What do we have HERE?! We have pretty much every notable human character(haven’t seen the Fox movie) from all of Wes Anderson’s films lovingly encapsulated in the aesthetic of the Sgt. Pepper album cover which is my print in this years Wes Anderson devoted art show entitled: Bad Dads put on by Spoke Art. This is my FIRST EVER GICLEE PRINT, a limited edition of 100, measures 18″ x 24″ and since they’re printed in California the prints themselves are not signed BUT you will receive my first ever CERTIFICATE OF AUTHENTICITY, signed and numbered! Available for purchase now.

I don’t know why I thought this would easy, maybe because it’s conceptually simple but the execution was a pain in the ass.I had a bunch of ideas for Bad Dads floating around my head, certain aspects or characters in Wes Anderson movies I wanted to focus on, I had one about Alec Baldwin(free idea, I’ll probably never do it) who narrates The Royal Tenenbaums, he’s also in this print by the way but I was looking for some concept to tie it all together…I don’t know how I landed on Sgt. Pepper exactly but once I did it just seemed to fit.

“BAD DADS” is six letters like “BEATLES” and they both start with “B” and end with “S” which jumped out and slapped me in the face right away and then I was like “oh and I’ll make Wes that important looking statue there in the foreground…” and it all snowballed from there, felt like it would be easy, a cute slotting in of this person here and that one there but I got really anal about where exactly everything would go, I wanted to match similar faces and or poses wherever I could from the Peppers cover.

It took forever but I think I included everything and it turned out well. Aside from all the film characters there are also appearances by familiar musical contributors to the Wes Anderson universe, Cat Stevens, Ray Daivies, David Bowie and others, buy a print and find them all!

It’s that time isn’t it internet? The sunny days have wandered out into traffic and have been smeared and splattered all over the freeway. It’s the same shit every year yet it’s always a bit of a bummer, it’s like a recurring bad dream….yeah I’m waxing poetic cuz this is the intro to the write up on my Edgar Allan Poe art prints (AVAILABLE NOW), but it’s true this time of year is dreary. That’s why Halloween happens now, not July. It’s a real Nick Cave, David Lynch, Tom Waits, Mark Lanegan time of year.

Maybe not everyone feels that gloomy, funky, damp thing this time of year, maybe you just start wearing a coat and don’t feel any different, but I do. My birthday’s the day before Halloween, maybe that’s got something to do with it. SCORPIO, ooooh!! Spooky, whatevs, I dunno. I just spit it how I live it homie.

Anyway seems a fitting time to release these 4 art prints based on 4 poems by Edgar Allan Poe. I’ve been sitting on them for a while, I wanted to release them on the anniversary of Poe’s death which was October 7th, that wasn’t possible but at least we got it done in time for Halloween.

There’s a lot of imagery in Poe’s work, there’s a lot to play with but I wanted to focus on some of the lesser known stuff. I like to be super obvious or intentionally way off the beaten path which is why I landed on the poems, I realized I’d never really read much of his poems other than The Raven and of course they’re a quick read which is great for me since the last book I read was Win Forever! Yeah, I know.

Kidding aside, Poe’s poems are pretty awesome. I think the imagery in a short form like that makes it a real explosive read. I jumped into designing these prints upon reading all the poems here, most of them for the first time. Check that shit out and BUY THESE PRINTS THEY’RE A SHORT RUN, I THINK THEY MIGHT GO FAST.

Here’s the full rundown on the print details:

4 prints, 8 1/2″ x 11″(Spirits of the Dead, Eldorado, Dreamland and The City in the Sea).

Regular edition, 4 color including metallic gold on Mohawk Cream, edition of only 50.

Limited edition of 20 on French Speckletone, 3 colors including metallic gold(excluding the purple from the main edition).

Here’s both sets, together:

My first ever Mystery Tube sale is happening right now!!! Or as I call it “The Jon Smythtery Tube Sale” * Fifty bucks gets you 5 randomly selected posters and or art prints, which is a wicked awesome deal to begin with BUT I have also pulled a small handful of reserve copies of sold out prints out from vault for this sale so if you’re lucky you may end up with Black Keys(Columbus) or Weezer or a sold out Big Lebowski print.

