Prints, Giveaway Boxes, etc!

Happy Tuesday, all; here's what I've been up to! I made 20 prints with digital photos I took combined with screenprinting; here are three of them:

In other news, last night I put up this installation of about 40 boxes. This was an exquisite corpse-esque collaboration between two other people and me; we took 40 of these little cardboard boxes, printed out a bunch of stuff, painted, drew on them, and passed them between the three of us until they were suitably worked over. Then we hung them from the ceiling and decorated a big pair of hedge clippers to hang with them so that people could cut down a box and keep it. I think this might be something that you kind of have to see in person, but I tried to get a couple of pictures anyway:



















I passed by it later today and there were only four boxes left, so I guess people were into the idea! Speaking of people taking art (although not with permission this time), if you want to see my grand television debut, you can do so here. Wooo!

I've also been playing around with Illustrator for my next project, and although I'm having a great time using it, I still have a LOT to learn. Here are some sneak previews:




What does it all mean? In a couple of weeks, hopefully it will all make sense! I feel as though this post has been a lot of stuff that doesn't really look like the kind of thing I'd usually make, but there you are. I sort of mentioned in the last post, but I've been thinking lately about including more than just finished art related things on this blog (more videos, sketches, little comics, etc.) Still up in the air about that. Stay tuned!

Magnets, Prints, Photographs, and...a Video Blog?!

Hey gang!
First of all, I recently had the awesome opportunity to screenprint these posters designed by artist Joshua Ray Stephens for the AUX 4 experimental arts festival here in Athens, GA:




So other than that, for one of my classes, I was asked to make magnets with a "springtime" theme. Maybe I'm just jaded, but I thought that was a little cheesy, so I got kind of "creative" with my springy magnets. Here's Spring, but why is there a knife in her mouth?

Because she killed Winter:

This next on was my roommate's (brilliant) idea:




And this quaint little Easter scene was mine:



Here are a couple more 35mm photographs! First, the always-unnerving Patrick:



Here's my awesome dad, working in his woodshop:



This is a photograph taken by photographer Diane Arbus:



And here's my copycat version (with aforementioned awesome roommate Lauren):



And for the last photo, a self portrait. Embarrassing. Thanks Kathryn for helping me on this one!



But what's even more embarrassing than a self portrait? A video blog. Yep, I've thought for a long time that making a vlog would be fun, if not pretty self-indulgent. So I'm going to try and give it a shot. Nothing deep, just a kind of anecdotal diary-type thing. Anyway, here's the first one:

Squid vs. Ship Mini Installation

Hello everyone!
So this project is based on the idea shown in this blog, the idea of making an installation in a tiny gallery space. I really encourage you to check the stuff out there; I love the idea of a tiny installation, and building this was super fun! I made my own box out of foamcore and filled it with stuff I had printed with an inkjet printer and screenprinted:



It's difficult to tell in the photo, but the space actually goes quite far back. And what are those four switches at the front for? They control the lightning, the most fun of the whole project! Here's a video in total darkness of my friend Patrick demonstrating how you can make your own lightning (and adding his own sound effects.)



I really enjoyed putting circuitry into this thing, so look out for more electronic things in the future! Here's one more 35mm photograph of my lovely friend Eric to rap up the post:

Screenprinted Animal Pelt Headdress

Hello all! So this past week I built this bizarre headdress. Everything on it is screenprinted and attached to the foamcore structure I built, and yes, you can wear it. Wooo!

The Evolution of a Poster, and a Birthday!

Hello everyone! Happy Valentine's Day! Although it's actually after midnight, so I suppose I'm a bit late. I'm just going to go on pretending that it's still the 14th and tell you all that today is my 21st birthday! So to all my friends and family that helped me celebrate, thank you all so much! I got super-awesome art tools PHOTOSHOP and an awesome DIGITAL CAMERA that not only takes pictures but HD video! Expect movies from now on. Oh, there will be movies.

But for now, here's the evolution of a poster I made. To start, I googled one word ("propaganda") and made an image using only google images from that word:

Then, I printed the image out, and drew/painted on it, added paper and cardboard, etc, to get this:

I then scanned the new image, opened it in Photoshop, and added more things (because it didn't have enough dragons the first time, apparently.)



After that, I (you guessed it) printed it out yet again. At this point, I was getting kind of tired of looking at this image, so as my final product, I altered it quite drastically. Once it was printed out, I cut it all up and painted and screenprinted all over it:



So there it is, my final product...a 22x30 poster of this guy's head!

