Sign Of The Times(G.A. In Store Signing, Saturday may 3rd)

I'm still alive and will be signing with my Graphic Apparatus partner and confidant, Chris Mendoza(believe me, he had to hear it all this last week) at Flying Colors Comics in Concord California, the store we used to work at, on Saturday, May 3rd. It is to celebrate our first published comic art. It is a short story in the 20th anniversary of Flying Colors comic book. It is also in celebration of Free Comic Book Day(It's a holiday, that's why no one is working. I'm already lighting a candle tonight on my Comic Book Candelabra).

If you want to see how immensely nice Mendoza is in person(as opposed to the ogre I portray him as) and how upbeat, loud, and trying-too-hard-to-be-funny I am(as opposed to the suicidal Morrissey I portray myself as), come down. We'll be signing from 11AM to around 3PM on May 3rd. We will have a bunch of artwork featured on this site as well as a bunch never seen online from the last two years(I have three portfolios filled with nearly one hundred color, black and white, and comic pieces to show. Some are gigantic). I will also talk to you past the point of reason about existential subjects such as girls, soda, binary class stars and the orbits such systems generate, Skynyrd, pixie sticks, absinthe, M.U.S.C.L.E.S. toys, Night Of The Creeps, Jenna Haze, and the Bushido code.

I'll stick around long enough to brighten all your lives. Bring women and beer please. Or better yet, be a woman.

Adrian

Pretend You Don't Exist

"The guy I'm kind of dating." And with those words I receive my closure. I can now take my bow and exit stage left.

She doesn't seem to hate me. She just wouldn't mind never seeing me again. I think there might be a difference. I know another girl who actually loves me and feels the same way. So hate must not enter into it. Maybe just profound dislike.

I drew this at work one day. It was supposed to be some random made up girl. I backed away, looked at it, realized it looked like her so much that, who was I trying to fool, just make it into her.

The video below is self explanatory.

Art means nothing to me right now. Movies, even less. Sympathy, truth, fantasy, it's all pretty useless to me right now. It's all falling through. Like life. It all sucked.


Adrian

And So On...

Pretty much the same as the last month and a half of posts. Except now I don't even want to leave the house. There are no sweet women in the bay area aside from the ones I'm friends with.

Adrian

'Sorry to break up this party.'

This is a loose quote from a manager at a chocolate cafe that Rivero and I were patronizing. Rivero wanted to visit his friend, so they talked, and I ordered the chocolate au lait after the young guy behind the counter assumed I was a moron who couldn't figure out the meaning of some names on the menu. I had only asked a couple of questions just to make friendly conversation, but he mistook my kindness for illiteracy. Then three of us talked about Adrian's behavior, drinks they had the day before, etc. More chit chat, and no other customers were coming in when this guy comes out from the back room and rudely interupts the conversation with his red face. Now, I fully understand that most bosses don't want their employees to enjoy themselves especially when it comes to food service, but this was a bit much. He barked his orders and told them to dust the cafe, even getting up on a chair to wipe the top of a picture frame to prove his point. The guy will probably continue his stressful ways and drop dead at the age of 41 if we're lucky.

So now on to more important things. After that lovely experience, Rivero and I go to see Forgetting Sarah Marshall which ends up being a great movie. Mila Kunis is in it along with Kristen Bell and Jason Segel. I've been calling him "the drummer guy from Freaks and Geeks," but no longer. They're all great in it, and it's nice to know that we're not 100% bitter when it comes to relationships and life that we can't enjoy a comedy like this. Hell, the 85-year-olds down the row from us probably liked it, too, except for the parts where Seagle gave the audience a view of his dong [on two occasions].

Below are a couple of early stages of the digital drawing. Check my other blog in the next day or two for the finished piece.

See? No boring bloggers here, Lauren. -cm


note: This is an exercise based on a photo from complex.com. Photograph by Brian Bowen Smith.

Crocodile Tears

For like the third time I was told(by Lauren this time) that in person I am nothing like my posts. In fact, I seem to be precisely the opposite in person. Well, when I'm sitting around trying to be the comedian and making jokes and laughing I am really slowly dying by degrees inside. Dying of laughter, hahahah. No. Just dying inside.

What, no one ever heard of "Tears Of A Clown" by Smokey Robinson?

Anyway, I have a comedy and a tragedy to film in the next two or three weekends. So, we'll have fun acting like I didn't really go through the story I'm directing(fuck it, it happened many years ago anyway). And then we'll laugh at the beautiful torture I went through(I mean the character). Because love is grand, isn't it.

This is a commission I did of the Dirty Pair. I went a little too hard on all those details.

GTA 4 come out already, I'm dyin' here!

Had a good time at a girl's night out with Lauren and her friends. Brilliant idea on my part, really(patting myself on back). Girl's night out, except for me. I need to do that again. Trying to just hang out with women as much as I can. Hung out with too many boys in my life.