You've got like a 10% chance of getting one but it's your last chance for romance! Buy 10 tubes, beat the system Weezer fan!!!

It’s a mystery tube so you don’t know exactly what you’re going to get(that’s the fun of it) but I made sure that every tube has a print that I have deemed “premium” in it. Like one of the deep sold out reserves I just mentioned or maybe a Mallrats print, maybe one of the new Pulp Fiction prints, you’re guaranteed to get something awesome that’s what I’m saying. To be honest I think I may have gone a little too far in making this mystery tube sale chock full of good stuff but I wanted to make it worthwhile. I’m giving myself a headache trying to explain how great a deal this is, I feel like Jack Roberts.

Go here now, internet. Get you some screen printed gold for pennies on the dollar.

* some of you(like literally 2) might be saying “sometimes you’re funny on the blog, you didn’t even try this time”. This is my reply, say “Jon Smythtery Tube” out loud, it’s funny. If you don’t like it, I’m sorry. It’s like an episode of Louie, there’s one funny part. Take it or leave it.

First of all the website as you can see has just been revamped! I still need to fill out the Portfolio section and tweak a lot of little things but it looks a lot better and will be up to 100% soon.

NEW STUFF AT THE NAKATOMI STORE:

My new prints based on Pulp Fiction for Spoke Art’s “Quentin vs. Coen” show are now available!!!

AND Nakatomi is also releasing a T-Shirt featuring the art from my “A Wiser Fella…” print from the first round of “Quentin vs. Coen”. I don’t do a lot of shirts and this is my first shirt with Nakatomi so I’m excited about it, be the first on your block to own a shirt showcasing Sam Elliot and a severed and split open bear head!!!

In other news I have a poster for Weezer coming up soon, a movie poster, more art prints are definitely in the pipeline and of course Flatstock Seattle is just a few weeks away.

Alrighty, here’s the rundown on my second batch of prints for the Spoke Art Quentin vs. Coen show.

This was the natural progression from the first round of prints I contributed on the theme of The Big Lebowski in the Ralph Steadman aesthetic.

When I started brainstorming concepts on the colossal theme of “Quentin vs. Coen” I naturally had a million ideas but I wanted to do something I figured no one else had thought of because you never know what everyone else is bringing to the table in these kinds of shows. Somehow the idea of Walter and The Dude driving around in a piece of shit car overlapped in my head with Hunter S. and Dr. Gonzo flying around in that convertible in Fear and Loathing. It’s apples and oranges in a lot of ways but the similarities are two guys in a car on an insane adventure, the protagonist is on a mission while his sidekick means well but mostly just complicates things.

I started playing around, doing my best Steadman impression and it worked out. But in the middle of the process before I landed on what became the pieces on Walter/The Dude, The Stranger and Donny, I was trying the same aesthetic on other movie elements under the Quentin vs. Coen umbrella to see what fit. The illustration of Marsellus Wallace in the basement with Butch was actually one of the first things I started working up but set it aside when the Lebowski stuff started coming together. I knew I liked the illo of Wallace but didn’t know where it was going.

So when I found out there would be a second wave of Q vs. C I figured I should finish what I started with Butch and Mr. Wallace. Thing was, the Lebowski prints were specifically, intentionally a Fear and Loathing/Steadman homage. That tongue in cheek angle wasn’t necessary for a three piece art print arch on the character of Butch Coolidge BUT I had already started it in the Steadman style so I figured I’d keep the illustration style rough, gritty and insanely sloppy but I din’t feel the need to go out of my way to do a tight impression of another style. I wanted it to fit  with the approach of the Lebowski set but still be it’s own thing.

But anyway, let’s talk about Bruce Willis. I really think the character of Butch Coolidge(Bruce Willis) in Pulp Fiction has the most underrated storyline in that movie. Butch is for lack of a better term the “hero” out of the entire ensemble. He overcomes great obstacles to earn his freedom(kills a guy in a boxing match, nearly gets raped and or murdered in order to go back and get that fucking watch! Kills Vince etc.) and makes a clean getaway in the end, no strings attached.

