THUDRUMBLE

I broke my new years stuff last night about not going to art openings or out too much for that matter...but for good reason.

I been trying to get together with Jay222 to work on a toy idea. I was going to hit him up the other day via blog or twitter or some other form of interwebbery when I saw a flyer for him in a show with a guy I was lucky enough to meet before he blew up, my buddy Mars1. I have been going to Mario's shows on both coasts for years and def had to go check out this one...



the show also featured work by Jesse Hernandez, who has done toys for Kid Robot, a cartoon called the "The Nutshack" , and is the host of a new show on cable about vinyl toys and the culture called Vinyl Addiction . Jesse had made it over to the toy show I put together at termina22 but I didn't get the pleasure of meeting him that night, so I was excited about that.

Damon Soule had some work up. He shows with Mars alot. The guy is incredible and another person I'd love to meet one day. Downtimer
, a graff artist who's brought his style into the canvas and gallery world, that's been a friend on my myspace for a good 6 years or something. I've always paid attention to his work but never had the pleasure of meeting. last but not least Nate1 a graff artist that holds a class called "sketching letters" at the the 1AM gallery in SF.

So, I pretty much had to go to this one. for some reason it was out in the burbs in a town called San Mateo instead of in the city... which didn't make sense at 1st. I called by friend Gregory of STRANGEco, whom I met through mario, if he could make it out the house to socialize a little and catch up with our old friend, and knew my buddy Leecifer knew downtimer, Jay222, Jesse and would love to get a chance to meet some of the other artists in the show. So, I went to the gallery website to get the address before leaving the house and realized why ths show was in the burbs..



It was the grand opening of DJ Qbert and Yogafrog's new gallery.



For those of you who don't know Q-bert is a DJ I been listening to since highschool. One of the most famous Dj's to come outta the bay area,,, and since I'm not into too much of this bay area crunk hyphy stuff or too much E40 or anything heiroglifics, pharcyde, and qbert is all the bay area really has for me as far as hip hop goes, depending on how long aesop rock stays out this way...Daily city right by san Mateo is where qbert and shortcut and scratch pickles and a talented bunch of Dj's came out of sometime in the 90's.

I put a pair of pants on that don't have paint completly all over them.( which are getting hard to find ) and jumped on bart with Leecifer to meet gregory who drove down to the show. it was the 1st time leecifer and gregory had been formally introduced which lead to all kinds of great toy conversation, being that Leecifer has the biggest collection of Strangeco toys I ever scene.

The show was awesome...



got too catch up with Jay222, who spent at least an hour or so having people take pics of these characters painted on the side of the building pretend to grab his ass...was pretty great...if I find anyone posting one online I'll grab it...watch what me and him put togther this year!



I got to hit up his black book too,, it's been a minute since _ did one of them...

David Chooong Lee and Olivia from Fabric8 Gallery made it out to the show, Got to see My buddy Brin Berliner who just sculpted the che skull bust for frank kozik..

This wasn't at the show but how sick is that...



but this sculpt by Brin for Mars was in the show...



Mario himself on the left



I got to finally got to meet Jesse for a quick minute...I would of like to get a chance to chat with him a little more about his cartoon show project. I am working on a cartoon project myself, that i'll let everyone know about soon enough, and would loved to of picked his brain about that a little bit.



got to meet DJ Qbert, the man himself, who was greeting people at the door. The turntables that had in there, were indeed, pretty sick..



got to meet Oliver Vernon, Marc from fatlace , a bunch of other great people.. the art was great, music was great, people were great.

ot a little private sneek of the offices where there was plenty of nice glossy apple stuff ( which i always like) and a 3ft grey felt qee among other things. would of liked to snuck a pic of that...

afterwards, About thirteen of us rolled out to a restuarant ate drank and discussed art. I was thinking I was happy I broke my new years resolution for the night and I realized how extremely lucky I was to be sitting in this fancy Italian restuarant, and how at this moment I was probably surrounded by more artistic talent at one table at that moment then probably most of my time here on earth... not even just this friday night but almost everyone I've met since i been out here in the bay. It gets me very excited for the future and what's to come...this year and after...

so stay tuned...


and if your in the san mateo area or anywhere around San Francisco see about stopping in to Thudrumble and check out the art !

