jen must

We're Moving!

2011-11-28T14:05:00.003-05:00

We're putting Winston and Macy in their crates, packing up our Sight Glass and Four Barrel coffee and heading back East! Look for us in New York City come February first, 2012.

YOGA PANTS?!

2011-08-22T16:31:00.003-04:00

Well, isn't this is a cool advertisement for Anthropologie San Francisco's super sweet personal shoppers?

Lettering Samples

2011-08-09T19:53:00.005-04:00

Just some sample lettering, playing around with different ideas

Vend Send Mend

2011-06-27T00:55:00.003-04:00

A very little gouache drawing for Vend Send Mend. Will be sold for Japan relief!

Amos Tour Poster Illustrations

2011-06-21T12:06:00.002-04:00

I was asked to quickly create two illustrations in the style of the Mission Bell cover for Amos Lee's new tour posters. Keep your eyes out at your local venues and see if you can catch an image of the final design!

strawberry jam

2011-06-02T17:14:00.002-04:00

A little sum'pn sum'pn based off of Animal Collective's Strawberry Jam

More engagement lettering

2011-06-02T17:03:00.003-04:00

Drew up some fun lettering on a chalkboard we built together for our engagement shoot! Just a couple shots. Drawing in chalk is awesome because it's so easy to erase and get the curves just right. Photos are by Lisa Teso!

We're Gettin' Hitched!

2011-05-17T13:50:00.002-04:00

Woohoo! We're totally engaged. Plans are slowly forming, but we are aiming for Fall of 2012 in Pennsylvania! We took some engagement photos with the lovely Lisa Teso, and you can see a sneak peek here! I've been collecting inspiration images over at my secret wedding blog, Rough Cut. Take a look :D

mums

2011-05-08T21:26:00.001-04:00

A really rough, really quick little something for all the moms out there this Mother's Day.

KEEP CALM AND

2011-03-30T17:57:00.001-04:00

So sick of seeing parodies of the classic British war-time poster being sold to suckers on Etsy who don't know any better.

quickie

2011-03-29T22:57:00.002-04:00

Just a quick little monogram I drew up because my EightShit Twitter icon was freaking out my followers. Now I'm a part of the Big Boy's Monogram Twitter Icon Club like all the cool kids 8|

Outliar

2011-03-05T16:44:00.000-05:00

Looking forward to working some really quick lettering gigs while being hung up on some larger, seemingly endless projects. Things like this come really easily for me and are also very gratifying.

James from Outliar contacted me through Niv for some quick lettering for their new release, and I was more than happy to do this job. Keep your eyes out for this awesome new band's release!

sketchy doo

2011-02-22T16:42:00.003-05:00

Quick sketch of Winston (from life) in Adobe Ideas on the iPad. Really digging this app as a sketching/brainstorming tool.

Happy Valentine's Day

2011-02-14T18:32:00.000-05:00

CRUSHIN

2011-02-01T17:01:00.004-05:00

My lovely friends/colleagues and I created this killer promo just in time for Valentine's day! Pick one up and send some sweetness to your lovies here in my Etsy shop. This is the first of what will hopefully be many successful group promos, so keep your eyes out!

EDIT: As of three am this morning the Crushin' Valentines have sold out! Thank you! Missed out? You can still grab a 5x7" print of my "Lovin' You" piece from the set here!

this is an anthem

2010-11-28T22:29:00.001-05:00

a little sketch for something fun

Amos Lee

2010-11-09T17:45:00.016-05:00

About a month after school let out, the fabulous Burton Yount contacted me about joining him to create album art for Amos Lee's new release, Mission Bell under EMI's Blue Note Records.
I was really excited to be a part of this project from the beginning. This will probably be the most viewed piece of artwork I have created so far!

I was first asked to create custom lettering to go along with a photograph, but it soon turned out that Burton was looking for something a little more interesting. We did multiple versions of different themes until we got to our final:

Image copyrighted by EMI 2010

"Amos Lee has announced the January 25, 2011 release of Mission Bell, his fourth album for EMI's Blue Note Records, and his richest and most fully formed album to date. Mission Bell, which was produced by Joey Burns of the acclaimed band Calexico, displays both range and cohesion, an array of emotions unified by Lee's eclectic taste and distinctive vocals. With a remarkable set of guests--including Lucinda Williams, Willie Nelson, Sam Beam (Iron & Wine), Priscilla Ahn, Pieta Brown, and James Gadson--and the musical backing of Calexico, the album marks the arrival of Amos Lee as a mature artist who continues to explore his musical and thematic interests." -from Amazon's Product Review

The music is amazing, and this album is definitely going to be well received. We worked off of the western undertones and poetic lyricism to create a feel true to the music. Check out the sketch for the final below. Amos really wanted to keep things masculine, so the floral elements were out.
The typography was a challenge. One thing that we really found necessary with this project was not to be obvious. Sure, we wanted something Western, but we wanted to stray far far away from "cowboy." See some of my other thoughts below. At first we started with photographs of Amos. Here are some earlier versions before we really found the direction everyone agreed on.

