FORTUNA CARD~ YEAR 2001~!

FORTUNA CARD~ YEAR 2000~!

Ever since the year 2000, I have been

creating an annual Fortuna Card,

variations on themes with the

Roman Goddess of fortune.

These cards, slightly smaller than

Baseball Cards, are then laminated

and given to Friends & Family in

the hopes it will protect them,

bless them with good health,

and maybe even toss a little

luck their way.

THE ROMAN GODDESS FORTUNA

BUSH-BABY CAPTURED ON FILM~!

The Bush-Babies are a bunch of Sibling feral

Cats that live in my Green Machine Dodge

Sportsman Motorhome. Their survival

instinct is very strong; three of them

stick together @ all times to avoid

being ambushed by Spunky, the

Cat who adopted me, sleeps in

my bed, and forces me to buy

her Fancy Feasts. The Runt

Bush-Baby is only seen

@ dusk. Pictured below

is the female I call

'Sweetey', who

now trusts me

enough to

approach

within

three

feet~!

A NEW CHRISTMAS TRADITION~ 'PUNKING' MY NEPHEW~!

My 24 year-old Nephew Justin is a huge

Philadelphia Eagles Fan (sorry about his luck),

and a big fan of former QB Donovan McNabb...

Last year, I gave him an Eagles Football that,

oddly enough, washed ashore on Ocracoke

Island NC where I live year 'round, proving

yet again that Truth is Stranger than Fiction.

The FAKE part (or, NON-truth), was

perpetrated by me, the sinister

Uncle, who FORGED Donovan

McNabb's stylized signature

on the ball after some

extensive research

on the inter-web...

Well, he was ecstatic with the gift

up until I broke his heart (just like

the Eagles) by letting the cat out of

the bag that he'd been Punked.

Laughter ensued and at least

he had a cool leather football

with an embossed Eagle and

forged signature to fool his

Eagle-Fan friends...

SO, this year...

After feeding an entire Bus-load

of half-starved midget football players,

due to their escort's credit card being

expired, their grateful Coach enlisted his

old star-player from High School to

come do some promotional work

for our little road-side sandwich

shack. The final photo was,

once again, signed by

Donovan McNabb~!

;~j

Me, McNabb, & his Midget Football Coach...

PHOTOREALISM~ OLD MAN ON A BENCH~!

I took a slide photo of this Old Feller

on a bench in the Galleria Shopping

Mall in Philadelphia & really fell in

love with the image, so, I drew it

with colored pencil, marker, ink,

& acrylics on 18x24 illustration

paper...

RITA HAYWORTH POSTER ART~!

I have always been an old film buff

and was blown away by Rita Hayworth

as a Teenager. When I found out she

was also a Pin-Up Queen for our

Men At War during WWII~

it sealed the deal. I just

had to do an homage

piece that tied the

two together...

18x24 Acrylic/Mixed Media

MA~FRANK~REDUX~!

Just got an early X-mas gift while

visiting the Folks... My new Wacom

Bamboo Pen Graphics Tablet. Thus

far, I have only farted around with

the enclosed Corel Paint Essentials

4 program, which, is like a super-

simple user friendly Photoshop

for ADD 3rd Grader minded

people like me. So, needless

to say, I love it~! I will be

using certain features

in conjunction with

Photoshop to do

the coloring

chores for

my Clown

Rebellion

Graphic Novel

;~j

ANATOMY OF A REJECTED T-SHIRT DESIGN~!

Ever have one of those assignments where

the Customer has no idea what they want,

and can barely speak English, and can

give you no direction whatsoever when

you do present them with sketches

and concept designs...? Yep. The

problem was, this client was also

THE NICEST PERSON EVER !

It got to the point where I just said,

"Look. Unless you are going to hire

me as a full time employee, I am

going to stop working on this

t-shirt until you have a better

(any) idea what you want".

I ended up getting two 'free'

take-out meals outta this

deal. Much as I enjoyed

the process, never

again ! I refuse

to work for food

like some (gasp)

starving artist !

STREET SCENE EXERCISE~!

I actually considered (briefly) getting a job

with a graphic illustration company back

in the 90's, before I went totally blue-

collar jack-of-all-trades. This piece

was just a self-chosen assignment

to help fill out my portfolio.

GRAPHIC PENGUINS~!

