Originally published at Gibberings. You can comment here or there.

The Exorcist, originally uploaded by vebelfetzer.

I am told this piece was the one holding up the final layout of the
second Unhallowed Metropolis book. Well, it’s done now. Stop
emailing me.

Tags: artwork, demons, digital, games, steampunk, unhallowed metropolis

Originally published at Gibberings. You can comment here or there.

Friends, Countrymen;

In a few days I will be retracing the path of thousands of ancient conastogas, puttering up Shasta and down Grant’s, charring and grimacing under the Oregon blaze, just to get to you.

It’s very rare that I show my art publicly. After last time, when an angry mob showed up early with torches and pitchforks and ate all the cubical cheese, I had really lost hope in the Seattle art scene. I tried showing down here in the Bay Area, where I now reside, but had to take down early due to hippies protesting a yeti that had climbed one of the campus trees.

It is for this reason that I would be terribly obliged if only you’d find some way to drop in at either one of the art shows I’m launching this weekend.

Anachrotechnofetishism - artifacts by pioneers of american steampunk

Long before the age of the internet, and well before the cold efficiency of the assembly line, existed fantastic and terrible machines, run on hope, sweat, and steam. It was a time in which form and function lived in sin, and everyman was a revolutionary.

These are 13 American artists united by broad geography and narrow aesthetic.

Marrying narrative and nostalgia to design and technology, they imagine the triumphs of the past overriding the failures of the present to create from the ruins and detritus a dazzling future-perfect.

Starring me and twelve other retropostapocalypticians, including Molly Porkshanks and Jake von Slatt, this show will feature insane amounts of designer teas and chocolates, a full set of my fine art prints, and a half-dozen original oil paintings that I have never shown in public, including Shine, Rustbutton Brass, the City, Afterglow, Twilight in the Roachfields (What I Did On My Summer Vacation), and most ridiculous of all, the Vacuum Traffic Controller: a 40 x 66″ collossus that I hope will dominate the room with his deep, slightly furrowed gaze.

Featuring Datamancer, David S. Dowling, Eliza Gauger, Jake von Slatt, Libby Bulloff, Magpie Killjoy, missmonster, Molly “Porkshanks” Friedrich, Molly Mitchell, Quentin Ziplash, Rachel “Ratchet” Olson, Steven Archer, Suzanne Rachel Forbes

…and the Lonely Bastard
The second show is a solo venture, and will launch on Saturday the 13th. This is a much more low-key affair, and I’m hoping my friends can show up and say hello before I have to tear ass back down to the Yay. The flagship painting, an original oil on a 24 x 24″ circular board, is the Cardiographer: dark, slick, and glowing, a portrait of a ghost-muse spinning a pulse out from ectoplasm. Co-stars include brand new (as of yesterday) 12 x 12″ Flee, a silvered landscape with robot on the lam; the ever-popular Bat Smax, an extremely adorable collaboration with my partner in rape-and-pillage, Jhonen Vasquez; the complete set of original sketches for the Bee Commission (monsters, demons, and vespid whores); and a full host of fine art prints, including many that won’t be shown at the steampunk show because they simply are not steampunk. And of course, refreshments will be served. Which is really the only reason to show up to an art opening in the first place.

No need to RSVP, I’ll just be happy to see you. And did I forget to mention? Free stickers for everyone, pirated directly from the US Post Office!

PS: if any Seattle folk have some rusty chain lying around, I’d like to borrow it.

Tags: artwork, demons, etsy, not my artwork, paintings, seattle, sketches, space, steampunk, the bee commission, unhallowed metropolis

Originally published at Gibberings. You can comment here or there.

A long conversation, in the mode of self-pity, with J. Goldberg outside the Nucleus Gallery, out in the LA balm. Inspired by the stylistically carefree artists on the walls inside, we rumbled over familiar turf: generalized self-doubt; the tug-of-war between pushing ourselves to develop new ideas, vs. the necessity of retaining some kind of “voice” from piece to piece; having too many ideas; having too few; feeling left behind or, worse, as if we have missed our chance entirely. We growled at the pop-art darlings’ beautiful hardcover books. “I wish I could draw the same thing over and over again without being tortured with boredom. I’d be in Juxtapose, too.”

It’s the same old nonsense, really. We all feel so goddamned lonely, so precious and special in our arty little hamster balls. Bonking into each other and rolling around in soiled wood shavings like idiots. FOLKS IF I COULD JUST DIRECT YOUR ATTENTION TO MY GIGANTIC UNFINISHED PAINTING FOR A MOMENT (TORTURED GENIUS OVER HERE). Do I really need to keep picking up and gessoing-over all those discarded Berkeley canvasses? And then when something is done, really done, like a Bachelor’s or a commission or even a personal work, the feeling is less triumphant than it is terrifying: what next? Jesus god, that took eight thousand times longer than it should have, the client probably doesn’t even want it anymore, where is my tea I just set it down five seconds ago, is this tea from yesterday or is it just cold and sloppy, I can’t remember if I got paid for all those book illustrations I finished last year, I wonder if I pretend to have worms if I can take my sketchbook into the bathroom for a couple hours a day while I’m at work, oh fuck where is my to-do list, did I even make one, fuck fuck fuck something comes after this and I’m just not sure if it’s worth the time/trouble/miniscule amount of money they’re offering.

I try to remember a time when I felt triumphant, or even “good”, finishing something. I wonder how I managed to almost completely destroy my ability, and motivation, to write for pleasure, just in the what, year and a half? that I worked for Kotaku, Wired, et al. It’s unbelievable.

But I am here, that is to say, away. Out in space, out visiting, where the insects are plentiful and the views aren’t so ordinary yet. Tomorrow evening will be the journey “home” (as much as I can claim to have such a thing.)

I leave you on a dangle. Imagine the sound of a record being ripped off the table.

Tags: artwork, berkeley, comics, demons, depressing, hate, writing

Originally published at Gibberings. You can comment here or there.

The Hellmadam, originally uploaded by vebelfetzer.

tags; hell, sketch, pencil, demons, wasps

Tags: artwork, bees, demons, sketches