The one above was one of my favorites!

Over the past few weeks Burton has been wrapping up the final design for the booklet and asked for some spot illustrations and a portrait for the back cover.

So that's that! Keep your eyes out to see it in stores, in the iTunes store, and on Amazon. And if you want to pre-order the album, which drops January 25th, visit the Amazon page!

Big reveal on its way...

2010-11-08T16:52:00.003-05:00

Hmmm...who could this be...? There is a big reveal on its way, so keep your eyes out over the next few days to see who this handsome gentleman really is ;)

super secret sneak peek

2010-09-09T02:39:00.002-04:00

Hmmm what could it be? A super secret sneak peek of what I've been working on since school, maybe? A high profile gig nearing completion? A supercool illustration you can't wait to see the rest of? BOOYAH, ALL OF THE ABOVE. keep your eyes peeled for the final ;)

Very Important Posters

2010-06-08T16:17:00.002-04:00

My thesis series, Very Important Posters, is up in full on its own site! Check out the entire series, buy a few if you are so inclined, and read the project's statement. I'm also thinking about adding some process shots on a new page... Spread the word!

ETSY!

2010-06-07T14:19:00.004-04:00

My etsy site is up and raring to go! I'm selling screen prints, original drawings, and other handmade goods. Everything is made and shipped with loving care. Click on any image or click here to check out my shop!

Style Crush: Norwegian Edition

2010-05-28T20:01:00.003-04:00

Bjorn Rune Lie is my new favorite illustrator.

You Saw

2010-05-19T14:33:00.004-04:00

A gift for a friend and mentor, Whitney Sherman. Micron pen and white Jelly roll pen on toned paper.

Also, guess who is a proud owner of a Bachelor of Fine Arts? Stefan Sagmeister was my class's commencement speaker and I got the chance to meet him in the morning. I know, right?!

He was surprisingly huggable.
Next step: design and create an awesome self promotional mailer that will make art directors everywhere want to know and hire me!

Screen Printed Business Cards

2010-04-29T12:43:00.004-04:00

So I caved and went with GotPrint. After much pressure from my peers I left my tried and true overnightprints.com. I have no idea how these cards will turn out, though, so I decided to do a run of handmade cards. I found a whole ton of scraps in the print shop (someone had cut off the bottom two inches of some forty pieces of paper) with a deckled edge so I designed the card to that. The paper is cut to 4.25" wide, so they are .75" longer than standard cards. The fancy run has five colors on the front and one color on the back, the more basic run has two colors on the front and one color on the back in two version (silver/black and teal/black).

I love how these turned out! I had to print these ONE BY ONE. Next time I'm definitely pulling a whole sheet of cards and THEN cutting them!

Lust and Chastity

2010-04-27T13:02:00.003-04:00

These guys are a final for Dan Krall's class. I still feel like I haven't figured out how I want to draw the figure and faces, but I feel like with these I'm getting closer. I wish I had more time to focus on the lettering, but I've been trying to work faster/looser with my lettering so maybe it's successful in that sense!
Ladies are wearing Martin Maison Margiela's amazingly weird wig coats and sitting on Eames molded plywood and Barnes&Barnes chairs.

CD Designs!

2010-04-15T16:39:00.004-04:00

Here are two potential CD designs for a digital portfolio. Seniors in the Illustration department are designing these for a Skype chat we're doing with art directors at the Society of Illustrators in NYC. Which do you like best?

UPDATE: I ended up getting the first one printed as it was the obvious favorite! Thanks for the input, guys!

Business Time

2010-04-09T20:42:00.018-04:00

It's business time in the Illustration department and seniors are going nuts all over the studios about self promotion. It must be every few hours that I hear someone ask "Where did you get these printed?" or "You know how to letterpress?" Many seniors have already gotten their cards made and have a finished portfolio, but since my deadline to have these things isn't until the end of the month I get to spend some time with the design. I've settled with overnightprints.com before and I was more than prepared to do it again. But today I did a little flickr browsing to get inspiration and remembered how great the business card can be as an object in itself. Now I'm thinking that handmade and hand printed may be the way to go this time.

Check out some of the great cards I saw today and also be sure to click through to the artist's webpage!

Fortress

kpucu

Everyone's favorite print tech, Kyle Van Horn

Moker Ontwerp

Pattern People

Sassen Design

Thomas Christensen

Sid Skull

Papa Music

Toile!!!

2010-04-06T13:14:00.004-04:00

I've always had this unabashedly tacky attraction to toile patterning, which may or may not have something to do with my childhood obsession with being a British colonist. So when Babs gave me the prompt to create a 3-part illustration incorporating photographs of accessories I first tried to fight off the urge to go this route. In the end, the toile always wins.

The pink shoes are by Harumi Muto, the necklace by Shourouk, and the silver shoes are by Christian Louboutin. Photos from Luisaviaroma.com.

Heather saw me working on this and showed me this awesome Threadless tee. Totally want it!