Collaborative Installation and a Poster in Progress

It's that updatey time again! I was able to borrow my super nice friend Patrick's digital camera in order to post the following installation I recently participated in:

These pixel-esque little squares are all mono prints! My portion is the third grid from the left on the bottom row...

They are all animals at a tea party; here are a couple up close:

I made these by printing a few layers of monoprint color on plexiglass, screenprinting the animals' shapes in yellow, red, and blue, and then using a pronto plate to print the black lines.

Here's one more thing I've been working on; I took a bunch of images from google image, photoshopped them together, printed it out, then painted/glued things onto it until it became this:

But this poster isn't done yet; I've already scanned it back into photoshop, messed with it a bit more, and printed it out again. Tonight I'm going to have fun cutting it up and rearranging it, so look out for more on this soon!

Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers Zine

OK guys, I know I haven't posted for awhile, but I've been busy making lots of new projects, so expect lots of posts in the next few days! The first one is this zine package I just finished; I made these an edition of ten, and here they all are:



So here's the story: these are made to look like corporate packages from a fictional company called Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers. I screenprinted everything in this package: all the box logos, coupons, letters, and the zine itself. Here's what the package looks like when it's being opened:





From the top left, there's a white chocolate box, two coupons that read "One free truffle redeemable at any Ghost Mantis location," a black chocolate box, and a sealed letter with the actual zine itself underneath. The letter is abaca paper I made myself, and I sealed it with red wax and a "G" seal; here it is unopened:



The letter reads: "Dear Loyal Customer, as a member of the ATHENS-CLARKE COUNTY community, either you or someone you know has most likely been affected by the tragic events that occurred over the Thanksgiving holiday. Some have pointed to Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers as the source of this disaster, but we would like to stress that test results with the potential to substantiate this claim have not been released. As such, we must all remember that we do not yet know the cause of the accident. That said, although Ghost Mantis does not yet take responsibility, any disturbance to the ATHENS-CLARKE COUNTY community affects us, too. That's why we have prepared these complimentary chocolates, coupons, and Collector's Edition Ghost Mantis Company History Pamphlets as a reminder of our concern for the community and as a sign of our goodwill. We sincerely hope these packages find you well. Happy Holidays, Mortimer Windle, CEO Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers."

That's right, these packages are sort of apologies for some sort of unexplained tragedy that was, in all likelyhood, caused by this company. Here are the chocolates that come in the package (white and dark chocolate, with painted chocolate G's on them.) I made these by painting G's backwards into a chocolate mold, then pouring the opposite kind of melted chocolate on top:



And finally, here is the zine itself, the company history pamphlet:





Text: "Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers
A history of painstakingly observed tradition"



Text: "In 1884, Gregor Mantodea, a wealthy Englishman and the future founder of Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers, moved to Warwick, Rhode Island, to make his fortune and to escape a father who had difficulties accepting his many eccentricities. One of these eccentricities was his fascination with the ghost mantis, a small African species of praying mantis. In these glossy, black specimens, he saw not only himself, but the decadent allure and polished aesthetics of chocolate."



Text: "Mantodea adopted the ghost mantis as his mascot when he founded Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers and began selling chocolates out of a small cart in 1886. The American public were willing to ignore his rather offputting mascot in order to get their hands on the delicious chocolate that he was making in his own home. By 1891, the Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers company boasted its own factory, situated in the heart of Swansea, Rhode Island. His fortune made, Mantodea retired early in 1893, leaving Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers to a series of individuals hand-picked to run the company."





Text: "Since Mantodea's time, Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers has altered neither its chocolate recipes nor its machinery, despite all modern advances in the field. We believe that this respect for tradition is the key to our success. Aesthetically, however, our company continues to improve. In 1902, company CEO Humphrey Carasik created the iconic "G" that now appears on all Ghost Mantis Chocolates when he discovered his daughter Isabelle painting in her room. He wasted no time in putting her to work hand-painting each chocolate. To this day, every "G" is painted by hand."



Text: "CEO Artemis Gadebush, too, developed our company's look when he introduced the black and white motif, based on the aesthetics of the mantis itself, that still graces all Ghost Mantis buildings and packaging. Today, Ghost Mantis Chocolatiers has nine factories and hundreds of specialty stores around the globe. We look forward to overcoming any obstacle that we meet and providing our customers with unparalleled service and quality."



So, at some point I'm thinking I'll don a Ghost Mantis representative uniform, take these babies to the streets, and hand them out to the unsuspecting public. Delicious!