makes me think of the legion of doom

For those of you reading in Atlanta, this is your second-to-last weekend to catch the exhibition of Annie Leibovitz photographs on display at the High Museum through Sept. 9.

I’m actually not much of a Leibovitz fan. I find many of her celebrity portraits stiff and oddly uninspired, though this exhibition did include some surprises when we saw it last weekend.
I loved the above image of Dubya’s inner circle (apologies for the poor scan), which is truly one of the most terrifying photographs I’ve seen in ages. Something about Cheney’s smirk just says, “I’m a sociopath!” Condi looks like she’s about to spit hot acid into your eye.

Even better were the many shots of Annie’s longtime partner Susan Sontag, whose battle with cancer plays out in graphic detail across perhaps two dozen photographs (including one taken after her death). Too bad Susan gets demoted to just a “friend” in the accompanying text. Any fool can tell that these two women were more than friends, and Leibovitz’s shots of intimate moments with Susan and their children show an emotional intensity that I found lacking in most of the magazine work.
Anyway, it’s worth a visit. That Bush picture alone will haunt me for months.

baby’s first xanax

I haven’t posted any new artwork on here in a while, so here are two at once, both taken from the Loaf’s crime reports.

In the above, I had fun playing around with gradients and transparencies in Illustrator, which led to some unusual colors for me. The BF declared it “very Southwestern — but I like it.”

I struggled with the composition in the drawing below. I’m still not in love with the final, but my original idea — to place the sleeping grandpa on the far left and play the baby huge in the near right foreground — just didn’t work at all. The item from the Blot involved a babysitter who dozes off on the job, apparently due to too much Xanax. Some eagle-eyed (and pill-popping) readers might point out that Xanax is not a capsule, but it just didn’t work as a tablet.

a birthday, a wedding, a funeral

“I’m anxiously awaiting a new post,” someone said to me the other day, and I sort of shrugged. I haven’t paid much attention to this blog lately; I’ve been knee-deep slogging through actual life with not much time to stop and pontificate on what it all means.

The BF and I spent eight glorious days in Provincetown celebrating my close friend Jimmy’s 30th birthday. (As a side note, when did all my friends get so f-ing old? Every time I turn around someone’s turning 30, and in October we’re celebrating another friend’s 40th. Lord.)

The week couldn’t have been better. Perfect weather, lots of laughter and lots more liquor. Ptown isn’t exactly known for its nightlife but we managed to hit either A-House or the Crown every single night we were there. At this rate, my liver might not make it to 40.

On our final day of the trip, the BF and I left our crew behind and mounted the long hike out to the beach. If you’ve never been to Ptown, you may not realize what a commitment this entails. The beach is beautiful once you get there, but it requires an almost comical trek through the wetlands to reach the area where the gays gather.
Once we were there, I wanted to rest, but the BF was chatty and affectionate. I soon found out why. He was trying to figure out a way to pop the question. He’d planned the whole outing and had a ring hidden in our backpack.
No one believes me when I say I didn’t see this coming, but I seriously had no idea. We’re not sure yet of the specifics but considering a ceremony next spring or summer. Details to come.

On a more somber note, we came back to ATL and were met immediately with some grim news, reports that our friend Todd had died over the weekend. This is a person we traveled with to Mexico back in December and have seen often this summer, one of the few guys in Atlanta that my BF immediately clicked with. He was one of the most consistently upbeat and positive people I’ve ever known; unlike me, he was nice to everyone, always welcoming, eternally generous.
This is the first friend I’ve lost since high school and I’m still going through all the expected stages: disbelief, shock, anger, numbness. We attended the funeral on Saturday and I was moved by the pastor’s homily, which was personal and authentic in a way that too many eulogies are not. He spoke of Todd’s passion for life and his love of travel. He pointed out how difficult it is to find a photo of Todd where he’s alone.

I’m still trying to wrap my thoughts around all of this, to find the unifying lesson to tie all the events of August into one neat bundle. Maybe there isn’t one that’s not totally artificial. Life is beautiful, life is hard.

studio stick up

A new crime report illustration from Creative Loafing. The item involved a guy who was robbed of all his recording equipment — by a friend who was in his place recording a song at the time.
I based the assailant (partly) on memories of a guitar player I knew when I was a teenager, though I really couldn’t imagine that guy pulling a gun on anyone.

beware, black dog

Two new drawings posted today. The one above is the latest for AirTran’s Go magazine. It’s a piece on how to turn your slowpoke computer into a speed demon. I guess the old tortoise-and-the-hare angle is a tired cliché, but I enjoyed playing around with the animal silhouettes—sort of a departure from my usual style.

The drawing below is for last week’s Blotter in Creative Loafing. EMC once pointed out that the pets I draw always look terrified. This poor puppy is no exception, I guess. But if your pet made it into the crime report, chances are he wasn’t having a good day.