Mike Hirshon Rides a Unicycle

3x3 ProShow No8

2012-01-30T08:55:00.000-08:00

Got some good news in the mail a few days ago - the creepily covered 3x3 Annual arrived and three of my pieces were inside! One of my pieces, Losing It from St. Louis magazine, was awarded with Distinguished Merit. A huge honor, to be sure; it always amazes me to see my work crammed in a book with all of my illustration-heroes.

"Stalking the D.C. Novel," for The Los Angeles Times; AD Wes Bausmith

Losing It, for St. Louis Magazine; AD Kevin Goodbar

"My Daughter...?" personal work

I Present Presents

2012-01-26T07:53:00.000-08:00

These two illustrations were gifts I drew for two of my friends.

This little ditty was for Andrea, a five-tail fox afficianado and illustrator.

And this number was for Emily, a lumerjack-loving designer, for her birthday.

Another thank you note

2012-01-17T09:13:00.000-08:00

Here's another piece I did for a thank you note to my future parent-in-laws. This is a scene from Morro Bay, a wonderful little spot along the central coast of California.

Thank You Notes

2012-01-09T07:23:00.000-08:00

There's really only one thing you have to do in January, and it's thank you notes. I dug up these two ones from the archives - I drew them awhile ago. I hope that they might bring you a little inspiration through the tedious process of figuring out how to thank people in a heartfelt way (that secretly suggests: look at me, I'm an illustrator! You should hire me some day!).

This card was for my landlords, shortly after we moved in. It was a thank you for all the help moving and setting up the apartment - for being good landlords in general. Note: I do not own a stately mansion. I live in the renovated attic (once the servants' quarters) that you enter through a side-door.

This was for a former oboe instructor (yes, I play the oboe), thanking her for 4 years of fine instruction.

St. Louis Magazine - Bob Cassilly Feature

2012-01-05T12:23:00.000-08:00

I recently worked with Sarah Norwood over at St. Louis Magazine to illustrate the intro spread for their article on Bob Cassilly. Cassilly was a legendary sculptor in St. Louis - it's hard to drive around the city without seeing one of his larger-than-life-size sculptures. He recently died in a tragic bulldozer accident (while working on a new project), and this article beautifully summed up his life, career, and memory.

If you've never been to St. Louis, I urge you to take a trip here and visit the City Museum, Cassilly's masterpiece and one of the most fun places I've ever been.

The illustration was almost as fun to draw - tons of zany things that normally wouldn't fit together splashed together in one spread. A praying mantis, two airplanes, a butterfly, turtle, apartment building, giraffe, and a school bus all in one picture? Madness!

This was the spread without the text.

Here's the spread, after print.

A drop cap I was also commissioned to do for the first page of the article.

Portuguese Man

2011-12-13T09:10:00.000-08:00

Haven't posted any personal work in awhile. Here's a piece I did the other night, inspired by a photograph I took on a trip to Portugal a few years ago. Some day I hope to own a street-facing window that I can gaze out of longingly.

Washington Post: Holiday Advice

2011-12-08T08:18:00.000-08:00

While I'm the last person you want to take holiday advice from, I am still somewhat qualified to illustrate other people's holiday advice. Here are a couple of pieces that ran in today's LocalLiving section of the Washington Post.

This one ran as the cover.

And this one ran full-page for the intro spread. I had a great time drawing all the people - especially the crying child and the Christmas sweaters. I would never be caught dead wearing one, but I sure do like to draw them.

AD: Tippi Thole

AARP: The Case of the Questionable Signature

2011-11-28T18:27:00.000-08:00

Another pair of illustrations for AARP Bulletin's Hear Ye! feature. This one was a case about the validity of a man's signature made by his daughter (per his request), over the phone.

The signature was valid; the man's daughter received ownership over the house, rather than the son.

Illville Hotel

2011-11-13T13:53:00.000-08:00

I was invited to participate in Am I Collective's new project, the Illville Hotel. The idea is to create a picture of the inside of a hotel room - with no restrictions on what is going on inside - and draw it to fit their format. Each participating illustrator gets one room, and one window on the outside to decorate. You should check it out, and if you're an illustrator: you should apply to participate. They have tons of available rooms.

Most of the rooms I saw were extremely dark and macabre - some of them downright disturbing. I elected to go with a more....cheery and vibrant room.

So there you have it: Room 1B. I had a ton of fun with it, if you couldn't tell.

Famous Fictional Family Feud

2011-11-05T09:15:00.000-07:00

Last night was Dan Zettwoch's annual Famous Fictional show. The theme: Family Feud. Invited artists were asked to create two images, the same size, that feature families from film, television, and/or literature. I chose to portray the Cranes, from Frasier, and the big fat Greek family, from My Big Fat Greek Wedding.

"This 1987 is sublime."

Opa!

Soon after starting on these portraits, I realized that I'd made a bad decision. I should have picked a family from literature, where I could draw people from my imagination. Instead, I'd picked a movie with a giant ensemble cast (My Big Fat Greek Wedding) and now I had to draw 8 likenesses - plus the 4 likenesses from Frasier. Why did I do this to myself?

....at least it was good practice.

The Artfuls Interview

2011-10-30T12:17:00.000-07:00

I was interviewed over at The Artfuls. You can read it here: http://www.theartfuls.com/interviews/mike_hirshon

That is all.

Illustrators Unlimited

2011-10-25T08:03:00.000-07:00

A few months ago I was contacted about having a spread in Gestalten's new book, Illustrators Unlimited. Yesterday, it came in the mail and I'm amazed at how beautiful (and heavy) the book is. I'm honored to have a spread in this thing, alongside some of my very favorite illustrators.

You can find the book here.

A Sumo's Feast

2011-10-04T08:35:00.000-07:00

Another completely random personal work.

Many times, when I do pieces like these, the final drawing arises from an organic flow of thoughts during the sketching process. The final result is rarely what I envisioned when I first put pen to paper.

Let's use this drawing as a case study: I was sketching faces...heavyset faces. I generally find old people and heavyset people more fun to draw (more details in the facial and body features). I thought to myself, "I don't really want to draw a shirt...but I don't really want to draw a naked fat guy right now, either." So I justified the lack of shirt by making him into a sumo wrestler. I drew a bowl of rice and put a pair of chopsticks in his hands.

But then I thought, "One tiny bowl of rice for a sumo wrestler? No way!" I doubled the canvas size and drew every Japanese dish I could think of (which I've been craving ever since). And voila!

After I finished, I wondered what a sumo mealtime actually looks like. I hadn't used any reference for this particular drawing, and my curiosity led me to a Google image search. I quickly learned that reality is far more ridiculous than my drawing. Look at this!

Amazing. I think I'm going to have to draw Part 2.

This is Bill.

2011-09-21T07:27:00.000-07:00

For the greater part of this year, I've worked together with Ben Kaplan at Act3 Studio and the St. Louis Beacon on a short animation about diabetes and social ills in St. Louis. You can view it here (or view some screenshots below): http://vimeo.com/28821589

I made the images and Act 3 added the sound, movement, and typography.

Overall, a very different style than I'm used to working in. However, working with shapes is always a treat and I had a lot of fun crafting a wonky buildings and an intricate dialysis machine.

The Mustache Contest

2011-09-13T15:26:00.000-07:00

Another completely random, awkwardly-sized personal piece. I just started drawing faces and it somehow evolved into this.

This is how I imagine mustache contests go down. Personally, I hope the guy on the far left wins. I think mustaches should be judged solely on how many times they can spiral inwards.

Summer Sketchbookery

2011-08-26T07:49:00.000-07:00

Some new stuff from my sketchbook, up in the now public sketchbook section of my website: hirshon.net/sketchbook

Here's a preview:

Enjoy!

Forced Retirement

2011-08-22T18:18:00.000-07:00

This pair of illustrations, for AARP Bulletin, was about a topic very close to my heart: forced retirement. Just kidding. I don't think I'll even be able to retire, ever...unless somebody forces me to.

The court case aims to determine: can you take full retirement benefits but then turn around and sue your employer for wrongful termination based on age discrimination? Apparently, they came to come agreement, but the details are confidential.

Random stuff

2011-08-11T10:52:00.000-07:00

Just a couple of random things I was experimenting with... hope you enjoy!

Magic!

Roid Rage!

The Loving Grandparents

2011-08-08T10:29:00.000-07:00

Did another series of illustrations for the AARP. These were about a court case between a girl's mother and grandparents. Do the paternal grandparents, who spoil the child with gifts (causing issues with her step-siblings), have the right to see the child? AD: Cathy Kelley

Yes, yes they do.

Twitter is Bad

2011-08-01T18:30:00.000-07:00

Here's a little spot I did for the Washington Post Sunday Style section. It's about the dark side of Twitter - a website that I hate - and how the hashtag spawns miscommunication and offense. AD: Kim Vu

Ladies and Gentlemen

2011-07-25T08:23:00.000-07:00

I recently had the fortune of working for one of my dream clients, The New York Times Book Review. This illustration was done to accompany a review of Adam Ross' collection of short stories, Ladies and Gentlemen.

One of the common features between the stories was that they all contained nested stories: characters would tell tales to each other, or recount their experiences. As a result, each short story was its own collection of short stories. I chose to illustrate the moment in the book that was most powerful to me: a house-sitter snoops through the homeowners' correspondence and uncovers the tale of their rocky, depression-riddled marriage.

AD: Nicholas Blechman

A couple of things

2011-07-15T11:22:00.000-07:00

A couple of new pieces. First off:

I like to return to old pieces that I think have potential to be better than they were. This was a student piece - a scene from a New Orleans jazz funeral - that I thought could be updated. Here's the original:

I've tweaked the value structure, livened the lines, muted the colors, and given it a much needed visual resting space. Also, I don't know why the coffin was solid gold in the original...Needless to say, this drawing took a long time to create, and a long time to revise.

This is a piece illustrating a friend's screenplay; I don't want to give anything away. After I finished drawing the robot, everything else was extremely frustrating. After many hours of failure, I'm finally happy with the result.

AARP Updates

2011-07-02T07:57:00.000-07:00

A few new pieces for the AARP Bulletin.

These two were about a bench in a casino hotel. They blended with the decor of the room so well than an elderly lady misjudged where the bench ended and sat down too close to the edge. She fell and hurt herself, sued the casino, and lost the case. The casino removed the bench, at least.

I wanted to go with this idea, but it was not in the cards...oh well.

This article was about a man's struggle to refinance his house. Quicken Loans ripped him off, appraising his home for way less than its worth...this was a tough one.

Here are a number of sketches that just were not working...

AD: Cathy Kelley

Matricula Madness!

2011-06-16T07:16:00.000-07:00

Another spot for the OC Weekly: for an article about a venue in Orange County that does not allow matricula consulars as a valid form of ID, and one dejected band's resulting struggle. AD: Laila Derakshanian

The Forest Giants

2011-06-01T09:03:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick update with a wacky, random personal piece I've been working on, on and off, for the last 6 months or so. This is actually a synthesis of a color study and a quick sketch. Because I'm never satisfied with an empty landscape, I had to put in Mr. Unk, from my sketchbook.

Enjoy!

A whole lot of sketchbookery

2011-05-26T12:04:00.000-07:00

I've recently gone through my sketchbooks and started using them as coloring books, which has proven to be a great deal of fun. Also, I've scanned them onto my computer. As a result, I have dozens of spreads that you can see here: http://hirshon.net/sketchbook

Hope you enjoy them! Here are some of my favorites

Spot for OC Weekly

2011-05-12T09:52:00.000-07:00

A quick spot illustration for OC Weekly, to accompany an article about a new machine that measures your gadgets' energy consumption and gives you a break down of your power bill. You can read the article here.
AD Laila Derakhshanian

Gone Fishin'

2011-05-05T08:57:00.000-07:00

It'd been entirely too long since I last sat down and drew something completely random and unconnected to anything else. And here's the result...

Also, you can now see my work-in-progress on Dribbble.
http://dribbble.com/MikeHirshon
Thanks for the invite, Sharon (whose website you should visit, to see killer graphic design in action)!

The Dream Trip Gone Wrong

2011-04-20T09:53:00.000-07:00

This month's AARP illustrations accompanied an article about a woman who had difficulty suing Regent Cruises after their negligence led to a severe injury. AD: Cathy Kelley

You can read the full article here.

Know Thy Neighbor

2011-04-11T12:57:00.000-07:00

Finally, something that's not top-secret that I can share with you all! A fun piece for the Los Angeles Times: illustrating an article about the importance of knowing your neighbors, and not just living next to them. Disclaimer: be careful when you play baseball on the roof. Maybe just avoid doing it altogether.
You can read the article here: click me! I would...it's a good one.
Art director: Wes Bausmith

The Case of the Public Scolding

2011-03-21T07:16:00.000-07:00

Another set of illustrations for the AARP's Hear Ye! feature. This month, "The Case of the Public Scolding," was an article about First Amendment rights, tangents, and bitter verbal attacks. You can read it here: Click me

This was a fun one; I was very excited to finally have an opportunity to do some hand-lettering.

Arturo Sandoval

2011-03-11T08:27:00.000-08:00

This is a piece I did for Philippe Debongnie's Jazz and Draw blog. Everybody should visit it, because it's a great project without a lot of cool illustration from tons of different people. Here's the link. Illustrator friends who like jazz: participate! He accepts submissions from everybody. Just pick a jazz piece you really like, or a jazz musician you love, and use that to inspire an illustration.

Cherokee is one of the most mind-bogglingly amazing pieces I've ever heard. 4 jazz trumpeters, my favorite of whom is Arturo Sandoval, play -- nevermind. Just see the video here. I didn't even know people's fingers could move that fast...

Jesus at the Senior Center!

2011-02-28T09:31:00.000-08:00

Another assignment from AARP for their Hear Ye! feature. Art director: Cathy Kelley

You can view the article here. It's about a pastor's right to use a city-funded senior center for religious programming.

Is the pastor allowed to use the city-funded senior center for a viewing of a religious documentary and the distribution of Bibles?

The court says: You betcha!

Friends, pro bono, and more

2011-02-17T11:15:00.000-08:00

I did this for my friend Dan, and his zombie-apocalypse screenplay. Drawing zombies proved to be like drawing old people, but with wonky anatomy.

For the cover of an educational storybook - MUSCrAT stands for something.

Have you ever wondered what Frankenstein's monster would look like if he were a Persian king? Well, you can stop wondering. This poster was done for the Purim spiel at Temple Israel, in Stockton, California. If you're in the area, you should go see it. This year, they're doing a horror theme.

Arizona

2011-02-07T08:51:00.000-08:00

I took a trip to Arizona last month - my first time in the great American Southwest.

Despite all the beautiful scenery, I was still more inspired by the cowboys and guachos I saw... typical me, seeing a portrait in a landscape.

These two aren't even in Arizona...they're from the airport. But what can I say? Inspiration struck me, in the form of a badass, old cowboy.

Don't worry, I was still able to fit in a landscape.

This used to be a drawing of an outhouse we passed while hiking down the Grand Canyon...then it kind of evolved into something totally different.

The Mysterious Author

2011-01-31T07:20:00.000-08:00

I worked with Wes Bausmith at the Los Angeles Times on this extremely fun assignment.
The article was about a new novel, "O" and its anonymous author. In the past, publishing novels anonymously has resulted in strong book sales, as people read the book trying discover who the actual author is. We have some instinct to reveal hidden identities. These hunts become so intense that handwriting experts and prose analysts must get involved, as was the case with "Primary Colors."

Some silliness

2011-01-18T12:13:00.000-08:00

I've gotten a lot of time in the last month or two to finish some personal work. Plenty of random, zany drawings to satisfy my need to draw random, zany things. Here are some of the highlights...

What started as the execution of my friend James' idea for a political cartoon ended up as something completely different. Sometimes flies just can't be caught (except with chopsticks, by the Karate Kid).

I like to think this draw summarizes my difficulties in exercising these last few months. I've been pretty lazy when it comes to physical activity...

I'm not really sure where this idea came from... the triptych is an underrated format.

More to come...and with more cohesion.

American Express comes to St. Louis

2010-12-21T14:24:00.000-08:00

Last spring (I'm just now posting this now...I know) I worked on an illustration for American Express. Working with art director Tom Grillo at Siegle + Gale, the job was to create a small decal for points of purchase around St. Louis. Something that captured the spirit of St. Louis (no pun intended), and something that wasn't just a big picture of the Arch.

I'm just posting this now because I just saw the decal at the Chase Park Plaza movie theater, making me ridiculously happy.

Here is the final decal. It appears much smaller (roughly 3x3") in print.

Here is the image in context. I didn't even notice it posted on the window until somebody pointed it out to me. At that point, I held up the line to take a picture.

Here are some sketches. There were about 20 sketches in total. Fortunately for me, St. Louis has a lot of great landmarks and history to go off of. Unfortunately for me, this all had to fit into a 3x3" space.

We ended up going with a concept that represents St. Louis' rich history. St. Louis is a city that takes a lot of pride in its past. Hopefully, the rest speaks for itself.

More AARP

2010-12-17T07:07:00.000-08:00

I've been working with art director Cathy Kelley over the last two months on these Two more Hear Ye! Hear Ye! assignments for AARP.

The Case of the Defamed Friend - a legal battle ensues after one woman bases a very unpleasant character after her friend, in her novel The Red Hat Club

The verdict? The woman wins some money, after her name and image are slandered by implications arising from the alcohol abuse and sluttiness of the character.

Click here to read the full story

The Case of the Misused Corpses - a particularly gruesome case about a medical researcher mishandling donated bodies; he would chop them up into pieces and sell the pieces to different companies and labs.

The families, who were supposed to receive the cremated remains of their loved ones after the experiments had ended, had no way of knowing whether or not the ashes actually belonged to their relatives. Furious and heartbroken, these people received no compensation or justice, as the lab was protected by legal documents.

Read the full story here

Robot vs. Dinosaur Day

2010-12-08T08:57:00.000-08:00

It was recently Robot vs. Dinosaur Day.

Rams football: A Visual Essay

2010-11-29T08:33:00.000-08:00

A few months ago I got tickets to a preseason Rams game from my landlord. It was the first pro football game I'd ever gone to, and besides the overhead speakers that were way too loud, it was a great experience. The Vikings played the Rams, and the crowd was in good spirits...until the Vikings started winning by a huge margin. Anyway, here is a short visual essay I drafted in response to the game:

I was quickly enamored with the yard markers; they were like big, orange idols, worshipped and respected by the players, refs, and fans.

Football game, or Less Than Jake concert? Football is probably less dangerous.

The refs mull over one of the countless disputes of the game.

We had the great fortune of sitting a row behind two insane Viking fans (twin brothers). Completely, utterly insane. Upon each touchdown they screamed with joy, despite the grumbling of the Rams fans sitting around them. It didn't matter that they were in enemy territory: they would turn around and face the crowd, yelling in their faces. "Thank god for the Rams, giving us so many easy wins!" They didn't shut up until the third quarter, after a nearby Rams fan compared the Super Bowl victories of the two teams (the Vikings have none, though if they ever do win one, I'm sure the world will never hear the end of it).

An on-location drawing

From where I was sitting, the action of the game was always framed by the action on the sidelines: cameramen buzzing around, cheerleaders dancing, coaches discussing, referees measuring and scrutinizing, and players idling - waiting for their chance to enter the fray.

Another zany on-location drawing. The space doesn't make a lot of sense, probably because I wasn't paying close attention to anything besides the cheerleaders and their gyrating magic.

St. Louis Magazine

2010-10-31T16:18:00.000-07:00

St. Louis magazine! It was great working with Kevin Goodbar and Jeannette Cooperman on this article about a mental health care crisis in St. Louis.

Hear Ye! Hear Ye!

2010-10-15T08:18:00.000-07:00

I recently had the pleasure of working with Eric Seidman from AARP on a pair of illustrations for their feature: Hear Ye! Hear Ye! The article was about a court case between a woman who wanted to cremate her boyfriend according to his wishes and the man's brother, who wanted to bury the brother according to Orthodox Jewish law.

This image illustrates the conflict...

...and here is the resolution. Hopefully, you can tell who won the case.

Besides that, here is some zany personal work I've done in the last few days. In both, I just started by drawing a face...then they got out of hand, fast.

The Ballad of Frederick

2010-10-05T20:55:00.000-07:00

A great tragedy happened recently. Frederick was a possum in my neighborhood that I'd grown quite fond of. He was huge and he'd fearlessly run across the road at night, staring into my headlights with his big, shining eyes. He was probably a father.

But now Frederick is somewhere else. Apparently, not every driver appreciates his fearlessness as much as I did. Here is my homage to Frederick.

And on another note, here is an updated version of an old portfolio piece:

This was an illustration from a book I made about my time living in India. This spread was about the horrendous bugs that terrorized us daily.

Album covers and broomsticks

2010-09-20T08:02:00.000-07:00

Quick update: I had the pleasure of creating an album cover for Mouth's Cradle's new mixtape: Mouth's Cradle vs. The Hype. I relish any opportunity where I can draw evil ninjas. Here's the final print version.

New Statesman and more

2010-08-31T07:42:00.000-07:00

Got a nice little editorial assignment a few weeks ago that I can finally publish. It was a half-page illustration for New Statesman magazine; a political magazine that runs in the UK. The entire issue was about Pakistan, and this particular article involved two old men, a retired colonel and doctor, discussing the current state of the nation. I had about a day to do it...good times.

Here is some personal work. This is in my quest to get better drawing landscapes.

More personal work. This drawing was based on some drawings I did at the Missouri History Museum. They had these awesome lifesize statues of dock workers that I couldn't resist drawing...

This is an old Student Life illustration that I revisited...for the third time.

Some new things

2010-08-24T08:36:00.000-07:00

I've had a busy summer with lots of new work; I was debating whether to hoard it in my secret illustration lair, or share it with the world...I think I'm going to post it in the next two or three entries.


Here is a personal piece celebrating the joys of spoiled children. I took a page from my sketchbook and ran with it.


Wedding invitation, direction card, and RSVP card for the Bruchs-Levy...hopefully the weather will be as nice as on the invitation.

I had the pleasure of doing the cover for Eleven magazine about a month back. The picture is about LouFest - St. Louis' very own gigantic music festival that will be held in Forest Park for the first time...unfortunately, I'll be out of town for it.

A lot more to come!

New Studio

2010-08-10T13:03:00.000-07:00

I moved back to St. Louis about a month ago - now I'm living in the Central West End and working from home. The apartment is great; it's the servant's quarters of an 1894 mansion. We're up on the third floor, with plenty of space. Those servants must have lived well.

Here are some pictures of my studio space, where I sit for hours a day slaving away.


My desk, bulletin board, and supply drawers...I have a chair, too...just not in this picture.

The wall of art and design

And here is a wonky panorama of the whole space.

I also found out that two of my pieces (Soccer Riot and Spectating) will appear in CMYK no. 48! I'm honored that the judge, Penelope Dullaghan (a terrific illustrator whose work I love) liked my work enough to include two pieces.

Back in St. Louis

2010-07-29T12:35:00.000-07:00

After a few months living home in Massachusetts, I'm back in St. Louis, for good. It was tough moving everything up three flights of narrow stairs, but my new studio is set up and everything is good to go.

First, a new piece. I attended 3x3 Magazine's First Annual Nuts & Bolts conference in NYC this past month (which was great!), and one of the biggest things that I took away from it is that my portfolio needed some trimming. There was just way too much in there. As I was looking through it, making the painful decisions of what to hide from the world forever, I happened upon two portraits that I very much enjoy, but weren't really strong enough to stand in my portfolio. They were just standard portraits...they didn't offer much besides style.

So I decided to combine them into some sort of narrative. Something that would still highlight the stylistic decisions I made in each piece, but something that was more than a static portrait. Here is the result.

My daughter...?

So, if you look through my website's illustration portfolio, you might notice that it's about a third of the size that it used to be. Well, I hope you can still enjoy the piece that's left.

Finally, here is my new business card, coming to a wallet near you:

More work, more fortune

2010-07-02T11:07:00.000-07:00

I want to address three things with this update. First, I want to post some new work. Please enjoy:

First: I don't really know what this piece is about. It was just practice, mostly. Second: Colored/redrawn version of a Student Life illustration about elderly people enjoying life.

In junior year of college I missed an opportunity to draw a badass dragon with a nuclear power plant embedded in it...I was bitter. Senior year, I missed an opportunity to draw a giant robot made out of musical instruments...I was bitter. I drew it anyway.

Secondly, I have exciting news! My piece "Soccer Riot" was awarded with Merit in 3x3 Magazine's Student Show No. 7. It'll get published in their upcoming annual and I'm pretty stoked. I've been a fan of 3x3 magazine for awhile now and I love the stuff they publish. I'm honored to be in the mix. Congrats to Jon Rothenberg on his award, too! WashU representin'.