Now you could argue Jules makes a clean getaway, and he pretty much does but his story doesn’t make him a “hero”. Jules is more of a bad guy who took a while to realize he was a bad guy and decided to make a change once he figured it out…but back to Butch. The thing that makes him the hero of Pulp Fiction is the way you pull for him throughout the film, he’s a guy doing what he has to do to get out of a tight spot at all times, he has a love interest and a strong sense of honor and moral compass. There are more reasons to care about what happens to butch than any other character.

He has to go back and get his fathers watch. He has to go back and save Marsellus Wallace, a man who wants to kill him. That’s the fucking definition of a good guy if there ever was one, Butch’s problems are solved if he leaves Wallace to Zed and the boys.

With Wallace dead Butch would be completely free, but he turns around, does the right thing. This is the kind of character that Willis has perfected over his career, from Die Hard to the Last Boy Scout he always adds a level of believability to these action heroes. He doesn’t make it look easy, there’s an everyman quality there. He smokes, he’s hungover half the time, he’s not excited to be in a position where his life is constantly in danger, he gets the shit beat out of him and he looks and acts like a guy who’s pushing his mangled body through these adventures on pure adrenaline because he has no other choice where Schwarzenegger or Stallone come off as robotic or wooden in comparison.

Sorry I got all James Lipton on you at the end there, internet. Sorry. Anyway here’s the official skinny on the new prints: signed and numbered edition of 80 regular prints on Mohawk cream paper and  20 variants. 5 colors, signed and numbered by moi. Get them for now at Spoke Art, I’ll have my copies available later.

In other news I’m looking to have a major website upgrade soon(if I can manage not to fuck it up) and a top secret big time interview coming up…stay tuned!

Look alive out there Internet !

Pitchers and catchers have reported, Spring Training is in full swing, a fresh baseball season is right around the corner, hope spring eternal and all that. Being in a baseball mood again and realizing I’m going to be in Texas for Flatstock and SXSW it seemed as good a time as any to pull the trigger on a limited wood edition of the long sold out Don’t Mess With The Bull(Young Man) print.

Printing on wood is not easy, we just make it look that way:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhBijvO7ZUc?rel=0&w=480&h=390]

Here’s the skinny(less jokes, more facts cuz I have to get to work). The wood was pre-coated by my small hands with acrylic white paint mixed with PINE TAR. It really just adds more of a wood smell to it. In the video I squirt pine tar on one of the pieces pretty good but in actuality only a handful of pieces in the run got hit with pine tar after printing like that and it was subtle squirt not as deliberate as that. So y’know, when you get one it’s not going to be all sticky and shit with pine tar all over it. Don’t worry!

The edition size is 34 pieces(good number right Ranger fans?!). There is a slightly more limited edition of 10, the “SXSW Edition” which will be available with my posters at the Nakatomi booth at Flatstock 29. I get in to Austin tomorrow night and will sign and number them Thursday in time for the second day of Flatstock, hope to see you there!!!

Other specs: 18″x24″ on 1/4″ Birch Veneer(good wood). They turned out awesome…..here’s the link if you missed the first 2 times, AVAILABLE NOW CLICK HERE.

2011 is already awesome, things are gonna change I can feel it. Everything ground to a halt toward the end of 2010 due to having too much shit happening at the same time but it was still a good run, I liked it. A damn site better than 2009 that’s for sure.

Long story short, having a day job and working on overlapping deadlines at night during football season is suicide. I fucked myself on a couple projects, I would go into vivid detail but I’d be here all day.

But anyway that mess was in December and things are snapping back into shape, yknow like in Christine when the car rebuilds itself.

I’m going to Los Angeles on Friday(maybe that’s today depending on when I post this) to attend the opening of “Is This thing On?” a group show at Gallery 1988. Jensen was gracious enough(or drunk enough, zing!) to ask me to design the official poster for the show:

I’ve done a couple prints for 1988 in the past and have one more coming up, I’ve never been down there so I’m really looking forward to it. The other show I speak of is “MULTIPLAYER” the video game themed group show opening January 15th at the new Gallery 1988 location in Venice.

Speaking of which, while I’m in L.A I’m going to get over to Venice and check out some of Jim Morrison’s old haunts. Ha! That’s a joke…..but it’s…true. I’m going to do just that if I can.