I think whenever my art starts to get too

scritchy-scratchy muddy grey, I needs to

reminds myself (like Ali G), to draw

something implicitly graphic in

Nature, like Moo-Cows or

cute wittle Penguins,

then apply their

b & w simplicity

to other objects,

like People, Cars,

& geometric

structures.

;~j

DESIGNS FOR WEDDING BROCHURE~!

Don't know how we artists get talked into doing

some of these projects by friends & family... I

think we all do some obligatory cheese-ball

work for schmoozy events. I don't know if

I even have the final art for this project,

it may have all gotten shit-canned by

my cousin when the divorce papers

got signed sealed & delivered~!

more interesting, are some of my

notes for various writing projects.

most of my journals have writing

on the left-hand pages & drawings

on the right. like the spheres of my

brain; "gotta keep'm separated"~!

SKETCHBOOK PHOTO-COLLAGE COVERS~!

These were made from a combination

of test strips and reject prints, along

with stuff dug out of the trash

from the Photo Lab~!

FRONT COVER...

Back Cover

TORNADOES~ IN~ PORTUGAL ?!?

Saw on the news that Earth's new bizarre

Weather Pattern continues... So, can we

expect to see even more Tornadoes pop

up in the coming years across the pond ?

Prob'ly. Means it is time to finally put

my welding skills to use and build

that Tornado-Pod I've been

dreaming of; the one that

allows you to go for the

craziest ride this side

of Wild Pecos Bill's

stomp'n grounds~!

And~ survive~!

HUNGRY COMIX REPORT CARD~!

I did not show this to my Parents until I had

properly mutilated it to distract their attention

away from my lack of Academia & focus their

eyeballs on my raw cartooning talent, and,

on the reverse side, my skewed sense

of humor... These efforts were

all for naught, however~!

Looks like I will have

to suffer through

being Punished...

sent to my room

to look at more

comics in my

secret stash

;~j

AVATAR~ CIRCA 1984~!

Every few years or so I go through a creative

explosion triggered by inexternal influences.

Round about the early 1980's, the comic

book industry was having a Renaissance

of sorts & consequently ideas were

flowing like hot melted butter

over the corny cob of my brain.

One such idea, entitled 'Manican',

was not entirely original at the

time (unbeknown to me), but

has resurfaced with James'

Cameron's mega-hit 'Avatar'.

In my version, an 8-year-old Kid

is a quadriplegic. His Scientist

Father gets booted out of the

Military Industrial Complex

for failing to complete new

super-soldier Robots that

work; only to have an

epiphany & succeed

in private. His Son,

of course, becomes

a New kind of Crime-

Fighter, living vicariously

through the animated 'Manican'...

SUPER-DOOPER TEENAGE ANGST ILLUSTRATION~!

Going through a rough period around this

time, and, armed with an arsenal of multi-

colored markers~ a young lad is just bound

to unleash some cathartic scribble-scrabble~!

THE IMMORTALS AKA THE COMPLETION OF OSIRIS~!

Here is a recently unearthed drawing

that I did for a project back in the early

1990's. It is about a group of 12 Immortals

who are waiting for the 13th Soul-Shard

of Osiris to emerge, so they can complete

the Egyptian God's resurrection. The

story really focuses on each of the

12 characters, and, their current

life cycle; how they are either

at peace with, or rebelling

against, their own

Immortality...

A 'Prostitute' Immortal in

New Orleans, literally Mind-

Fucking her Fat-Ass Client...

RANDOM SKETCHBOOK IMAGES~!

I drew these when I lived in Baltimore. It's

cool how our memories remain connected

to times & places through something

simple like these drawings. I can

still smell the early summer

morning dew before the

heatwave of '92 took

full control of

the tarmac...

PORTRAIT OF EVM~!

This is a drawing of Erik Victor McCrea,

writing some poetry or taking some notes.

I drew this when we were roommates back

in Philly, well after our collaborations on

Dr. Dork & Matt Crenshaw...

COMIC COVER FOR A. TODD ELECTRIC !

I work for an Electrician here on Ocracoke,

and, back in 2003 I did this full-size (11 X 17)

comic book cover for his December B-Day.

I am the guy in the background carrying

all the supplies to whatever job...

DEVIL & MATT CRENSHAW COVER MOCK-UP

I know I've posted the final color cover before,

but, here we see all the pieces that make up

this puzzling Devil & Matt Crenshaw cover...