Steve the Merciless

Just f-ing around.

forrest card

lately I have not been able to arrive at "The Drawing Club" on time to secure a good seat. I ussually ended up sitting in the back of the room on the couch just shooting the breeze with Bob Kato (and raiding his fridge of ice cold beer.) Needless to say, I often attend these workshop but do very little drawing...at least not of the actual models. Forrest Card is one of Bob's assistant and would constantly be standing around in the back as well. These are my studies of Forrest as he wanders the studio floor.

Forrest is a talented artist that used to intern with us. He now works for an apparel company as a character artist. You can view his blog from the links column.

Preschool, hookers and beer

Below is an excerpt from my friend's blog who is currently working abroad in China as an architect. His name is Vic. I always love his stories.



I’ve been taking Chinese language class for about 5 months now and we recently finished up the first series of beginning Chinese class. The first few months, my learning curve shot up and my ability to speak “survival Chinese” was a pleasant surprise. I was so proud of myself that I could get into a cab and get to where I wanted to go or order food and end up with something relatively close to what I ordered.

Well, since class just ended we also had our Final Exam. The Final was broken into three parts. Part one was an easy enough and was a “complete the sentence by filling in the blank” section. The second part was comprised of two essays that I pretty much hacked through but was seemingly acceptable to our teacher. Then there was part three, the dialogue with the teacher. First, I must give props to Neko, our language teacher. Not only has she been patient and very tolerant with me and the other goof balls in class (all we do is ask her how to say cuss words and make fun of all the situations we’ve experienced in China), she has made our class quite enjoyable.

After Neko and I go through part three of the Final Exam and after five months of blood sweat and a half ass effort on my part, Neko’s response to me was (as she rolled her eyes and shook her head in disgust)…”Victor you speak like a preschooler that can order hookers and beer…”

That said, on to Beginning Chinese: Part II. Hopefully I can do as well as I did in Part I.

'Drifting'

Here's another piece from the show.

"One to Grow On" show

Hey all. I'm in a group show tomorrow night, May 20th, @ Galery 1988. Please come by if you get the chance. I will have new pieces about the innocence of childhood. Hope to see you there.

Carlos

This week's victim, I mean volunteer, was Carlos. He had an intense stare in his eyes because he was playing 'Grand Theft Auto' the whole time. I found myself very distracted and wanted to play as well.

Undead Kelly

Kelly was kind enough to sit for a painting session...so I took the opportunity to turn her into "Crying Undead Kelly." Hope she's not too upset @ me.

Joshua Tree

I had no idea what to expect but a couple of nights camping at Joshua Tree National Monument and my perception of the dessert landscape has changed forever. Why didn't anybody tell me about this place years ago!!! We had some fantastic hikes with awesome payoffs, experienced an explosion of color in the spring dessert, tromped through some completely surreal landscapes, listened to the coyotes howl at the moon, and stayed up late just to stargaze. I can't go back there soon enough.

Here are some of the sketches from the trip. I couldn't paint at the "magic" hour so all the lighting was fairly flat. I decided to approach it with a different perspective and paint more of how i feel about what I'm seeing.

Spring colors and Joshua Trees.



Hidden Valley...a view of the actual valley after scrambling to the top of some of the rocks.



rockclimber.




on the trail.




dust.

Mr. Robert

Robert is a real nice guy. I hope he stays that way after he sees this.

Pin-up girl

from the Drawing Club. Gouache on chip board...then reworked with photoshop.

value study digital painting

here's value study of Andy from Bob Kato's digital painting class. Bob's a great artist and a superb instructor. He has a knack of simplifying a complicated idea into bit size pieces. I seem to learn something new in each of his classes.

barf

paratrooper

pegasus

A painting from a previous show.

On a not-so recent trip to SF.

quick study

Jflinn gallery show on Nov. 10th

I appologize for not keeping current on my blog and not responding. I've been off trying new things and it seems to occupy most of my time. No suprise that I'm promoting my own show the day of. How pathetic, right? But anyways, I will be at the Jflinn gallery show entitled "The Strangest Life I’ve Ever Known". The exhibit showcases artists tapping into people’s fascination and ties to folk tales, oddities, myths, legends and mysteries. I'm mainly focusing on mythology similar to the previous show. This piece here is my version of the celebration of Baccus.

I'm honored to be shown with artist such as Matt Groller, Seth Drenner, Sue Blanchard, Ron Velasco, Thomas Broersma, John Quinn III, Thomas Lee Bakofsky and Jeff McMillan. The show runs from November 10th, 2007 through November 24th, 2007. The opening artist reception will be on November 10th from 7pm through 10pm.

Here's the contact for the gallery:
JFlinn Gallery
2950 A Randolph Avenue Costa Mesa CA 92626 Tel 714.708.3504
Come by to the opening if you can.

digital alla prima

Just practicing with photoshop while painting a model. I think I used mostly the dry media brushes.

Guys guys show at Gallery 1988

So I was in another show at gallery 1988 last week. Been too busy and tired to post anything during that time. Thanks to all those that came out for the support.

I chose to have a running theme through my pieces...and the theme is Greek and Roman Mythology. I always wanted to tackle the classical themes. Here is is one of the paintings I did for the show. This is my version of Hercules and the Nemean Lion.

deviant

Jeff McMillan has a blog

Hey, if you want to see some hilariously wonderful paintings, check out my buddy's, Jeff McMillan, new blog. Well, it's not new but I think there's a lame story to it.

His work always makes me scratch my head and wonder how this guy thinks. He renders very well and it's chalked full of bizarre and funny narratives that only can come from his deranged imagination. Certainly, there's plenty of artist who's work anchors on the strange and outrageous but Jeff's work seems to be genuine to me. His humor is who he is and it seems to be his reflection on pop culture, which just strikes a chord in me. Anyways, go say hi.

This first post is one in a series of belt buckle paintings.

bond girl

quick studies from a costume workshop (roughly 7-10 minutes poses)...the theme was the "BOND GIRL". I think the model was Italian and looked just like what I imagine a bond girl to look like...WOW! Bikini and guns, what a perfect combination.

stigmata

I'm in another group show at Gallery 1988 San Francisco this weekend.

thailand

Baby E.



Sunny Bangkok morning.



Trekking through the jungle



long boats



our guide

hiking up to halfdome

I'm aching for the great outdoors, again. Every year I would go to Yosemite at least 2-3 times. It's already June and I haven't visit once. This weekend will be the first trip of the year.

Here are some old pictures from a few years back where we packed up to Half Dome. We left the campsite (little yosemite valley) at 4:30 a.m. to be the first on the rock. Unfortunately, it was late october and the cables were already down. Nonetheless, it was still well worth it.


Here is Half Dome in the distance taken from near glacier point.




On the way up...this is where we stop and have breakfast. On the left is North Dome and on the right just outside the top corner is Clouds rest. What a beautiful morning.








View of Halfdome herself. I have been at the top only once. This time around, the cable were down.



from the valley floor at dusk.