Secret Still

I’m gonna start off by telling you that I am completely and totally biased on the art of Ian Johnson. I love it. I love it because I love jazz. I love jazz eventhough my parents look at me like they’re trying to make my head explode with their minds when I listen to it around them. No form of music effects me as much as jazz. And unfortunately for all of you Ian Johnson paints jazz musicians. There goes my objectivity.

The truth is that Ian Johnson doesn’t just paint jazz musicians, he paints them the way their music feels. And somehow it’s still a portrait. Maybe it’s his simple colors and backgrounds, or maybe it’s his use of only black to sketch in the figure, or maybe it’s the moments that he captures, but whatever the reason, his paintings sound like jazz to me. They make me hear the loneliness that underlies most jazz. It’s a loneliness that comes of being obsessed with your instrument and your music, so much so that you tune out everything but. Jazz is lonely because it’s only interested in making itself more pure, and doesn’t have time for any of the day-to-day. But it also feels the joy of living no matter how hard staying alive can be. Ian Johsnon’s work shoots a straight, simple feeling right into your heart, and that’s what jazz is all about.

Ian Johnson

If you haven’t heard of Eboy already then you should doubt your cool. And your nerdiness. Assuming of course that the two aren’t mutually exclusive. And the proof that they aren’t is Eboy.

Eboy is a design firm that creates re-usable pixel objects and layer them together to create complex and extensible artwork. What that means is that they make whole cities out of pixel objects (trees, buildings, people), and nothing but. You might think that this is too specialized a form of design to warrant much business, but they’re talent with the medium and their creativity have landed more big names than most can claim.

See it for yourself here

The fine folks of Graffiti Reasearch Lab have come up with yet another brilliant way to make the cityscape come alive. They’ve got a mobile projector/laser system that responds to a laser pointer, but the great part is that you can be pretty far away from whatever it is your projecting onto. And the source code is open-source! These dudes should be my friends.

Find out what the hell I’m talking about here.

Show of hands: How many people have read Moby Dick? Or at least have read a passage from it or seen an episode of Wishbone that explained it? Unfortunately I’ve done all three, and I still think it’s one of the worst books ever written. The book did prepare me for the artworks of Mike Maxwell. Most of his work is nautically themed, and harkens back to what I like to call “The Velocipede Era” where men all mustaches and beards and longer hair. A time when mutton chops were worn by more than just car-loving southern rockers. In truth I think that comes before the velocipede, but my brain isn’t too careful about how it lumps things together.

Maxwell’s work uses a lot of muted tones and woodcut-like line work, which keeps the continuity of the subject matter, but he adds odd hues to throw the whole thing off kilter, giving it his own personal illustrative style.

Check out his work here
Juxtapoz has photos of his current show with Paul Chatem, doubly nautical

Tight. Hella tight. Tight to death.

Denis Darzacq

I ran across Andrew Wilson’s post-it pets a while back and I still haven’t managed to see them all. Not for lack of trying though. There are just too many to get through for an active surfer like myself. Looking at them sort of feels like playing Pokemon or something. Gotta catch ‘em all. I have no idea how to play Pokemon. Can you tell?

Andrew Wilson

Bloo Empire is the work of Keeley Carrigan. It’s got that Americanized Japanese style to it that always makes me think of kid’s cereal. But that’s cool. I love Peanut Butter Crunch…and Lucky Charms….and Cinnamon Toast Crunch………..I love kids cereal.

Bloo Empire
His Flickr

I’m sure that most of you watched Ren and Stimpy when you were younger, or maybe you watched it yesterday, but you were younger yesterday, too. Regardless of your youth you have enjoyed the work of Glenn Barr. Barr’s style is that nod to mod that’s dripping with swing. It’s burlesque and charicaturish and smacks of hedonism. The whole portfolio seems to have a pipe in it’s mouth, a scotch in hand, and a stained, silk smoking jacket barely covering it’s shame. It’s a dirty wink and a lude smile. It’s great.

Glenn Barr
Bjork - I Miss You, by Glenn Barr

Lomki is Jeremie Decalf, and as far as I can gather he’s French. So there you go again, France, making me like you a little bit more. We may just be friends yet.

Lomki’s style is very clean while not looking overly illustrated, but he manages to pack a lot of expression into single images. That’s the real trick of illustration: making your point without being completely direct. If people wanted their message delivered directly they’d just type it out. Illustration is there to make it dance and sing a little, to dazzle you into interest. It works, too. Especially in the case of Lomki.

Lomki

I came across Dan Zettwoch because of the illustrations he did on cardboard with just a marker and some white out. The pictures are illustrations of his trip to France, but they are very indicative of his style, which looks like a cross between R. Crumb and a rube-goldberg device. Eventhough most of his comics aren’t writing heavy, all the notes and details and arrows add up to some very interesting pieces regardless. I spent at least an hour just going through his work and trying to read every little message. You should do the same.

Dan Zettwoch
His Blog