Spinal Tap

This weeks cover for City Pages about fixing and breaking spinal injuries, over and over. Thanks Mike.

off da chain

 For Harvard Magazine about the immobile labor force. Don't know what that is? I didnt either, but its really interesting - essentially, Low income workers are unable to migrate to wealthier areas (north eastern states, for example) due largely in part to high housing cost. Homes keep them from moving somewhere now. If low income workers are not able to migrate it spells bad things for the economy.

How to TRAIN your dragon

New one for the Dallas Observer about the inevitable, unavoidable glut of Canadian oil making its way to Texas (maple leaf icon seen in print edition of image). Oil Sands oil in coming south, whether residents, or the environment like it or not, and its in a hurry. I spent a long time refining this idea till i felt it was perfect. My thought was to have a train barreling toward you. one you can't escape - because that seemed like the right metaphor for this situation. but how to associate it with oil?! Then it dawned on my that the tracks leading to the drain, if drawn right (and using some of the train shapes) could double as an oil tower - thus, saying both. what a great visual overlap! Lucky!!

Also - a few weeks before I was fortunate enough to do a cover for Jay at Westword - this one had an extremely quick turnaround - Jay wanted an image of an "artist pig" - but after hearing what the story was about (a pig rendering plant causing a muck in an artistic neighborhood) I wanted to pitch a few ideas of my own. 

my favorite image, the pigs playing in the paint like mud was chosen, so i was off to the races.

 

thanks to my buddy Justin for passing on a pic of the cover too!

Happy Holidays

Wash-board abs

Piece for todays Washington Post that actually ended up going through a lot of changes after this point, but i felt this stage was quite nice / worth posting.

BrokenBehindback Mountain

  New piece for Government Executive about a new Government health care plan that keeps you covered but with some disadvantages - playing with having the patient having one hand tied behind their back - in this case shown as sling behind their back - seemed to boil down a complex article in a clear image.  Below are some roughs:

I also tried a few different compositions of the final before i started to paint - here are those:

Blind science

New piece for Canadian Wildlife, about the weird, blind science behind conservation.

The end of winners and losers

New piece for The Progressive about leftist / activist soccer players who share their views (apposing tyranny and selfish top down politics) by playing a unique approach to the game where there are no winners. The game isnt about whos ahead, its about the way the game is played.  An icon on top of a soccer trophy being pulled down like overthrown dictator ( i referenced the infamous Saddam statue) was a perfect visual overlap.

Workload

New personal piece about the heavy workload i've been juggling since i started teaching in September. My priority is freelancing, so it sometimes feels like its all just really piling up. Had this idea in the vault from a previous project - felt like a great fit.

mother trucker

For Pro-Sales magazine about Canadian lumber shipping

Snow Job

For Cottage Life about buying the right snowmobile. this one went through stage after stage of getting messier and messier. nice, subtle concept. Some ideas that didnt make the cut: