When The Storm Comes Down...

Entitled The Storm this piece is a mono type print off plexiglas. It has appeared as a background for one of my drawings. It is also the piece I chose for my header design at the top of the page here.
Done at a time when I was mostly just experimenting with texture it came late in the process. As a result I was able to do a piece that reflected my experimentation as well as my mood at the time.
Angry and driven to distraction over a few issues in my personal life I began to think of events as a never ending storm from which I could never find shelter.

Abstraction?

Entitled The Red Spider Nebula this piece is a posterised silk screen print of the actual red spider nebula (also known as NGC 6537) located approximately 3000 light years away in the constellation Sagittarius.
It is a planetary nebula meaning that it is the remnant of a star much like our own sun, that had exited the red giant phase of its life. Having thrown off its outermost gases the star itself collapses back into a white dwarf star.
I chose to do a piece like this for several reasons. Firstly I am a total nerd when it comes to astronomy. Secondly while I am not particularly a fan of landscapes I figure that if I am going to go for the grandiose I may as well go for the grandest view there is: our galactic neighborhood. And thirdly while it is an image of an actual thing it plays a bit like an abstract piece of art.
I have been finding things like this lately and playing with them a bit. The idea of taking something real and abstracting it is intresting, but I have found a newer and more profound interest in taking something that is real and already abstracted as well as being formalisticly sound. The Idea is one I am currently exploring in my art.
This is not the best photograph of this piece - I'll upload a better photo soon (or perhaps a high quality digital scan).

Roots

Roots is a piece I did specifically for my BFA show at Long Beach State. The opening was this last weekend (The 20th of April, 2008) and went swimmingly.
The piece is a mixed media of mono type and linoleum cut. The idea behind it (aside from 'hey, how cool can I make this look??) is about how people get wrapped up in their upbringing and their environment. Little skin heads become who they are because mommy and daddy hated this or that. But they don't really know why. Religious extremists (of any denomination) become so by virtue of these roots.
Pick an extremely myopic behavior and it can probably be traced back to their roots as they fail to embrace differences while hating the different.
These roots bind people into behavior they may otherwise break free of on the path to thinking for themselves. But bound into their little box they tend to loose themselves amidst the chaos of their limited world view.

Graphic Novel Test Page

This is a test page done to work on a look, experiment with atmosphere or just getting the lay out or what-have-you, for a graphic novel I am working on. I think I may have mentioned it before. To reiterate it revolves around the Zodiac killer and his series of as yet unsolved homicides.

As mentioned this is a test page - while the finished page may look fairly similar it will be completely re-drawn when the time comes...