Secret Still

Oh, it’s been so long since I’ve had the time to go out and actually see art. But tonight is the night that we ride, and for the first time in history I’ll be setting foot inside Club 6. Anything with the word club in it usually drives me away, but tonight is the Vans Lo Life show, and I’m not missing that for anything. Plus, Monday is my birthday (which means I have the day off) so I can get as hammered as I want this weekend and not worry about getting the DT’s at work. Bonus. Check after the jump for the full weekend calendar of crap I’m going to.
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The paintings of Erik Mark Sandberg look like what the lovechild of Matt Furie and Frida Kahlo’s mustache would create if it ate some peyote at The Great American Waterpark. I fucking nailed it with that sentence. I get to use a sentence like that maybe once ever year. Fuck yeah. That shit is better than jizzing on some giant boobage with Foreigner blasting in the background. And so are Sandberg’s paintings. Even if the hairy people creep me the fuck out. That’s ok. I like being creeped the fuck out sometimes. That’s why I still watch Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood when I get crazy paranoid stoned. Sometimes you’ve got to see how far you can push it.

Erik Mark Sandberg

Don’t know shit about the dude. I know I’m into his hella grungy stencils and paintings. Do I really need to know anything else? Nuh uh. And neither do you.

VRNO

I know that normally videos go in the Daily Videos section of the sidebar, but this video was just too good to relegate to a simple text link. Shot entirely on a Red HD at 120fps, even at a web compression level the video comes out beautiful. The shots are set up perfectly, never blown out, and some tight enough to add more tension to an already tense activity. The film is helped in no small part by the dudes throwing down some nice tricks with damn near perfect form. If I had $18k to spend on a camera you can bet that a film of me eating cereal would probably look close to spectacular. A film of me skating would look like crap, but only because I always look like crap when I skate. It’s my signature style.

Skate

I never thought that I would find a comics artist who amazed me nearly as much as Chris Ware. I guess you never think you will until you do, and now I have. Joseph Lambert’s lines, form, direction, and framing make me want to put down my pen and pencil for good. Or never put them down. It’s hard to tell. Either way, Lambert’s comics, as well as his illustrations, are fantastic. Someone out there with the resources needs to put him on a permanent paycheck. A big paycheck. Like Bill Gates big. Too much? Ok, then just Richard Branson big.

Joseph Lambert

I’m getting everything out of the way early, because I’ve got a backlog of wonders to show you, and quite honestly, a day job to get back to. For anyone lucky enough to have attended the ICON5 conference in New York this year, this is probably useless to you. But for the other 99% of you out there, you might want to check out the podcasts section of the ICON5 website. Steven Heller gets down and dirty with a select few of the speakers right as they come off stage from their speeches. Interviewed artists include Gary Panter, James Jean, Mitch Nash, Stephanie Plunkett, and Stanley Hainsworth. If those names don’t mean anything to you then maybe you should find another website besides this one to spend time with. I just think we’ve grown apart.

ICON5 Podcasts

Australian artist Ant Keogh keeps today’s string of weird names going. He also helps to maintain the high standard we (by we I mean me) strive for here at Secret Still HQ. Keogh’s got a nice Barry McGee feels to his work, without such a dominating color palette. I also like his subtle linework which has a good Basquiat feel to it. Does that explain it enough for you? Basquiat and Barry McGee? If that doesn’t make you want to check out Keogh’s work then there’s nothing I can do to help. You’ve got nothing better to do right now, admit it. Just click the link, asshole.

Ant Keogh

I’ve heard Martin Wittfooth’s name before (I wouldn’t forget a name like Wittfooth), but I didn’t get around to checking his steez until I noticed that he’s in a show with Secret Still favorite Michael Page (previously interviewed) at Copro Nason in Santa Monica. Wittfooth creates some badassical surrealist paintings that usually feature zoological nightmares living in an apocalyptic wasteland. My favorite thing about his work is picking through and finding the aspects of the original surrealist painters that are scattered about his works. It’s like an acid trip treasure hunt. Well, I’ve never seen anything that scary on acid, but one time my mom made me smell an apple pie candle while Fantasia 2000 was playing in reverse on TV. It was pretty scary at the time. Maybe you had to be there. Shit, maybe I wasn’t even there. DID I JUST TOTALLY BLOW YOUR MIND?

Martin Wittfooth

Jeremy Tinder has somehow managed to stay under my radar even though he’s been in some shows in the Bay Area recently. Blame it on my lack of a camera mostly. With my camera gone I haven’t had the desire to treck across the bay for shows as much. With my new little shutter dude at my side, that’s all going to change now. But until I get back over there, I’m gonna have to rely on Tinder’s livejournal to keep me posted on the millions of ways that he dominates every medium with brilliant lines and colors. Looking through the 200 postcard-sized paintings he did for his show at Rotofugi was like inspiration overload. That is not even an exaggeration. I got so many color and subject ideas spinning out from his work that I filled a whole page and a half in my idea book (if you don’t keep one you should). Consider this your notice, Tinder paintings. I have you on lock and one of you will be procured as soon as I can find enough money under vending machines. 3 or 4 years tops. Until then I’ll keep dreamin and schemin.

Jeremy Tinder

I lived in Florida for a couple of years when I was younger, down Miami way, and the only thing that I can remember about it is that drivers would swerve to try and hit pedestrians and people would pay me a lot of money to remove reptiles, amphibians, spiders and scorpions from their outdoor trashcans. Overall it’s not a bad memory, but it’s not great either. That’s fine. There are a lot of people who aren’t me that love Florida. I’m a little more fond of America’s schlong since coming across the illustration work of Mark Malazarte. Dude lives in Tampa, but is originally from the Philippines, and is part of the Calavera Comics crew. That’s a talented group of misfits and rebels if ever I’ve seen one, which I have, like all the time. Mark’s illustration work dazzles my eyes because of his tight type control and color palettes, especially when throwing down with his illustrative counterweight Alexis Ziritt. Since Mark’s website isn’t up and running, yet I’m just gonna throw you into his Flickr stream. Sink or swim, bitches.

Mark Malazarte