Lastly, I just set up the Links section of my website. I've put in links to friends' sites...that I know about! (Blogs don't count) If you have a site, tell me about it...perhaps link mine back? (eh?) And if I know you, like you, and respect you, I'll put you in the listing. Sorry if you feel overlooked right now...it's probably just because I didn't know you had a website. But you can change that...

Robert Weaver Award

2010-05-29T11:52:00.000-07:00

During the graduation ceremony I was honored with the Robert Weaver Award for Excellence in the Visual Essay....something I'm very excited about because 1) Robert Weaver is easily my favorite illustrator and one of my favorite artists overall, and 2) I love visual essays. I think it might be difficult to start going out and creating visual essays with nobody telling me to...but I'm going to try my hardest to initiate visual essay projects on my own. Any ideas?

I believe I did about 6 visual essays throughout the Communication Design program, and here is one from John's Narrative Sketchbook class, drawn on location on The Loop.

Finishing off college, yeesh...

2010-05-09T22:44:00.000-07:00

I hate to say it, but I've got to say it: my undergraduate career is pretty much over. I still have to walk down an aisle and grab a piece of paper, but I am done with classes and homework and Student Life and the Gargoyle. Forever. Now it's just me versus the real world. But, I can still bask in the glory of college for just one more post. Here are the last two assignments from The Narrative Sketchbook class...

This assignment was to create a visual essay synthesizing the ideas and emotions of the Soldiers' Stories published in The New Yorker. The challenge: 18" x 24" and no computer (which is something I've not done since sophomore year).

The assignment: create a book cover based on a fictitious title. Make the imagery evocative; make it look interesting and appealing without telling the full story.

The Books, and beyond

2010-04-25T23:22:00.000-07:00

Senior year means a lot of lasts. For the last poster I was to do for The Gargoyle (the music venue here on campus), I set out to make a kick-ass poster for The Books...some band I'd never heard of before the assignment. After listening to one of their albums and hearing multiple references to the Angel of Death (creepy, I know), I knew that I wanted the poster to feature the Grim Reaper in some way. And so, this poster was born....

After finishing that, I wanted to polish it into a portfolio piece - something that would tell a more complete story. So...

It's not all fun and games for the Angel of Death. He has to do everything himself...

Ra-Ra-Rasputin!

2010-04-21T11:02:00.000-07:00

After a nerve-racking presentation, a few stiff drinks, and a sigh of relief: I am finally done with my seminar project on Rasputin. This concludes a few months of repeatedly drawing an evil maniac doing what he does best - evil, maniacal things.

I framed the whole project as an article in The Atlantic, though I cleverly disguised it as a fictitious magazine: The Pacific. The whole thing is 20 pages long, cover to cover, and every spread has at least one image on it. It's got advertisements, a re-subscription card, and shiny paper, as well. This thing had to be authentic.

I'm posting a few of my favorite images below, but if you want to see the entire project in PDF form, click HERE!

And now, time for the show....

Left: Rasputin tricking girls into sleeping with him by telling them that he was a vehicle for their salvation. Right: Rasputin becomes ubiquitous in the royal palace and makes various impressions on different people. These run the gamut from raping nuns to charming the empress.

Left: Advertisement for Absolut Vodka. Right: Rasputin suggests the emperor accompany the Russian army to the front lines of WWI. They suffer disastrous defeat in the West, while Rasputin gains power at home.

One of Rasputin's many adversaries was Pyotr Stolypin who became prime minister and tried to compile a list of grievances and evidence against Rasputin. He failed and was assassinated.

The central theme of my article was that Rasputin and Rumsfeld served similar political roles. Here is the introductory spread drawing the comparison.

I hope you enjoy the magic of Rasputin. And remember, if you want to see it all in PDF form, just click HERE!

Good Fortune

2010-04-06T20:48:00.000-07:00

Some good fortune: Two of my pieces were accepted into the St. Louis AIGA 15 Show.
My book of hockey illustrations, and the picture of the big angry soccer riot (posted below) were awarded with Student Merit. Congrats to my fellow C-dessers who were also accepted into the show!

This piece was definitely the angriest looking thing hanging on the walls. It glared at everyone from across the room.

I like to think that the judges also liked my design skills... but probably not. This badboy probably got in only because of the illustrations.

Student Life Illustrations

2010-03-21T22:41:00.000-07:00

In the next month or so I will be wrapping up my tenure as the Senior Graphics Editor for Student Life, the independent student newspaper that serves our campus. I've done a whole buttload of illustrations for it in the last 3 years, but I'm just going to post some of the ones from this year (both semesters).

First: First of the year. This article was about Chancellor Wrighton supporting clean coal initiatives for our university.
Second: An article expressing the need for more male support groups.

First: An article about negative censorship in a high school newspaper.
Second: An article about fitting yourself with a new persona before going off to college.

First: The article noted how old people like to have fun, too.
Second: How our society still assigns value to people based on the value (darkness) of their skin.

First: The article talked about not being so hard on yourself when self-evaluating. Second: A very frivolous article about one student's experience being alone in the school library over spring break.

The Hangover

2010-02-27T13:05:00.000-08:00

This assignment, for John Hendrix's Narrative Sketchbook class, was to illustrate a viewpoint on a movie using The New Yorkers 4" x 6" format. These illustrations are generally likenesses of the characters acting out the idea of the movie - not a specific scene of the movie. I chose The Hangover.

