Final Project: Crime Spree

So for my final project I created three (fictional) concert posters for a (fictional) festival of shows. The hitch though, is that I have to make one of the posters ready to be silk screen printed.

On to the Crime Spree.

L to R: John "Red" Hamilton, John Dillinger , Fred "Killer" Burke

and here are the files for creating a screen print of Crime Spree Night 2 poster:

Crime Syndicate Records

They came for me in the middle of the night...

Poppy and Fun, Bold and Uncouth; DIRECT HIT! is a font that demands attention. 

Applications:

My goal with this font was to create something uniform, but with a bit of organic feel to it. My idea was to recreate writing with big permeant markers, or writing on homemade show posters. 

Classic. Cool. Minneapolis. : The Foshay

I've missed a few things in the last two weeks, hopefully someone can catch me up.

Now, Foshay Towers! Click the images for a larger size!

 Each piece has been done in Illustrator, using shapes, paths, and the pen tool I created the shapes and colors of the buildings. I then took the highlights of each and using live trace as a start, I went in and edited all the paths to create a much more organized, architectural, feel to it. To finish it off I went in and added the text and a dust effect to break up the colors, and adding a hint of a vintage feel.  

Communication Studies

(Check it out, New Blog Design!)

First things first: I really don't have an artist statement. I couldn't really found anything that felt like it fit, or that didn't feel forced. Most of what I read were biography-esque with nothing really profound or insightful to be found. So instead I will post this:

“Often, as artists, we’ll look to our heroes and feel despair: “I wish I could get my stuff to come out like his/her stuff!” “This artist seems to get things SO RIGHT, why can’t I?” I think that at this point it is important to remember that nothing EVER comes out quite the way an artist would like to. Remember that your art heroes are tearing their own hair out, howling with rage because their work (which you love so dearly) is falling short of their own desired visions.”   - Darryl Ayo

I think this is the perfect tie in to our the list we had to assemble. It's a insight into how all artist work, because  whether are not we admit it, we all have felt that way. These people inspire me, but they probably just go just a crazy as I do about my own work.

Now: List Time!

1 & 2: Mitch Clem & Nation of Amanda 

Mitch Clem was one of the first artist I mentioned on this blog so I thought it was fitting to talk about him again. Mitch and his fiancé, Amanda, often tag-team on their artwork. Inking by Mitch, watercolors by Amanda. They're unique styles combined and dedication to their work are often sought after. 

3: Lucy Kinsley

Lucy Kinsley is a Jack-of-all-trades artist, but her auto-biographical comics can strike a chord with almost everyone. Something difficult to accomplish. 

4: Kate Beaton

Kate's Hark! A Vagrant comics are based in literature and history, providing humorous commentary on things like King Leer to cover artwork of old Nancy Drew books. 

5: Liz Suburbia

The style Liz creates is all achieved by sharpie. Her comics, influenced by punk and metal culture, all maintain this style and creates a compelling composition. 

6: Phil Hanson

Phil Hanson is what some may consider a modern pointillist. His work is massive and highly planed. Each element is just as important as the big, final, picture.

7: Bryan Lee O'Mally

 

O'Mally is the creator of the Graphic Novel series Scott Pilgrim. His work has pushed the stature of independent comics. Not only is artwork elegant in its simplicity, the story told is deserving on multiple readings. Not an easy accomplishment. 

8: Corey Ayd

Corey may not admit it, but he is an artist. Having no web idenity, his work is often seen on show posters, music, and other merch. His style is one I've tried to mimic and incorporate into my own work.

9: Tim Sale

Condensing the work of Sale down into a sentence is difficult. His heavy line and inked artwork is a staple in numerous comic properties, and has expanded into the world of television in Heroes. Ehhhh.

10: Jeff Jordan

Jordan is a surrealist-based artist. His work has come into the main steaming by providing the public identity for the band The Mars Volta.

11. Shepard Fairey

Fariey is one of the most in demand artist today. His most recognizable work is the work done for the 2008 Obama Presidential Campaign. High highly-stylized simplification of images create an immediately lasting effect.

12. Harrison Krix

Krix is a full time graphic designer, which I have never seen work of, but in his past time he creates incredibly detailed props. This above is a prop of a Daft Punk Helmet, while it may look simple here the work put into it took months. 

13. Salvador Dali

I really don't have to explain much about Dali. He is the first artist that I can remember being introduced to when I was a child. 

14. Raymond Pettibon

Ray started out his career drawing show posters for Black Flag, over time he would be doing art for other SST Record Artists. His work is mostly done with ink on paper, but also using other elements as fit. 

15. Peers

This one may be more of a I don't have a fifteenth artist deal, but in all reality the people who I've had to pleasure to work with are probably better then any textbook. New eyes promote new ideas, and push me down avenues I won't normal pursue. 

Final Word: Roots, work ethic, and the culture each artist inhabits are the main reasons I have selected them. While I might not have gone in depth as to why each one inspires me, the easiest thing to say is that each artist has one of those three things that I try to strive for daily. 

Entrepreneurship 101

For this card I drew inspiration from old fashioned labels, while adding some modern flare. 

Boom. Know about it.

Everybody it's a BEARFIGHT!

BEARFIGHT!  is an art anthology book released April 2010 from Portland’s own Banner Year Press. Minneapolis native by-way-of-Portland illustrator BT Livermore put out an open call to artist to create a composition with only one rule: it must involve a bear fighting something. It is a short run handmade book, with only 500 copies being made to sell, plus a small amount that were a made available to contributing artist. 

This was my submission to BEARFIGHT!

I took a Digital-Analog-Digal approach to it, which I was unsure would work in a book that ended up being majority illustrations.  My submission graces page 46, along with 76 other other artist.

"You're a clever man, Cleverman."

"23 year old and perpetual slacker CLEVERMAN has had enough, gets it together and finally decides to attend college. With fall two months away and tuition due in a a two weeks, the money that was to become his tuition payments is lost over night in a stock market fiasco. Now faced with the stark reality the he might not ever be able to attend college, resulting being stuck in his suburban surroundings, CLEVERMAN falls into a state of melancholy. What will happen to CLEVERMAN?"

(I look nothing like what Cleverman would look like, but lets go with it)

Thoughts on Cleverman Posters: 

My main goal in creating these posters was to create a believe piece. In doing this I thought it would be a challenge to bring the same theme and tone over three design. Cleverman is not a movie aimed at the popcorn munching transformer-iron man crowd. I aimed the poster towards the more indie-movie crowd, and my aesthetic choices reflect so. I decide to do my best to create a silk-screen printed feel. I achieved this effect by using halftone, threshold and keeping elements restricted to black and white.