By Mark Kaufman
Scary rejected spot about Sasquatch Music Festival.
I think it's scary beautiful.

 

Mark Kaufman
Sometimes old projects come back to haunt you, sometimes, like in this case, old projects come back in a positive way. Vivitiv will be a part of a book documenting Poetry on Buses which we worked on a few years ago.  Floating Bridge Press and 4Culture are producing a Poetry on Buses Anthology. The project included bus cards of poetry on all Metro buses in King County, WA. We also designed and illustrated a booklet with all of the poems. Pictured here are the cover and back cover of the booklet. A couple of notes about the cover, it was produced using thermography for the illustrations, a technique that emulates engraving to raise ink above the surface of the paper, an old, cheap technique, yet one that added a warm, tactile value to the books. Since our concept for "One to One" was to show the human aspect of points of contact, I had to draw many different types of people in order to illuminate the theme, I slipped in a drawing of myself on the back cover. Yes, that figure in the orange box is what I looked like 30 years ago in high school.

 

By Mark Kaufman
A spot for the Stranger about a writer facing rejection again and again. We've all been there right?

By Mark Kaufman
Less than 2 weeks to go before election day! I did a cover a while back for the Isthmus in Madison, WI which featured Governor Jim Doyle. As I recall there wasn't an "F" in the report card article, he got pretty good grades, but I think I was asked to add it to the illustration at the last minute. Jim is currently running for reelection and it is close. Check out his site, and donate some money before time runs out. While on that subject why not go to ACTBlue and find a candidate to support. And don't forget to vote!

By Mark Kaufman
Here's a detail of a spot I recently did for an article for The Stranger on New Yorker Fest, a literary and arts festival presented by The New Yorker Magazine. The two gents pictured are of course the authors Jonathan Raban and Charles D'Ambrosio. But you knew that right? I never used to be asked to do caricature or portraits, but I've been asked to do alot of it of late. I'll throw up a few of those pieces in the next few posts.

By Mark Kaufman
Here's a book I am going to go and get pronto. So far the selections that I have seen are funny. This one is from Pat Byrnes. The book The Rejection Collection: Cartoons You Never Saw, and Never Will See, in The New Yorker, is edited by Matthew Diffee, published by Simon & Shuster. Now there are many, many reasons why a publication will reject a cartoon, an idea for an illustration or cover. The New Yorker does have standards and a middle brow audience to uphold, but funny is funny. Collecting these rejects for a book is a brilliant way to push the envelope and stamp the New Yorker brand on "naughty" cartoons, without having to print them in the magazine and incur the wrath of English lit professors from Vermont to La Jolla.

 

By Mark Kaufman

I was doing some roughs today for a spot for Seattle Metropolitan Monthly. Here's something I thought about doing but then abandoned. I think I'm supposed to hard boil or blow the yolk out first. Oh well.

By Mark Kaufman

A while back I was asked to contribute to thye Start a Story project. As described by John Harrison the project founder, "Start a Story is a project that encourages creativity and collaboration. Through different projects I hope to get people involved in creating narratives. I'm interested in seeing how different people can bring their own unique insight, creativity and direction to a story." Basically illustrators from around the world contribute pieces and then another illustrator builds upon that idea, and so on. It is an interesting experiment in sequential design and storytelling and the power of technology to bring people and ideas together from far-flung parts of the world. It was also interesting to see how other folks interpret one of your characters. There are many projects that you can participate in. I am definately going to do some more. John is based in Brighton, UK. Check out his other site at  whatwhat.co.uk.

As I lay myself down to sleep the other night I had an idea for a t-shirt. We all do that from time to time. It was a shirt that reads "Enemy Combatant". Because we are all enemies of the state now that W signed the Military Commisssions Act. So I Googled it and as usual I was beaten to the punch by a guy named Tim Murtaugh, as seen on BoingBoing. That's OK. I bought myself one of these shirts anyway. I suggest you buy one today. If that's not your style I think an "I am Not a Terrorist" shirt would look fetching on you.

Here's a new spot I did for Demo Fregosi, the art director at the Portland Mercury. Part of their Gods of Guitar issue. My spot was for an article on the the master that is Joe Satriani.
Rock on

I was reading Talking Points Memo this morning and saw an web ad for something called HistoryShots.com. They make prints of charts. Now, I don't normally click thru on these ads, but for some reason even at the teeny, tiny size, the detail on one of their charts drew me like a moth to a flame. Do check out the site. Some marvelously rich, dense, beautifully designed charts are available for purchase. This site made my day!

By Mark Kaufman

You may view and purchase my buttons at the prickie.com site here. In addition to my pins, you will be able to peruse buttons from artists and designers all over the planet. Hell, why not upload a few designs yourself?

 

By Mark Kaufman

Here's another bit of Italian street art that I found on my recent trip. I think this was from Florence. For all of Rome's charms and amazing sights it had a serious lack of interesting, contemporary street art. At least in the areas that I found myself in. Mostly spray painted support for AC Roma and insults towards Lazio, AC Milan, Inter Milan and the governing board of Italian football. Rather uninspiring on that front, but a minor quibble. The rest of Rome was utterly amazing. LOVED it.

Here's a piece that I did a few weeks back for The Stranger in Seattle. Lindy West has nailed down 5 simple rules on how to write crappy, yet wildly popular art, historical, spy, terrorist thrillers.
1. Skillz.
2. Chins and titties.
3. Secrets.
4. Inability to write.
5. 9/11.

There you have it.
Hit those typewriters and send Lindy a piece of those residual checks.

We are back from our vacation to Italy. Bernini, Caravaggio, Raphael, Michelangelo? Check. Gucci, Fendi, Ferragamo, Brioni, Costume National? Check. Allessi, Ferrari, Fornasetti, Borsalino? Check. But I did find this graffiti all over Florence. Molto buon. It was such a great trip, I will certainly be interspersing some thoughts and images of Italian art, food, style and culture between other posts in the near future. Grazie mille!