN BLOGLAND!

I mostly keep this site for purely art-related stuff but there's a part of my life that discreetly pokes out into this site now and again. Very discreetly. I am a Hallowe'en FANATIC! And me and my good friend Ben Krakowsky, who runs http://www.hauntBC.com,  are hosting a Hallowe'en party. If you live in Vancouver and love the hell out of Hallowe'en, this is the place to go my friends. We are tired of club night parties with no Monster Mash, 20 dollars in shoppers drug mart tombstones scotch-taped on the walls and no, for lack of a better term, gusto.

We have the gusto. We have cornered the market on gusto.

We will have surprise guests trick or treating at the venue throughout the night! We will have burlesque, highland dancing, magic, comedy, music and the coolest prize give-aways in all of the lower mainland. Want an autographed photograph of Jeffrey Combs? How about one of Udo Kier? A private tour of a horror televsion set? $1031.00 in cash prizes? How about some one-of-a-kind artwork made especially for the event by an artist whose work has appeared in Ripley's Believe it or Not?  And that's not even close to all of the amazing prizes we have for people who go all out for my favorite day of the year.

Remember that feeling you got on Hallowe'en night when you were a kid?

Come to this party and reclaim it!

PS we are thrilled to be hosted by the near-legendary Aleister Crane! That guy's a national treasure!

The Death of the Horned King

This movie was a huge favorite of mine as a kid. I remember seeing it in theatres and totally falling in love with it. Then there's the sense of mystique because it never got a VHS release until WAY later. Watching it that long after the fact though underlined the enormous problems with the movie. But the fact remains it is an animated movie with a WICKED badass looking villain who raises an army of the dead from an evil cauldron and in the end rots in what is probably the best Disney villain death ever.

Here's to you, Horned King.

The Hermit

It's a lazy Friday here at the mansion. The asylum walls are built, the pumpkins are carved, the props are nearly finished. Why not draw some more ghosties.

ALMOST OCTOBER!

So it's about time I start doing some cartoony skull ghosts.

Vodnik

Just back from a trip through Croatia and Prague with some friends. Been a great couple weeks! I started this illustration in the plane. It's based on a Czech bogeyman called Vodnik. Cleaned him up in flash quickly to get the idea off my mind.

ZORN!

Man I haven't drawn this guy in ages. We go back years. Like, 2001 ish. He's from a game that I was helping develop way back then. Every time I draw him he changes a bit. This time his mask has come out somewhat General Kael-ish. Which was a jumping off point for the design so I guess that's fair.

Ogre Wants Magic Fish

I wanted to draw an ogre and a guy with a katana. So that happened. And I was going to give him a lantern but I thought it was more interesting for it to be a bowl and for the light from that bowl to be cast by magic fish that the warrior has collected for the ogre. I realize this is not a thing you can see clearly in the illustration. Which is why I'm saying. Anyways...

Also I've been LOVING working with pen lately. I'm hitting a groove I haven't in years where drawings are just... working better I suppose. I think it's because I'm letting go of the drawings more freely and not imposing something external on them. Like trying to draw in a certain style or feeling compelled to make the linework a certain way.

Also included is an image from an eerie dream I had where I had rented a room in an enormous mansion where every room was the entire length of the house and there were 3 floors of them. It was profoundly unnerving.