IT CAME FROM SKULLBRAIN II

Leecifer invited me to be a part of the ICFSB2 show. which is a Japanese vinyl show that takes place at a toy store and company called super7 in japan town in San Francisco.

This was my second show of this year and my first japanese vinyl show ever. For people not familiar...Japanese ninyl toys as apposed to others are supposedly a bit softer, usually clear or tints of clear...and are normally pointy pr spiky toys that are most likely in the shape of some type of lizard or robot.

definatley not into it as much as the western vinyl but I can respect it and am honored to be invited to a show with artists like leecifer, drill1, brent nalasco, motorbot, bob congi and paul kaiju to name a few..

I ended up doing three pieces for this show.



and Leecifer was cool enough to invite me along the day before to come help open boxes and set up...I love doing that it's like a kid at christmas everytime...






the show was pretty cool...got to Meet Brian Flynn from Super7 and hang out with glenn and his wife afterwards, sold the blue LED lit zombie...probably let Super7 keep one of the ghosts and take the other home for my own collection.


there is a flickr set of the show here to see everyone's pieces.

TABLET part 2

OK, I changed my mind.. I don't want it...

whacksauce...Apple... whacksauce...

I don't even know where to start, this thing is the touchscreen computer I been waiting for but runs on a phone os...

This device might be perfect for me, If i was under twelve or over fifty.

Is this our future ? Dumbed downed versions of programs called apps ? How awesome would it be to dip your fingers into a color palette and paint in photoshop? Instead, I got some app called brushes. Am I supposed to be happy cause it actually has multiple layer options? Where is the desktop and folders ? The abilties to run a real program?

have we really digressed to a dashboard operating system and widget applications ?

only syncing ? can I plug monitors into this thing ? can I use it like a big remote control for my itunes ? Or, as a wireless keyboard for my mac pro ?

Why is there no camera on this thing ?
Why no mobile video chat from the #1 mobile company in the world? Not even on the iphone? Why are we like 5 years behind the japanese with video cellphones ? We should be on mobile video multichat by now. I can look at all my beautiful pictures on my ipad but I can't take one ?

Now i have to admit the gaming and the google street view looks like it will be somewhat awesome, and, could possibly be the world's best new GPS/navigation device. But, games built for an ipod instead of some real graphics ? I think you could of done a little better then that. This thing is more of a toy and media player rather then a tool

and why are you so sleeping on letting us use the apple tv as a gaming system? There is all ready a contract with EA sports ...a bunch of games for mac available through your istores, Bluetooth capabilities for wireless controllers, Or, Maybe an app that turns your iphone or ipod touch into a touch screen bluetooth game controller, and, what appears to be a stronger os then your ipad. Playstation was the greatest selling product in sony history. Xbox is one of the strongest legs of the microsoft empire. You have no desire to step in that arena ? Your gonna focus on ipod touch games? Really ?

then i almost forgot what for me is probably the biggest kick in the ass...the fact that there is still no flash support, so I can not even look at my own site on the ipad.

So, This is all you have for us this year ? No monitor redesigns? why are you almost two years behind dell and hp in touchscreen monitors ? What about some bigger monitors or hdtv's ? it's been more then a year since you dropped computer from your name. Maybe touchscreen hdtv's. Maybe with a little appletv built right in that bad boy.

Can I leave att who has been raping me since I got a iphone plan ?

Nothing on this itunes subscription service we have been hearing so much about ?

No new iphone OS update ?

I really don't know what to say Apple...sooo much potential...and such misdirected focus. If you guys ever wanna talk I am right here for you... you won't ever have to pay me a cent. I am just down to get this advancement thing on the road. After all how many years do we all have left to wait for these things ?