Shit! I gotta go, my dad’s giving me a ride to the airport(I let him do it, he loves it…) which means getting there 3 HOURS EARLY.

Oh and speaking of comedy posters, here’s that Doug Stanhope poster I did. Illustration/design by me, concept by Rob Jones:

Alright I gotta hop in the shower. Love you, talk soon! XOXOXO

I’ve been meaning to hop back on the blog since I got back from Renegade Austin in May and here it is the week after Renegade San Francisco. Doing two out of town shows in one summer has been a bigger pain than I anticipated and I don’t mind saying I came up short on both occasions. I think I covered my expenses(travel etc.) in Austin but I got my head handed to me in San Francisco. Came in guns a blazin’ and got creamed, you remember the end of Butch and Sundance right? Like that.

I’m over it but I bitched up a storm about it of course you know all about that if you follow me on twitter or facebook. As per usual all my caterwauling is all in good fun, I use my twitter account as free therapy, dumb joke depository, shit talking sounding board amongst friends and lastly a venue to dispense news on new prints/design and such. It’s synced straight to my facebook, I rarely check in on facebook itself.

If I wasn’t counting on making my rent money in San Fran it wouldn’t have been as big a deal to me, I don’t want anyone who came out to Renegade San Francisco or anyone involved with Renegade to feel slighted by anything I said….well, except the DJ. The DJ was spinning a mix tailor made for Kindergarten nap time, I mean you go to a Grocery Store and they at least play something with a consistent tempo. Keeps people engaged on what they came to do, introspective Neil Young or sad bastard Leonard Cohen slow jams are counterproductive to say the least. That DJ was not helping the atmosphere….though I like Wings as much as the next guy.

Jesus, speaking of bringing the mood down…to the bright side we go! I hung out with Tyler and Michelle Madsen of Love Nail Tree in San Fran, after meeting them initially in Austin. We’re going to try and collab on some shirts in the future, excited about that but god knows when that will see the light of day, fall probably. Anyway we saw Dinner for Schmucks the night before I flew back, fun times.

Also in San Fran were the usual poster suspects but I’m not going to list all the Two Rabbits, Kevin Tongs and Nate Duval‘s of the world, they’re all overrated anyway. ZING! LOLZORZ but working my booth myself I didn’t get out and mingle at all really, I think Regan Smith Clarke the shirt designer from Boston is the only non-poster new person I met. His buddy helping him at his booth looks like a young Seth Romatelli from the Uhh Yeah Dude podcast…anyway Regan Smith Clarke, solid guy. Traded him a print for a nice Tank Top. Oh shit, I also met the dudes from Fuzzy Ink, they make shirts too. Nice guys, met them while drunk(..ish) with Mike from Two Rabbits in lower Haight.

Leading up to San Francisco I needed to finish a design for Spoon and get it approved, the time crunch due to finishing new wood prints(more info down the road) and boxing up 100 lbs of my wares and display paraphernalia forced me to spend most of my Friday once I landed in my hotel room slaving over a hot laptop finishing up the design. The design ended up being rad and it was approved:

The print however did not go quite as I had hoped, more on that later. Flukey weird shit, hardly ever happens but…like I said I’ll address that later.

Moving right along, printing this week will be a 3 color poster for The Black Keys(strangely playing the same venue as Spoon in the above poster)  this Friday in Columbus, Ohio.

To recap my trip to Austin in May, it was a great time. Austin always is. I stayed with Tim Doyle (of Nakatomi inc. fame), his wife Angie and darling son Rocko! I’m bad with baby ages but he’s a little guy, got a lot of bam bam in him. Also met Nick Derrington(awesome illustrator) and his wife, if I had 5 minutes to concentrate on it I’m sure I could remember her name but she made this amazing Peach Cobbler. One of the greatest foodstuffs I have ever partaken in. Anyway Tim lives right down the street from where they shoot a portion of my favorite guilty pleasure, Friday Night Lights. Driving through the neighborhood I always felt like I was in the opening montage.