Native Appropriations

2010-03-26T12:11:00.003-04:00

My drawing (above) has made its rounds around the interwebs for various bizarre reasons. But really, who doesn't love making fun of hipsters? It's also been featured on the very cool blog, Native Appropriations, in a post hilariously titled The Strange Case of the Hipster Headdress. Adrienne makes a great point of showing hipsters who wear the fashions almost accidentally, on purpose but with no reason, and then also with feminist purposes. My big problem with the whole thing is that dressing like a "native" is as much as a novelty as wearing those Kanye "sun"glasses. Go irony?

Feel Good

2010-03-11T22:39:00.002-05:00

A little drawing for Heather! That's Indy on the left and Macy Gray on the right.

Runaways final

2010-03-10T20:59:00.003-05:00

Here's the final for my Runaways editorial! She's wearing Rodarte boots.

Runaways Editorial Sketches

2010-03-06T17:44:00.004-05:00

Here are a couple of sketches for a Life Style assignment. Everyone was given a movie that is supposed to come out this year and the job to create a high fashion editorial spread based on the film. Dan Krall gave me "The Runaways," the movie with Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning about the all-girl teen rock group. At first I was like "ugh," then DKralls said to draw a muscle car and I was like "STOKED." Totally didn't realize just how much I actually enjoy 70s girl punk until this assignment.
The car in the top piece is a 1974 AMC Gremlin and the grill she's leaning up on in the crotchtacular piece is from a 1972 Javelin, one of my favorite cars ever. Dan chose the first one, so keep your eyes out in the next few days for the final!

flesh is flesh

2010-03-05T15:12:00.002-05:00

New poster/print/illustration! I still don't really know what to call them yet. But they are big (15x22") and graphic and fun. This series is really taking shape. Keep your eyes out for a new one in the next few days!

New piece in vis/res!

2010-02-27T12:34:00.006-05:00

I'm so excited that the new issue of vis/res is out! I saw the first issue featured on notcot and was really into it. Issue 1 sold out really quick, so make sure you get your copy of issue 2 before it's gone! Craig Matchett is the captain of this ship and a generally awesome dude. I would seriously recommend trying to get into issue 3 ;) Craig gave me the brief at the beginning of January, with the theme being connectivity, virtual/real worlds, how our generation's identity is so reliant upon the internet, etc. Great thinking behind it, for sure. I really latched onto it and got to thinking about how our culture is a type of "non-culture." No one thing is really in fashion in any area (fashion, art, lifestyle,etc.) and I think that the internet has a huge role in this. For this piece I was really looking at how most generations before us can be labeled or defined pretty easily, like the Jazz Age of the 20s, the refined 50s, the sexual revolutionary 70s, etc. So this piece is an attempt to define our generation. Which, I also believe, is kind of impossible.

SLUGGER

2010-02-25T13:19:00.002-05:00

Just a little doodle :P

PROCESS: Screenprinting "Flesh is Flesh"

2010-02-24T15:34:00.006-05:00

I've been really enjoying screenprinting and have been able to use it for my thesis as well! I designed this print to be 3 colors but it ended up being 5. I haven't quite finished the print, but here are some shots from my late night print run last week. I ran into a good number of problems that I needed to trouble shoot this time around. The ink was drying in my screen, not coming through in spots, not the right color, etc. but in the end I had a few solid prints. My ceramics teacher has a good theory about why skills we are learning come so easily one week and then are almost impossible the next. She says that new skills need a week to go from short-term memory to long-term memory. So whenever things like this happen I just brush it off with the confidence that the next time I try things will be in my long-term memory and I'll be much better!

Welcome, Tilo!

2010-02-21T18:19:00.002-05:00

A little drawing I did to welcome the very cute Tilo Red Eisenberg into the world! His wonderful mommy is Tina Roth Eisenberg, a.k.a. swiss miss. Here's wishing Tilo and his family a very happy life together!

two really awesome pieces by John Gilman

2010-02-20T19:19:00.011-05:00

If you're in Baltimore you should definitely check out the two new pieces by John Gilman in the MAT Thesis Exhibition on the 3rd floor of Fox. John's a great artist, even better friend, and fellow SE Pennsylvanian, not to mention an excellent painter and craftsman. He cut and constructed these monstrous shapes completely by hand (no power tools) and it shows how much effort went into these guys. John explained that so much of what they deal with is man's desire to impose structure upon himself, especially in mythology, both Greek and Norse. The hexagonal shape is titled Protagonus, and the star is Midgard. Great stuff, John! Check out the show between February 19th and March 9th.

vis/res

2010-02-20T15:04:00.002-05:00

I made a new piece for the second issue of a publication called vis/res which will be released sometime next week. Watch this space! I'll post the new guy when the new issue is ready.

...

2010-02-20T01:42:00.000-05:00

It's Little Ricky! And he's swimming.

Blogspot Shmogspot

2010-02-20T00:49:00.001-05:00

...giving Blogspot/Blogger another try. Figured out some things that will make this go much much better!