Tablet

I want one !



tomorrows the big day...incase you don't know i am a big apple nut and i will be waking up super early tomorrow or not going to sleep tonight and peeping appleinsider.com for the conference details as it goes live and watching the whole video later...lots instore and a lot they are probably totally ignoring ..like turning apple tv into a gaming system... i'll prob be popping some shit on here about the whole thing tomorrow...javascript:void(0)

The lebowski's

So... I sculpted these two toys of the big Lebowski the multiversal group show at Art Basel, in miami florida last month... Art basel is probably the biggest art show in the united states and i was very proud to take part in this one..

super sculpey and acrylics over two 8" vinyl munny's.




Jefferey the dude " mind if I do a jay ? " Lebowski



Walter " i'll get you a toe by 3:00, with nail polish " Sobchak



you can see some more pics at my site here here

anyway the figures seem to be getting a good response and i really like the way they turned out...so this year in the spirit of the Lebowski toys i am gonna produce fifty different television movie and music figures similar to these two guys...i have all fifty planned out and more i would like to do put i figured i set a modest goal and see if i can reach that first...

i don't wanna give them all away and keep most a surprise...but i'll tell ya I am working on two characters from fear and loathing in las vegas now and will be doing three characters from my all time favorite tv show the trailer park boys after that..to find out the rest your gonna have to stay tuned....

P.S.. and sorry kid robot but i might have to make a mold of your munny for that since i am not spending 1500 bucks on munnies to do all these things...

The TASK Project

I have been working on a 3d street sculpture graffitti project for the last 2 years that i think might be pretty unique and original as far as i am aware...and it's all wrapping up and coming to an end very soon...will be updating this post shortly....

TOYS

I have always loved toys...who hasn't ...loved heman...legos were my favorite,,,started to look at it as more of a collectible thing as pppsed to smething to destroy around the time mcfarlane started doing spawn characters...kept an eye when kidrobot 1st opened its doors in manhatten...and lve the fact that some of my favorite artist produce a small vynil affordable keepsake i can bring home and put on the shelf...

over the last couple years i have had the pleasure through my boy MARS1 1 of working with a designer toy company called STRANGEco ...the owners are 2 of the coolest people you'll ever meet..and through me deeper into the world and realm of the vinyl toy..



I starting making my first custom toys only less then a year ago when we started planning a big toy show at the terminal22 gallery last year...since i have been getting invited to al types of toy shows from munnies to qee's to japanese vinyl for a show for a show at Super7 in sf ...the guys there are pretty super themselves...so this year since fate is kinda pulling me that way anyway I am gonna dedicate a bunch of time to pumping out some serious toy action...

stay tuned !

2010

So it's 2010 a new year with new focuses. One of my best friends Evan quit his wall street gig to go on a year long journey around the world...which would be awesome but I am def not financially set to join in at this moment...but you can check out his travels and awesome pics here at www.chasingthesunwest.com a bunch of my other childhood chums are getting married and settling down...which is awesome as well but most likely not in the cards for me and definatley not in my plans for this year...one of the other most important people in my life just started walking again for the first time in over a decade with the help of some braces after getting into an accident when we were young...so in the spirit of what i called my extended family and some of the great artists I have met since moving to the bay area I am gonna take this year to do something quite the opposite of evan and lock my self in the studio and spend the whole year on myself...i have swarn off girls, bars, parties, art openings and social gatherings for the whole year..I have been sooo busy this past year ,,,involved in so many projects and working on a gallery here in oakland called terminal22. it's been super fun and I have met a ton of awesome people in the process...but it's all beena real lot of work and i have been pretty broke since we started it...and i kind of lost focus on my main reason to move back out to california was to relax and make art...

I have had an account on blogspot for years and never posted any thing til now... I am gonna use this to document my year of seclusion and see what ideas and art come out of it...first thing on the agenda will be updating my website taskoner.com which has not been touched in a year and a half.

so stay tuned ....