Started As Sort Of Rorschach Of Watchmen, But I Don’t Know I’m Tired.  Around Seven Minutes.

I didn’t want to draw David Bowie today.  I don’t feel capable of accurately portraying anything close to what his work has done for me over the course of my entire life.  My drawing hand had other ideas, no other drawings would work until I got this onto the screen.

I haven’t felt this personally screwed up over the passing of an artist I’d never met since Freddie Mercury in 1991.

I took some video of part of my rail commute and set it to the English-language cover of Yatta! I made recently; the result turned out surprisingly mellow.  More info and an MP3 download in the track's original post.

Captioned lyrics are included if you click through to YouTube.  Here's the direct YouTube link for embedophobes.

This goofy track has gotten a far kinder response here and elsewhere than I thought it would; thanks, Internet!  I shall have to do more musical things.

Reis Telephone 1861

Having worked on his own telephonelike concept since the 1850s, German inventor Johann Philipp Reis successfully demonstrated that his invention could transmit speech over a decade before Alexander Graham Bell would achieve that goal.  Reis' test phrase was “Das Pferd frisst keinen Gurkensalat,” which means “The horse does not eat cucumber salad.”

Acrylic on canvas, 7x5″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.

Stromberg-Carlson upright phone 1894

When Alexander Graham Bell’s patent on the telephone expired in 1894, American Bell Telephone Company employees Alfred Stromberg and Androv Carlson went into the telephone-manufacturing business for themselves.

The telephone shown here is Stromberg-Carlson’s first upright desk phone, nicknamed "the Coffee Grinder" by enthusiasts due to its unusual shape and side-mounted hand crank.  Few of these unique members of the "candlestick phone" family survive today.

Acrylic on canvas, 5x7″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.

Gower-Bell Telephone 1880s-1890s

Having operated a Bell franchise in New England for a time, American entrepreneur Frederic Allan Gower set his sights on the original England.  His redesigned telephone was quickly adopted as a standard and declared “the best and most reliable telephone in service” by the British Post Office in 1882, and spread throughout much of Europe within the decade.

The Gower-Bell telephone's distinctive receiver-tubes, which were held to the users' ears, were designed to avoid receiver patents held by Bell.  Despite using Bell's name on his phone for the marketing value, Gower was not anxious to share the wealth with Bell.

Acrylic on canvas, 5x7″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.

The Fifth of November, 1955

Remember, remember the Fifth of November, The scientist hanging a clock, Who knew on that date, That fortune and fate, Would reveal so much more to the Doc. Doc Brown, Doc Brown, he did invent Such objects of folly, with good intent, He tumbled and fell in his lavatory But soon after took to his lab'ratory For though he'd been woefully injur'ed A vision unfurled in his bruis'ed head Great Scott! Great Scott! From this disaster Great Scott! Great Scott! The Flux Capac'tor! And what did he do with it? Build it!

Archival ink on paper, 6x8". The original drawing is now owned by a private collector. I've also done a reading of this poem on YouTube.

This plant did not come out looking like the photo on the seed packet.

My BFF Grey has a listing on the Internet Movie Database.

As you may know, if someone listed on IMDb wants to upload a photograph to their listing they need to buy a pro membership on the site.  While I couldn't do that for her, I did the next best thing: I redrew my Fairey-ish portrait of her in smileys, and posted it to her IMDb message board.

I can't help but think the potential of message board smileys as an artistic medium has barely been scratched.

Texted one friend asking for a profession, and another asking for animals.  I got back secretary, chipmunk, and ball python.  This is the result, done in ten minutes on my lunch break.

Because we all love visual puns.  Made for b3ta's verbular celebrities image challenge.

Speaking of Doctor Who, care to kick my starter?