Himalaya: An Appreciation

Here's an illustration I've got in this month's OXFORD AMERICAN, The "New South Journalism" Issue, for a story by Kevin Brockmeier. The 7th grade character in the story travels to the midway of his local state fair, eats fried pickles, and fantasizes about floating around the carnival rides. Sketch:

My favorite ride is and will always be the HIMALAYA. Something about the combination of an obnoxious carnie DJ blasting classic rock and the centrifugal simplicity of they physics makes it PERFECT. Then the DJ shatters your eardrums with air whistles and reverses the direction. WOOOO WOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

I love it aesthetically most of all though, especially at night. Its fluorescent neon glow, its arabesque lettering rendered in metal and light bulbs, its incongruous Bavarian sport-skier/Nepalese sherpa theme, its fluorescent glow, and shimmering metal-flake paint job on the cars make it outshine every other ride on the midway.

Here's another Himalaya drawing, from an unpublished comic strip:

And here's another, in the lower left-hand panel from another unpublished (state fair themed) comic:

C'mon people! The louder you scream the faster it goes!
ps. I also drew portraits of Dolly Parton & Bull Shannon for the Oxford American story. Check it out!

Bacon Library

Hey! There's a new t-shirt for sale at Shirt.Woot! featuring this pig-tographic design of mine. Buy it here!
Eagle-eyed/Bacon-hearted scrutinizers will recognize the design as one of the gazillions of pieces of custom vector clip-art I've been drawing for Woot as part of this icon library project (above). The initiative was partially sparked by this page in my sketchbook:

Keep your eyes peeled for more!

Feast Day of St. Louis IX

Here's a new poster I printed up for this year's FEAST DAY at my favorite local tavern & restaurant The Royale , feauring a new beer by my favorite local brewer The Civil Life. 4-colors (including metallic gold) on wheat paper, 24" x 18".

Inspiration for the poster was drawn from this book --

-- specifically these kind of gilded age engravings featuring bird's eye view renderings of breweries and flowery (and barley-y/hops-y) type:

Some early sketches:


More developed sketches:


Map reference for the area of South St. Louis generally transcribed on the print:

A color study:

A tight under-drawing:

Finished lineart:

Finished vector art:

Hope to see you at the Royale this Saturday, ready to celebrate the eponymous patron saint of our town in frothy fashion! Also, I heard there will be live accordion.