And, you know, whatever.

Adrian

There was more. Honest.

So I checked out the Drawing Board's drawing jam for March and started to draw a portrait with my tablet. I flipped the canvas horizontally in PS and noticed it was very lopsided. I redrew the the mouth and nose. Then I redrew the jaw line. And then I repeated that when it was still not looking right. Finally, looking at the clock, I decided enough was enough and just started dropping a lot of black into the sketch with various brushes.

I can still see what's off, but here's a version that I wasn't going to post anywhere. Just imagine it's really cold (which it was today here in the Bay Area), and this girl is wearing a big turtleneck to stay warm. Maybe she's a ninja.

Time to sleep.

-cm

4:05am: Forgot that I saved the first marks in PS. I can already see where it was going to go wrong. I was going to save more of the steps but forgot.

Be Near Me

I just want to sit down with a girl I like, watch some TV and talk.

That's how I know I've hit rock bottom. My fantasies are not focused on a date. Not focused on sex. Not focused on the "finer" things in life. Just that normal, everyday, appreciating each others company situation.

I was hanging out with some girls I'm friends with. We were just sitting down on their couch one sunday and watching TV. I realized that that was the life. And that I hadn't done that with a girl I like in a long time(at least not only me and a culprit). It was nice just watching this with my friends. I realized how much I missed that with someone I have strong feelings for. It was already nice just watching a movie with platonic friends, and I almost felt like I better not do that regularly. Otherwise I might develop feelings or something that wouldn't work in a platonic friendship.



This is a 11X17 rough for a 18X24 picture I'd put on my wall. It would look exactly the same. The video is a little 80's cheese that illustrates my girly feelings.

Yesterday, I had to go to Berkeley to buy art materials. The sun was on the verge of setting. The sky was streaked by whisper thin clouds that streaked across the sky. The streets were for the most part empty. Everyone at the store or the people I passed were enjoying themselves in the saturday sun. The women were beautiful. And all I could think of was that the sun would go unappreciated by me. I was alone, after all. I knew people, but they weren't there right then. When all that could be seen and absorbed and appreciated.

Some moments need to be shared. Lately none of mine have been.

Stop being a baby, I guess,
Adrian

Absinthe In Hue And Demeanor

Remember how the second post of last month I made a big deal about not posting because the last post seemed to imply I was only thinking that one thought. Well, my last post pretty much stood for the last week, so I let it stand(whew, repeating words is fun).

Working all the fucking time right now on a zillion things. I looked up from my work and thought I was seeing a leprechaun. Turned out to be the green fairy of absinthe fame. It said, "sir, let me preface this hallucination by saying I will not dress bawdily or pretend to be of the feminine persuasion just so you can have your delights. That being said, all your toil will be for naught, so please drink of ye old absinthe and enjoy to your hearts content, for your carrot will not be scraped this night or any other(as a filthy leprechaun would say)."

My hours have been getting better because of all the work. I wake up at a somewhat reasonable time(to me that is before 11 AM) and go to sleep at a reasonable time(to me before 3 AM as opposed to the old 5 AM insomniac crouch I used to do[now I'm just making phrases up...insomniac crouch?).

I know you can legally buy Absinthe somewhere. But I forgot where. I don't want the fake shit. I want the stuff that's undiluted and has wormwood and is emerald green(you add the sugar and water yourself). It's bitter and unpleasant without the water and sugar. Hence the reference to my demeanor.

I made the painting in watercolor at work. I based the pose on this one Kate Bosworth did in the poster for the movie 21. I only used the general pose and basically didn't look at it for any details or reference after the rough was drawn, so it may not look at all like the poster. I don't even remember. Too skinny, so at least I got that part of Bosworth right. The other one is pencils for a personal piece I am working on(when I have five minutes). Those are the finished pencils. I'd basically ink it like the celebratory post of March 1. Still find ways to reference that, huh? And of course another brilliant Garfield Minus Garfield strip from the site of the same name.

I have been hanging out and meeting people and doing different things. So that's good. But no muse. Or new muse at least. Just stupid old me drawing for no reason. Fucking boring and stupid.

At least I found some great photography sites. It's been making my art more inspired since I have no muse.

This is what it's like when I "move on". I become a living ghost. I don't know which is worse, staying on the last subject and whining because a quality girl hates me or moving on(I hate that phrase).

I'm fucked, dear readers. Fucked I say. Oh well.

Adrian

People Doing Stuff

It was bothering me that most of my drawings didn''t have people interacting, just standing around.

The third panel is supposed to take place near train tracks. That's not nice.

I actually like the idea of a dad being dumb enough to give a kid boots with spurs on them, and then giving him horsey rides around the house. Poor dad's going to bleed.

I don't think the lesbian in the last panel is cute, but the guy has been waiting for it all night, so just let him.

-cm

No Joke

Will try to post more often this month. Who cares if the posts don't make sense?

-CM