About a month ago, on a routine trip to Flax in San Francisco with Rene, I bought myself a sketchbook. The last time I had bought a sketchbook was when I needed a dedication book for my Eddie Guerrero Day of the Dead altar in 2006. I realized that the art that I had drawn for my comics is terribly disorganized and not well kept and I thought having a solid central book to contain my new work would be exciting.
Things didn’t exactly work out as planned. I’m starting to realize the limitations of the bootsy-ass printer/scanner that came with my computer. It prints great but the scanner bed is too small for my sketchbook. I was still able to scan two of my drawings and color them in Photoshop as a late night escape.
Mariela
I drew this portrait of Mariela very loosely and inked it using a set of pens I’ve been meaning to use. The result is something I’m very happy with, it’s simple and reminds me a little bit of Nancy Hom’s work.
King of 24th Street
This second piece is much more in the style of my comic strips. I’ve been thinking a lot about Jughead and my strong identification with him lately. I think the whole crown motif is really appealing to me. The background is my Photoshop freehand take on the infamous Chinese Food and Donuts on the corner of 24th and Mission. I love their food, especially the Egg Foo Young, but you need an iron stomach to digest most of the menu options.
About two weeks ago, on the eve of San Francisco’s Open Studios in the Soma area, inspiration struck. I was out shopping for some art supplies in the Mission and came across what would become the materials for the work you see below. Somehow I connected the dots to use sticker books and crucifixes together and was very happy with the results. They got a good reaction during my open studio at SomArts, I priced them at $25.00 each and sold a Spider-Man crucifix on the second day to a school teacher. My first batch consisted of only 3, I’ve since sold or given away others and have now remade them.
With my wares - photo by Lex Leifheit
Since my open studios presentation I’ve made more crucifixes and am now contemplating what direction to go with them. My current body of work is below.
Hello KittyHigh School MusicalSpider-ManHannah MontanaBetty Boop
There are more in the works, a Disney Princess crucifix and a Batman crucifix are both on their way. To purchase one of these sacrilicious artworks please email me. They are ready to hang and each of them has a design on the back as well.
Amidst the the profound event of our election there has been another something on my mind. I occasionally go through phases where I am obsessed with zines, whether making my own or collecting them by others. I have hundreds of zines since I started making and taking them in 2002.
This past Sunday I went to APE (the Alternative Press Expo) in San Francisco to buy comics and zines from small and independent publishers. I brought along 10 copies each of my recently published zines hoping to give some away. I never would have guessed that I would have gotten so much mileage out of them.
I totally dorked out and gave a set to Jaime Hernandez. Jaime is one of the artists of Love and Rockets and the single largest artistic influence I’ve ever had. I actually chickened out the first time I went to give them to him; just asking him to sign my Love and Rockets graphic novel instead. I finally ended up working up the courage to do it and confessed my shyness as I handed them over to him. Jaime was totally cool and happily took my zines. I dorked out similarly with Keith Knight but I was able to play it cool and have a great conversation with him. I’ve been reading Keith’s comics and listening to his group The Marginal Prophets since I was a freshman in high school. I never actually mentioned to Keith that the very first sentence of Peligroso Pop lists his autobiographical comics as the primary inspiration for its creation. Hopefully it’ll be a nice surprise to him if he reads it.
Keef!
I was totally shocked that I was able to trade my zines for other people’s zines and comics. While wandering the many tables at APE my eye was caught by a zine called Tortilla. Being a Tortilla Artist myself, I quickly chatted up its creator Jaime Crespo. We hit it off and I was able to trade my zines for copies of his books Tortilla and Slices.
Sometime later I ran into Marcy Voyevod, one of the artists in the Day of the Dead exhibit I curated this year at SomArts. It turns out her daughter Sophie Elliot was at APE with a table for her latest work A Door in the Swamp. Sophie’s art in the book is amazing and if anyone come across a copy of the comic I hope you snatch it up. I scored again when Sophie traded me the first two issues of A Door in the Swamp for my zines.
A blurry Sophie Elliot
A few minutes later I ran into my homegirl MariNaomi on the floor of the expo. I’ve always met Mari when I never have any zines so I was excited to finally share my work with her. I gave her my last copy of Peligroso Pop and she was totally kind and ran over to her table and gave me the fourth issue of Estrus Comics.
MariNaomi
I left APE with a new sense of confidence about my work. I had gone through a three year dry period of not producing any zines and these two books were my chance to get back in the game. So far the reaction has been really great, especially with the Ghetto Frida Reader. There’s an energy of renewal in the air and it’s motivating me to work on more zines and comics. More to come!
Graphic Art, Tortillas, Comics, and Troublemaking 