GO SPEED RACER

This week’s portrait, Peter Fernandez.

I can’t believe it’s been 7 years since he past away. He isn’t the first person I’ve known and care about to have died. My dad was a person who had a huge influence in my life. My close high school friend, Gregory Baker. My next door neigbor Ms Cleary. Mr Ferguson, Ms Klyde, Mr Nagel, 3 teachers from high school, who without their guidance, I wouldn’t be the artist I am today. Grade school teacher, Sister Raphel, who allowed me to work on art projects with her class of 8 graders when I was in the 6 grade.

I was late with posting this week because of something that happened on Monday. Through conversation with someone it was bought to my attention that they had no idea who Earth, Wind and Fire were, never heard the name before. The timing of course being Monday made me introspect even more on the subject of this piece, the meaning of who we are, and how quickly what we think of as important is forgot very quickly as time moves forward. And time did move forward and here I am posting at the end of the week.

Am sure a lot of you have never heard of Peter before, I didn't know of him until I met him back in 2008 at the New York Amine Award Show where he was given the American Anime Award for Outstanding Achievement. I was also shooting a video at the convention which he was kind enough to be a part of. It’s on YouTube, called “Pierre Bernard at the NY Anime Festival”. Very funny, if I say so myself, I wrote it all. (who says am not a writer!)

Here’s the link

https://youtu.be/WUpGLIoI9NI

If the above link doesn't work, just go to YouTube and type in: “Pierre Bernard at the NY Anime Festival”.

On this portrait, I used the colors that were prominent in the anime serie. The checkered background to represent racing flags. I felt the grey showed a more matured, respectful person.

Overall, calming no saturated colors to reflect the kind person he was.

I guess in the end like Earth, Wind and Fire, and many other people and things I am aware of, they will be forgotten in time by the world around us and be replaced by that moment’s topic.

This all brings to mind another instance where 3 years ago I was talking to an intern who didn’t know who Conan was, name or person. I kid you not, imagine working somewhere and not caring enough to knowing who your boss was.

By the way, Go check out Speed Racer, the anime series from the 60s. Also, in case you are wondering, Earth, Wind and Fire is a music group.

MUSICAL ARSONISTS

This week’s portrait, Dave Grohl!

Everlong, Monkey Wrench, My Hero and the list goes on. Often I’d hear certain songs on the radio but for some reason never made a real effort to find out who the performers were. In 2011 I discovered the name of one of those performers. The guest band on Conan came to perform a song and after the taping continued to play, giving the audience and staff basically a mini concert. What made that moment special for me was the fact that I had heard a number of the songs before and loved them and now in front of me playing them live was their creator, The Foo Fighters.

I’ve been wanting to do Dave’s portrait for a while now, but I wasn’t sure of the direction to take, then I remembered that there was this special on HBO about the Foo Fighters album, Sonic Highways, I watched it for some inspiration and got a whole lot more. It’s an amazing 8 episode series covering each song on that album with each one being recorded in a different city, and the musical history of that city.

I think in the very first episode, Dave was talking about the song, “Something from Nothing” and the phrase, “musical arsonist” came up and I thought that it, that’s why I love their music. It’s a lot like a fire that gets lit and then starts to burn hot and fast. The Foo Fighters are arsonist using music as the medium to start the inferno.

I wanted the feel of fire in this portrait so I decided on setting Dave on fire… his hair of course. As for the background colors, red and black I picked up from their logo. Though now looking at the finish art there’s an X-Men feel to the background which wasn’t my intent.

Unlike my regular illustrations, aside from working out the likeness in pencil, there isn’t a lot of preliminary art created especially with the colors. I’ve been trying to feel my way through each one, with a theme in mind and picking colors as I go. 

That’s the fun and the challenge for me every time, I have nothing but my imagination on how I think each one will turn out.

COME ON GET HAPPY

This week's portrait is, Keith Partridge - David Cassidy!

I started this portrait at the same time I was working on Lena Dunham. A strange side note, the Partridge Family came up in a random conversation during the week and I almost let it out that this was my next portrait, strange huh?

I am a big Partridge Family fan. I loved the TV show, the comics, the lunch box with the breakable thermos (had one, it broke), trading cards (still have a few around) and of course the music. I think I owned a 45 once but it no longer exist in my music collection but I do have the current CD with the best of.

I would have liked to have done a portrait of every member, or Susan Dey, who I had a MAJOR CRUSH on but decided on Keith. That decision was made back in February of this year after hearing that he was no longer going to perform live due to his health. It's sad to hear someone having to give up their passion because of health. Also I decided to do the David Cassidy I grew up on, Keith Partridge.

It hard to say which Partridge Family song is my favorite, there are so many great ones, though, “Together We’re Better” stands out because it was part of an episode which is my favorite from the television show called, “Princess and the Partridge”, it’s where Keith had to escort this visiting Princess around, only she wanted to see the “real” America, kind of like Audrey Hepburn in “Roman Holiday”, but in this case she had Keith kidnap her. Of course I fell hard for the Princess, played by Season Hubley, she was beautiful then and I am sure she’s even more beautiful now!