The challenges here, for me, were definitely the likenesses. I went through many many revisions before settling on drawings that I felt looked enough like Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifanakis, and Ed Helms. Also, I got to draw a tiger.

I still have some revisions to do for this piece, but here are some process drawings and the final result:

And here is the final (unrevised) version. I am still working on the value structure and adding more details to hint at the movie's location of Las Vegas.

More sketchbookery

2010-02-16T23:17:00.000-08:00

Here are some more entries from my sketchbook - most of these were done last year, or during the summer. I just hadn't gotten around to scanning them in until now. To see all my sketchbook work, visit here.

Also, good news! Two of my hockey illustrations (posted below) were accepted into the Society of Illustrators Student show. I'm really honored and stoked about this! While looking through the winner's gallery I was pretty astounded by what I saw. Congrats to my fellow classmates and fellow winners Louise, Jon, and David!

Housing Guide

2010-02-05T15:25:00.000-08:00

This week Student Life put out its annual housing guide, which was in need of a cover. I love any opportunity to work in full color (the newspaper usually forces me to use grayscale...which is one of the most soul-crushing limitations I can imagine) and a square format, so this was right up my alley. I decided to take the idea of housing to an international scale (even though St. Louis housing is pretty homogenous).

I used to hate drawing architecture, but once I realized that everything doesn't have to be so precise - that the lines can be as jaunty as I want them to be - I started to enjoy it more. At any rate, this was great practice for drawing architecture. By the end I was getting much quicker and was able to draw more accurate lines.

Last semester I forgot to post my other two Student Life covers: one for the Dining Guide, and one for the Finals Guide. So, here they are:

Sketchbook

2010-01-20T20:03:00.000-08:00

Today I started my studio class The Narrative Sketchbook, with John Hendrix. Needless to say, there will be a whole lot of sketchbooking in the next few months (he even gave all of us some snazzy new sketchbooks to use). This has all inspired me to post some stuff from my sketchbook from the last semester - I spent a lot of time in my clinical psychology class drawing my wizened old professor. Sketching, per usual, was pretty much the only thing keeping me sane during lecture. There are also some preliminary sketches from my hockey work.

I have no idea...I was feeling spiritual that day.

Horace in the Big City

2010-01-11T17:10:00.000-08:00

This summer, when I was struggling to think up things to draw (to stay in shape for the upcoming semester), I turned to a story I'd written in a fiction writing class junior year. It was called "Horace in the Big City" (if you care that much, you can read it here. In case you're not reading it, the story is about a short man, Horace, with a pretty severe inferiority complex. He hates everything that is large or tall, etc. The story starts with him running around in a city that is just completely on fire, before he is saved, against his will, by a massive firefighter (Shaq-sized). By the end we learn that Horace had started the fire. So, I endeavored to draw Horace being saved by the firefighter amidst the burning city.

This process mostly demonstrates my normal working process: I started with a really rough, basic sketch. Then I fleshed it out and made some finished looking linework.

Next, I added the color flats. With these, I just put them down in any color and then use the Hue/Saturation adjustments tool to change them later. This process included the addition of shadows (a semi-transparent layer).

And then came my favorite part...layering on the texture!

For a little while, I thought I was done. However, upon going back and re-examining it, I felt that I wanted a whole lot more context. The story's main characters are not just Horace and the firefighter; there is a third character - the fire. So I decided to rework the composition to include more fire, and more destruction.

There. Now I'm satisfied. I removed the shadows, thickened the linework on Horace and the firefighter, and added a whole mess of fire and melting buildings. It's a shame that so much of the time I spent investing into the details on the two people didn't appear in the final product (the shadows, the tiny wrinkles and buttons, etc), but that's just part of the process.

Another semester ends...

2010-01-06T20:46:00.000-08:00

Here is the third and final installment of last semester's chronicle. Then I'll go back to non-daily, sporadic posting. I promise.

Meanwhile, in Doug's class: rather than focus on large-scale, weeks-long projects, as in Jeff's class, I worked on a flurry of quicker drawings, based less on conceptualization and more on furthering my style and craft. It started with an extension of the 100 figures assignment (draw more figures), then turned into drawings of groups of people (riots, mobs, crowds). Then I was sent out into the world to draw people on location - which I enjoyed less than drawing dozens of people trampling each other in epic scenes. Here are some more figures and mobs from Doug's class:

A drawing of Sithya; the village elder of Sithya-tanda, a place I visited while in India last summer.

A good ole-fashion baseball fight.

A (soccer?) riot.

After these drawings - about twenty or so total (you can see them all: here), it was time for the final project of the semester. Doug gave me some suggestions, and I picked a fun one: go to a hockey game and record the experience, then distill the experience into a visual essay. It ended up being about ten images. I used the assignment to experiment with color usage and take into account criticism on my earlier projects - lack of scale shifts and differentiation between people. Here are some examples:

To see more of the hockey drawings, click here

And that's the semester.

5 months later (continued)...

