“You Only Die Once”

In discussion with friends this weekend I realized I am afraid of death. I like to think I live every day as best I can, so that at the end of the day, I can fall asleep knowing I gave it my all. So why do I fear dying? When I really start to think about it, it’s not in terms of looking back, but looking forward. Not getting the chance to experience any more, well, experiences that sounds depressing to me. Death seems so boring!

ANYWAY, this illustration is for an article in Christianity Today Magazine titled You Only Die Once. Embrace death and live a fuller life, says the author, proposing that if we accept and (in some ways) welcome death as part of our life, every experience will be that much better. Living fully every moment while keeping the horizon of mortality in view.

Of course, maybe resisting death is another way to find fulfillment…

Back with more zombies! More apocalypse! More heroes! Peter Clines’s, Ex-Patriots. With book two my insecurities gave way to confidence and excitement for the subject matter and it’s challenges. As you can see, the general design of the series is to put the spot light on one main character per cover. With Ex-Patriots we have Cerberus.

I Wanted to share some of the brainstorming process this time around. These images are heavily reliant on accurate character design so I find myself doing some general studies to work out the build of each hero. I understand that’s totally common practice, but I never had the need for it before. Pro tip: Zombie battle reference? Photos of MMA fighters! SUPER helpful. Also, as I worked, I couldn’t help but think back on a vivid memory from my art education. When I was still an undergrad student an University of The Arts I made an illustration that featured battling robots. My teacher slayed me with his critique of the image. I’ll never forget the chastising, but also his words, “If you are going to make something up, it still has to feel like it could actually work! How would that arm bend? How does that head connect to that body?!”. That’s a little vague without visual context, but the point is, when drawing from make believe, in this case a fictional machine, to make people believe it’s power and authenticity, they need to believe it could actually exist. That’s not to say you have to draw up blue prints, but, you know, do enough to fool the eye. This rang through my head the whole time I was working on the cover.

Probably my favorite part, love this guy just getting totally decimated under Cerberus’s hammer of a foot.

The series is progressing quickly, stay tuned for book three in the coming months!

Last Sunday’s cover for the New York Times Arts and Leisure section. Wasn’t given a whole lot of information besides the premise that the article would be discussing the cynical and dark story lines that the latest political TV dramas tell. Enjoyed the open ended nature with this one and *really* appreciated when the art director said “this is for an article about TV shows, but don’t worry about that part”. Huzzah, creative freedom!

Reformatted a few minor details to help with the print version. Very pleased with what ran, but above is the original.

Illustration by Jonathan Bartlett,  “Paris In The Twenties”, written by Elizabeth Benedict

A new one coming up for The Saturday Evening Post illustrating an emotional story about a broken family and its effects on a child. Set in mid 70′s New York, Elizabeth narrates her experience as a piece of collateral damage to the degradation of her parent’s marriage. Infidelity, arguments, broken windows– her only true form of escape lies in  the pages of her cherished F. Scott Fitzgerald books.

If I’m being honest, I was a small bit skeptical of this project before signing on. How was I going to make these zombies different, how would I approach the conceptualizing of a super hero?

Truthfully I was simply over thinking the whole thing and once I shook it off and embraced the challenge and the fun of it all, it was nothing but enjoyable.

Also, a shout out to my super hero guru, Clay Rodery, for keeping any idea from feeling too redundant.

Ex-Heroes is the first book in a long series of novels by Peter Clines, in which he takes the readers on an epic journey through a zombie infested post apocalyptic world.

With each cover the editors wants to preserve a small sense of narrative from the story, but more importantly feature the character that that particular book focuses on.

For this first one, we have St. George, whose hero name is The Mighty Dragon. In the passage I was sent, it’s clear the mood is a bit more somber and the burden of his role as hero is weighing on him, maybe even a bit of failure. This was the emotion I wanted to capture for you on the cover.

Also, this had to completed from sketch to final in 3 weeks. Which made for an interesting Christmas vacation…

Book two is getting printed as we speak. I’ll share as soon as it’s published.

UPenn recently ran an extensive fundraising program to help boost everything from teacher salaries, scholarship funds, to building renovations. Apparently it was the most ambitious project the school had ever pushed and no one was sure how it would turn out (being that it’s an Ivy League school I can’t really see why it would have failed, but anyway…).

The current issue of the magazine is the big reveal of how much money was raised and to usher in the ‘new era’ the AD was hoping to have some sense of narrative, or revelation, from cover to interior. I had a lot of fun with the open ended theme of “abundance” and was totally free to do whatever I wanted. I felt it was still important to convey the idea of raising money, of course without slapping a big dollar sign on the page. UPenn’s mascot is The Quaker so in the name of school spirit, I worked with him as the main character along with the school’s colors.

So…The Quaker and the wishing well! Sounds like the title of a discarded Aesop fable, ha.

Technically the Lunar New Year began yesterday, but good thing for all of us there is a celebration for the entire week. As a follow up to the illustration I did last year when it was the Year of The Dragon, here is my latest “Year of The Snake”.

Perfect for my needs, it happens that 2013 is in fact the year of the WATER snake (just as last year was WATER dragon), allowing me to keep up the narrative sequence of the snake “taking over” the dragon.

From HanBan.com: “2013 is the year of the black Snake begins on February 10th shortly after the New moon in Aquarius, the humanitarian of the zodiac. The 2013 year of Snake is Water Snake, Water Snakes are lucky with finances, they always seem to have money flowing their way. They are adventurous spirits and love to take risks.”

If you’ve never been to a Lunar New Year celebration I highly recommend finding one. Always a good time.

Happy new year! Good luck to all of you

When I approached the opportunity to illustrate Ray Bradbury’s famous novel I knew from the get go I wanted it to be bold and full of menacing evil contrasted by a subtle sense of hope. As the central figure of the story, Guy Montag truly embodied this concept.

“Montag started up, his mouth opened. Had he ever seen a fireman that didn’t have black hair, black brows, a fiery face, and a blue-steel shaved but unshaved look? These men were all mirror images of himself!”

“Their charcoal hair and their soot-colored brows and their bluish-ash-smeared cheeks where they had shaven close.”

Such a great line. It stood out to me as the spark of coolness in a sea of burning heat; a foreshadow for the change that will break out and overcome the fire. The image is intended to capture the glimmer of resistance and rebellious hope peering out from under the heavy weight of what Guy’s world has become.

In the end my cover did not get used for publication, but I got a piece out of it that I am proud of.

The art was made as part of a cover competition that Simon & Schuster held. I don’t feel I have to justify this is any way, but now that I have students of my own I thought I would write about my decision making process as a way to educate.

Of course F451 is an intoxicating opportunity and S&S was actually offering up a fee that is on the scale of fair for what a book cover budget should be. So this is the advice, for what it’s worth, be careful of spec work, but no two cases are the same. If the project is something that feels personal and meaningful to you, I think it’s quite alright to consider the possibilities of such work; at a certain point is it even work? In this case the fee and contract were legitimate, which really was the tipping point for me. Had it not been for S&S treating the potential winner with fairness and the dignity of a professional and not simply “paying” him/her with the title of “the one who made the cover”, I would never had done it. This was my perfect storm of timing and circumstances.

I was close to working with the tiger from Pi (come on, we all love them), but after seeing the trailer for Holy Motors, I was inspired by all the rich symbolism and setting and pushed more towards the motifs of that film. I encourage you to check it out: I love the use of red as some kind of thread through each scene (watch closely) as well as the forest wall paper that the main character pushes through. I was close to getting approval to draw the green suit too, but ultimately the AD asked for street clothes. It’s all in the details!