On this piece of art I felt like I was having a hard time with deciding what colors to use other than the bus’ primary colors. On the next one I really have to make it a point to experiment more. Take more chances and leave reality.

WORK OF ART

This week's portrait, Lena Dunham!

So fidget spinners are now a dying fad already? I got wind of them by accident on Amazon. The price was cheap and they seemed fun. Now that I have a collection of about 30, I can say I was right about the price and the fact that they are addictively fun.

What does that have to do with Lena, actually nothing, I just read an article about spinners while writing this and of course playing with a spinner in my left hand. It's that modern day multi tasking thing.

I became aware of Lena as a result of watching “Girls”. Watched all 5 seasons. The first episode introduce us to the last black male and any minority in Brooklyn, New York and after those first 3-4 episodes, Brooklyn looked liked the New York of “Seinfeld” and “Friends.” But to my surprise this quantum reality was fun to watch. I decided to do the portrait after watching an episode in season 4 where Lena went to a photographer to get some nudes photos taken of her. The scene reminded me of a classical, beautiful Mucha model painting. I created a nude of her based on that, but had second thoughts about posting it and instead decided to include her in this portrait series.

As with past portraits I've tried to work with colors that I feel match the subject. Though I am happy with this piece, I would love to show the nude piece of her someday.

I KNOW HIM!

This week’s portrait, Pierre Bernard Jr.!

I’ve been wanting to do a portrait of Pierre for a while now but couldn’t find the time and he wasn’t exactly making this easy for me either.

I’ve known him for a while and I can say first hand he isn’t an easy person to get to know. He’s extremely private to a fault. And when you think you’ve got him figured out he might change up on you, which can be annoying. I know he’s reading this and saying it’s not true but am sorry friend, it is. But he is a good guy, a decent artist, and he collects way too many toys (Not trying to get on your bad side but you really do have too many “toys”).

This portrait was fun to work on. It was almost like looking in a mirror in some ways and seeing myself. Originally I was going to render him with his usual blank expression but thought I’d bring some life to his face by making him look happy and surprised. I also wanted to use his favorite colors, green and turquoise blue. The red I picked up on from seeing a icon drawing of him on social media.

Pierre, I hope you like your portrait!

MY ONLINE ART MUSE

This week’s portrait, Eugenia Diordiychuk!

2006, Chicago, that was the year Late Night with Conan O’Brien went there for a week of shows at the Chicago Theater. And while I was there during my off hours was the time I first saw pictures of a model named Katie Fey and later come to know her as Eugenia Diordiychuk (won’t go into details, save them for another time).

She's a model mostly known for her pictures on the web. To say she is beautiful is an understatement in my mind. It's strange how seeing someone you've never met can give you feelings of familiarity and closeness. Hey, in case you're thinking it, I am not stalking her... or anyone for that matter, too much energy and time needed and I don't have enough of either to spare.

I've created art works of her numerous times, and in each one finding something different and interesting about her looks that's worth exploring.

I found out recently that she is an artist as well, she went to art school in the Ukraine. Her art work is pretty good.

With this art piece I wanted to capture what I perceived as her soft side, using pastel colors all over except for her lips in which I used a magenta red color to draw attention to her lips.

She’s definitely someone I hope I'll have a chance encounter with someday, who knows, maybe she'll come and draw at one of my Cosplay events. That would be so freakin' cool!

LOST OF FRIENDS

This week's portrait, Sherilyn Stetz! 

I had some morphine last week, kidney stones. Felt great for an hour or two, the pain was gone for but then it came back, not as intense but enough to make my day shitty. Over the weekend I had another attack, but this time I stayed curled up in bed and just endured the pain till it subsided and I passed out.

Lately life has been causing me a lot of pain and it's at these moments I tend to start buying more crap than usual. In this case, those Pops character figures from Funko, suppliers of my bobblehead addiction.

The life pain is from the fact that in a 2 month period, three friends past away. Sara Porter, Sherilyn Stetz and Doreen Austria. And my mother and aunt almost added themselves to this list.

My mom is doing better but my aunt is a day to day. I love these 2 people a lot, but then again, I lucked out, I have a great family. Nothing but great memories and hopefully many more new ones.

Sara I worked with back in New York. We were friends enough back then that she allowed me to use her as a model for some of my artwork. The one piece I did of her ended up being art for a Christmas card.

Doreen, was a true geek girl. Didn't get to hang out as much as I would have liked but the few times we did, it was pure nerd bliss.

Sherilyn was a friend but I did have a lot of contact with her. She was someone who always had great things to say and always had a smile. When I heard she was sick, I drew a get well card for her. And word got to me she was doing better. Then next thing I am hearing is that she's gone.

I decided I wanted to do this portrait of her for myself. I wanted to draw what I remembered of her. Sara, I have my art of her, Doreen, I have pictures of us together, but I had nothing tangible on Sherilyn. Now that's changed.

I miss these friends.