Also hung out with Clint Wilson, yeah he’s a Wilson from Austin I’m sure he’s related to Luke and Owen Wilson…and the other brother, future man whatever is name is. Didn’t hit too many places other than fine eateries which meant I had to stop by Geof Peveto‘s joint: FRANK. It’s Peveto’s world, we’re just living in it…hats off to you sir.
This is getting long already, I’ll just keep blogging throughout this and next week. There’s new stuff up in the store plus the aforementioned Black Keys poster will be available soon and there’s a whole wave of new art prints I can’t even get into right now which will be going up in my etsy store as soon as I can get to it. But designwise right now Ghostland Observatory is on the front burner, need to get some shirt designs and a tour poster done pronto! Before Flatstock at Bumbershoot of course. I’ll be back in a couple days, thanks for stopping by.

I just watched the final episode of The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien and in keeping with Coco’s request, I will not delve into cynicism in this post. Conan in his closing statement as it were, spoke directly to the audience and urged us(the young ones in particular) not to be cynical and thanked NBC for his time on The Tonight Show and employing him for 20 years from his time as a writer on SNL to now. His message was that if you work hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen to you. I cried a little…and also before that when Neil Young played “Long May You Run”, one of my favorite songs ever a and perfect song for the moment.

That is why I love Conan O’Brien. Plenty of the jokes and bits on his show over the years were plenty snarky and poked fun at plenty of folks but I would say for every barb he threw at a Paris Hilton for example, he made himself the butt of the joke on twice as many occasions and it was always done under the umbrella of lighthearted fun. Conan is not a mean or bitter guy, most great comedians have well documented demons that make them who they are but Conan is a rare exception, in the vein of a Jerry Seinfeld I suppose…I can’t think of a better or closer example off the top of my head. Jay Leno is certainly not a happy person, David Letterman is a guy I’d like to have a beer with but that dude has mountains of issues. Conan took the high road on his way out because he is a well adjusted, smart and grateful human being.

I have been a Conan fan since I was about 12 or 13, staying up wicked late whenever possible to catch Conan, Andy, Max, Joel, Abe Vigoda,  La Bamba and Robert Smigel get crazy with the cheeze whiz. When the day finally came and Conan took his seat on The Tonight Show it was unbelievable, finally someone with a connection to my generation who won’t just give the audience what they expect at the premiere slot in late night. I considered it as important to the comedy world as Barack Obama’s election was in American politics and race relations….I was a little excited.

Because I feel so strongly about Conan as a fan of his and the late night genre in general(I’ve seen every episode of The Larry Sanders Show multiple times) I constructed an editorial Illustration to encapsulate what has happened here with Conan and NBC. The sun will rise on a glorious new day for my Coney Island baby,  he’ll be back and most likely better than ever in just a few months but I could not let this time pass without making light of this most heinous blunder NBC has perpetrated here. While also paying homage to Conan’s enduring spirit, soldiering on with perfect hair and plastic smile. Not letting the man get him down but not letting it go unnoted the great injustices that have occurred.

The fine folks at Nakatomi have brought this Illustration to life. Enjoy:

And in other news, I will be back to blogging this week. Working on multiple interviews and new prints, see you back here soon!

Behold, “Blotter Color” a 4 color hybrid art print, limited edition of 30 pieces. In addition to the 4 screen printed colors, it was printed on watercolor paper where I introduced water into the printing process along the way along with a slight color change(red to magenta). Before the last color(black lineart) I added brush strokes, dabs and splatters of watercolor which makes each piece in the edition quite unique.

Here’s a video I slapped together to better illustrate what I’m talking about in terms of the way the pieces vary:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zobqvdBriV4&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

I am adding these pieces to the Big Cartel Store store today, measures 9.75″ x 13″ and is printed on watercolor paper. I am listing them individually so check ‘em out and pick whichever one you like best!

Here are a couple more pics and blathering about the process…

On some of the pieces after the black printed I’ve gone in and elaborated on the linework to add more depth…

The original illustration is from a page out of a sketchbook from last year, I blew it up and played around painting shading or detail areas over it as I was putting the screen print together.

This is pretty experimental stuff so I wasn’t sure exactly how it would turn out but I’m pleased with the result. I’m excited about the future possibilities, I kinda feel like Doc Brown when he slipped off his toilet and discovered the secret to the Flux Capacitor.