Tumeyland

June 5, 2010 I glanced a few times at this image, while painting it. At some point, a memory of rendering a large pen-and-ink drawing based on this image when I was 15 or 16 came to me. I think it was shown in a county fair 4H art show. I remember it was matted and placed on a wall across from the prize goats. On the album cover, his t-shirt prophetically shows a Triumph motorcycle. A couple of years later, he would wipe out on a Triumph, disappear from the public eye for a while, and re-invent himself. I am also shape-shifting... so perhaps that is why I painted this image. However this is an artist rendering an image from 1965 in the year 2010... and so the final painting has some of his 2010 shape in it: Click here to see a two-minute film displaying more of my paintings.

A few scans from my notebooks.  A drawing made in an organically inebriated sun-induced haze on a Kaui beach in February, 2007. That's a weather-worn tree in the drawing, clinging to the beach... I identified very much with that tree. Memphis Slim. Check out his comments on Blues In the Mississippi Night . Waiting for a couple of Moons Over My Hammy plates at Denny's, my boy and I made up this comic strip.

Mollysongs ~ For Molly B.1999  -  D. May 6, 2010 Mollydog I called her usually Molly and once in a while damn dog! She had some songs, like 'Sweet Brown Dog,' which made her smile Sweet brown dog of mine, loves to be patted on her behind and then there's MOLLY: Queen of all she sees, Molly - Queen of the seven seas, Emperess of the dog treat Majesty of the light of the moon Friend to many, enemy to no one Comforter of my bruised heart Maker of the snooze fart fog, My Molly - My sweet dog. Sometimes in the car I'd sing to her Ohhhhhhhhh there once was a dog named Molly She was quite quite jolly She loved sport but not folly thaaaaat Molly! Now I am singing the song of soul pressing mud grief missing her, and the song of gratitude for her gifts - the gift of showing I could be a father the gift of saving me from abject, desparing lonliness the gift of someone to care for when my son had to go away every week the gift of...

April 25, 2010

The first SHADOWMAN comic I made was inspired by Art Speigelman’s Prisoner On The Hell Planet . This is a graphic narrative in the Expressionism style, rendered in scratchboard. Scratchboard is a heavy sheet of white paper covered with a black clay coating. To get the white lines, you have to scrape away the black part. So when you render in the way you normally would, you get an eerie negative image. Using this form for comics was brilliant, and I wanted in!  I played with the idea of darkness, shadows, and positive/negative parts of both visual and emotional realities. Here’s my scratchboard comic, made in 1983: Over the years, I’ve drawn several SHADOWMAN comics. I moved the style from scratchboard into into ink on paper which is a lot faster.  I think of them more as comic book haikus. Here’s one that, by my best guess, was done in 1995: And here is a SHADOWMAN comic I made today, Feb.10 2010.

In 1990, I was living in Leominster, Massachusetts with Susan. We were soon to married. This was my two years of experiencing blue collar America. This comic book shares my experiences and feelings about working in a factory. (Click on each image to enlarge and read)