Exist Portraits

I recently completed more work for the Washington D.C. band Exist. These are meant to serve as promotional pictures of a sort. A major theme expressed in these works are a focus on almost-psychedelic elements that lead to the band members. This allowed me to explore new, different methods of painting. Each painting is done in a different style, due partially to my tablet's pen pressure not working right occasionally.

In these portraits, I intended to explore color and the variety of ways it could be used. Many of the paintings I did previously for Exist were used as jumping off points for these works.

Throb

Dull ache
Sitting in the recesses of the mind
Nagging, ripping, tearing
Consuming
Restraining thoughts




I realize almost all of my writing over the past few months have been about the same thing. Promise my next short story/poem/whatever will be happier.

Austerity

A forest of thoughts,

Of desires and fantasies,

Shrouds the sky

Within the grasp of gleaming towers

Echoes of good memories linger

The warm air smothering our fears

Tensions cut loose

Lonesome yet fulfilled

Life as a transitory state of mind

A stupid poem

Numbing drones fill the air

Waves of noise crash and pull

A torrent of unknowing

Of swirling irrationality 

As we move about

Crickets buzzing about our minds

In a ringing, shrieking miasma

Pulsating grievances

A shivering reminder of fragility

Of vulnerable thoughts

A Moment of Clarity

This is a short story I'm basing a series of illustrations on for a gallery show. It's the first story I've written in a long time. Be ruthless, so I know how I can improve as a writer.

         A Moment of Clarity

The sky was a luminescent blue sheet draping the park. A brisk air coursed through the veins Lovers were meeting up. Within the revelry and camaraderie, there was a young woman seated on a withering bench. Her mind was cluttered with questions of self-doubt, of being a very small speck on a very large stage.  She had attempted to drown this numbing doubt through fiction, but it only drove it back temporarily.

As she glanced up from her book, she noticed that the various pedestrians throughout the park were starting to twist and warp in unnatural ways. Faces began elongating. An old man's limbs were starting to droop down from his torso. One gentleman seemed to be seeping into his dog. It was almost as if they were clay being tugged by unseen hands.

Everything began to blend together into some crude, pulsating form. People's faces were blending into a homogenous pulp. Pillars of churning flesh began stretching outwards, wrapping themselves around the singular spot of land she was sitting on.

The landscape was fading into the shadows as the tendrils that had once been human coiled around on either side. A storm of light shot through her vision, further obscuring the scene. Radiant colors never before described circled the bench. There was a comforting, yet obliquely terrifying notion about this.

For one moment, she was everything. She was a black hole, a singularity, both a destroyer and creator. She could feel an intense heat and collision of colors. Her clutter had collapsed in on itself in the deafening hum of silence.

Ashes in the Snow--painting

This is my first painting of 2011.
The idea came about when I found an old drawing of mine from early last year in a sketchbook. It was still very rudimentary as a drawing, but I still found a special value in it. It had a very kinetic feel. The neck's still kind of freaky, though.

I used photo reference for this piece. This portrait by photographer Mick van de Wiel had a very revealing, emotional quality that I wanted to interpret in my own way.

Pieces for Exist

I'm going to start this blog up with a few pieces I finished months ago. These were actually for a friend's band, Exist. I was asked to contribute some imagery for the band.

http://existband.com/

The band wanted these pieces to be abstract, but kind of detailed (if that makes any sense).

Initial Drawings: 

Inspirations/Research:

Aaron Turner-"Wavering Radiant", Alex Grey-"Despair", Robert Venosa-"Moonflower", Ryan Patterson, Alex Eckman Lawn, Andrew Jones

River of Time

Xibalba/Void (one of two covers for the In Mirrors EP)

Invocation

???

The series might be a success aesthetically, because it allowed me to break through my comfort zone and deliver something comparatively transcendent. As the series went on, my vision and my client's vision started to connect. Also, as a huge music fan, it is exhilarating working in tangent with a band.