2010-01-05T21:17:00.000-08:00

....Then things got kind of crazy. On the weekend before Yom Kippur, Doug assigns us 100 figure drawings. We had roughly 72 hours. 72 hours which were spent drawing, and drawing, and sleeping a little, but then more drawing. Despite its dauntingness and sadism, it was a great assignment. I'm not used to working at such a frantic pace, and so I discovered how a primal, desperate-for-time Mike works. I also fit in a little bit of fun. Here are a few:

In Jeff's class, we moved from stories to articles - from illustrating very complex subject matter, to illustrating very simple, trite subject matter. The articles were from in-flight magazines, and ranged from topics like cartilage regrowth to social support networks.

Cartilage growth and the pain involved if left untreated. That was the topic of this illustration.

This article explained how your network of friends is one of your biggest assets in landing a job.

For Jeff's final assignment, I created a poster for Sam Shepard's play Buried Child, a powerful, chaotic, and disturbing piece of work. My goal for this was to capture all of the chaos bouncing around the house - the disjointed actions of six different characters who are occupying six seemingly different worlds. This was definitely a departure for me: working on such a cluttered, complicated composition. I usually try to simplify things a whole lot and emphasize a few things clearly. Here was a new challenge. The result:

More to come...

5 months later...

2010-01-04T19:01:00.000-08:00

Let me start with an admission: I really suck at updating my blog. It's been almost five months since my last post - the entirety of my senior year fall semester, and most of my winter vacation. As tends to be the case with 5 month intervals, a lot has happened. Rather than write a Lawrence of Arabia-sized blog posts, I will share as much as I can over the course of a few blog posts this week. I'll start with the beginning of this, er, last semester.

I had two studios: Illustrating Texts, with Jeff Pike, which focused on taking a variety of textual sources and creating illustrations that dealt with the source on a conceptual level - and looked good. The second studio was Visual Worlds, with Doug B. Dowd, which focused on developing a personal style and a distinct way of seeing the world - aka, making a crap-ton of drawings. Both pushed me in different ways and exercised different muscles, and, by the end, I'd made enough pictures to cover a wall - and I did, during my final review. For Jeff's class, I started off the semester by illustrating a song lyric ("So what, I'm still a rock star"),

and going to the mall to draw people at the Cardinals merchandise store, in a three panel series. Here is the first, and my favorite, panel:

In Jeff's class, our next assignment was to illustrate one of two Flannery O'Connor stories. I went with The Turkey, a story about how a child's (Ruller) relationship with God is shaped by his pursuit of a wild turkey. Here is one of the spot illustrations, depicting the end of the story, where Ruller loses his catch to some country boys:

In Doug's class, we worked on a "silent conflict" - creating a storyboard which depicts a conflict without the use of dialogue or text of any kind. My conflict involved an obese man's choice between his attractive date and the meatball that fell on the floor.

Here is a link to the whole thing: Click Me!
Just click the first image, and then use the Next button in the slide to progress through.
Apparently, my talents do not lie in storyboarding. But that is okay; I had fun doing the assignment, once I finally settled on an idea. I hope you get a hoot from the ending!

This was the first month or so of the semester. More to come...

It is time... (continued)

2009-08-21T12:22:00.000-07:00

More work from the summer:

My next project was a re-do of a project I did in high school: Alice in Corporateland. It was done as a gift for my dad, who collects Alice in Wonderland books/merchandise. This time around, I redid all of the line art, played around with the composition, and added color and texture. I basically just updated it from a WACOM tablet practice session, to my current style. [January, 2010 edit: this is actually still a work in progress. I've posted the updated updated version above). Here is what the original looked like:

Here is a drawing of a sleezy British person. No backstory or details necessary...

After I finished these projects, I started illustrating scenes from stories I'd written before in Fiction Writing classes. Current inspiration was hard to find, so I needed to go back and use ideas from the past. This illustration was from a story I wrote about a door-to-door missionary who meets a decrepit, apocalypse-obsessed hermit. This is that hermit, Matthew, when he answers the door.

For this drawing, I really focused on the details of the house, since I usually skimp on environment design. I also focused a lot on the details in his coat and hair.

Lastly (I still have some works in progress, and stuff from work that I'm not sure if I can show), is this illustrated panel from an old graphic novel my friend and I ambitiously attempted freshman year. We decided to just slack off and play video games, instead, ultimately. Now, though, I figured it would provide some interesting content to render fully. Here:

More to come!

It is time....

2009-08-17T22:57:00.000-07:00

I've given in to peer pressure (once again) and created this blog. I am not going to say anything fancy...probably...but I will post the stuff I'm working on. I will start with this summer, from the beginning. Here is part one:

I spent two months of my summer not drawing anything. I was doing web design, a lot, and I was playing a lot of video games. Rotting my brain, and all that. But then I decided to start a series of drawings where I would look in magazines and take people in there as inspirations to build portraits/scenes around. This was my first image in that series.

And then came this guy. I like him. I was trying out some new things with coloring using three levels of shadows. I applied the same technique in the next drawing.

This one I adjusted more and I decided to build a story around this sultry looking model who ended up looking sad after I finished drawing her. The whole foxy-boxing thing kind of came out of my crazy brain.

More to come!