Marriage Announcement Illustration

A few weeks ago my girlfriend Claire and I got married.  The first thing that popped into my head, once it became apparent that we were going to get married at City Hall, was Norman Rockwell's painting "Marriage License" that he did for the Saturday Evening Post in 1955:

Claire and I decided to put together a little marriage announcement for our friends and family, so I made an illustration based on Rockwell's for the occasion.  I tried to copy his composition as closely as possible, while also modernizing it and bringing in a few specific elements from the Oakland Hall of Records, where our license was issued.

It was fun paying homage to a real master.  Hopefully Mr. Rockwell is not rolling over in his grave because of this.  If you ever get the chance, you should visit the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA.  The collection is incredible, and they have some wonderful programming.  

Next week it's back to the watercolors!

L'âge Dur Guest Drawing

Another project that my Belgian friend Max de Radiugès recently wrapped up, was his minicomic series  "l'âge dur" or, "the difficult age."  Each minicomic contained a short story about a teenager, and all of the stuff that happens to people at that age.  They were drawn straight to ink, as a relaxing, fun project for Max to work on while he was taking a break from his big book "Demi" which he is ALSO wrapping up (he's a busy guy these days, can you tell?)

On the inside cover of each issue, Max has a guest artist draw a moment from those difficult teenage years.  I was honored to be asked to make a drawing for the very last issue.  I chose to depict one of my most important teenage moments - sitting in the back of my Chevy station wagon, during lunch hour, in the high school parking lot,  on September 24th, 1996, listening to Weezer's "pinkerton" for the very first time.  If you've never heard this album, I suggest you check out the deluxe edition, which was just released.  I believe it is one of the most incredible albums ever created.

A collection of all the L'âge Dur minicomics (plus a few new stories!) will be out in January 2011 from L'employé du Moi.

Before the Catastrophe

For a long time, my Belgian cartoonist friend Max de Radiguès was making a series of drawings from life, which he called "Before the Catastrophe."  Each drawing is labeled with some amount of time before the catastrophe (ie. "three days before the catastrophe") which gives the whole series a sense of impending doom.

Another Belgian self-publisher, Nicolas Verstappen (who works at the amazing BD shop La Bulle d'Or) decided to make the 20th issue of his comics interview zine XeroXed a tribute to this project, and collected "catastrophe" drawings from a variety of other cartoonists.  If you understand French, you can read more about it on this page.  Here was my contribution:

This is a drawing of my Grandparents' bed, in Charlottesville, VA.  I traveled there this summer to attend my Grandfather's funeral.  At the time, the deadline for this illustration was getting closer and closer, so I thought I would make a drawing of his bed from life.  However, the weekend was very hectic, so I had to settle for drawing this from a photograph, after the fact.  

In this drawing, the bed is unchanged from how it was during the last night that my Grandfather spent in it.  The portrait on his bedside table is of my Grandmother, who died lying in this exact same spot, four months later.

NEXT WEEK: Something a little less depressing!

Karaoke Encryption Fan Art

This week I'm posting a piece I just finished for my good friend and fellow illustrator, Aaron Renier. This is my take on two characters from his recent minicomic The Karaoke Encryption, Tommy Attilo and Paul the dog. This was a lot of fun to draw and it will be printed in the back of Aaron's NEXT minicomic, which has a title so hilarious, I dare not type it here, for fear of ruining the surprise! It should be out next Spring in time for the Stumptown Comics Fest.