Last night, the Merry Karnowsky Gallery opened a new solo show for brilliant illustrator, writer and director Dave McKean.  Called “Persistence of Vision”, the show features several gorgeous large mixed media pieces, a smaller room of digitally enhanced prints and a host of beautiful pen and in drawings (many inspired by McKean’s recent foray into the world of tango dancing).  McKean is probably best known for his work on Sandman with writer Neil Gaiman.  His covers broke away from the typical comic book style, employing sculpture, digitally-manipulated photography and collage to create rich, arresting images not widely seen in the genre. In 1989, McKean reimagined the Dark Knight in Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth, written by Grant Morrison.  In 2005, McKean once again teamed up with Neil Gaiman for the film Mirrormask.  The film is a fairy tale, of sorts, in which a 15 year old girl must embark on a journey through McKean’s surrealistic designed dream world to retrieve the magical Mirrormask and thus restore balance to two opposing kingdoms.  Along the way she encounters characters, creatures and environments that could only come from the mind of Dave McKean.

My own introduction to McKean’s work was with a three issue mini series called Black Orchid, published in 1988.  As luck would have it, I was able to get Mr. McKean to sign all three (that’s right, the three 1988 originals, not the single volume reissue.  Respect).  After Black Orchid, I began collecting Sandman (the only comics I ever collected) eventually winding up with the entire series.  Each cover is a wonderful piece of art, but as with any art, you appreciate it more seeing the artist’s work in person.  Seeing the brush strokes, the textures and the details not available in a photograph bring the pieces to life. Getting a chance to chat a bit with Mr. McKean about the work, his process and how much he and his wife are enjoying tango lessons was icing on the cake.

I’ve only scratched the surface of the incredible work and career of Dave McKean.  If you would like to see more of his work, check out his Wikipedia page or search for him on Amazon.

Back in April I posted an entry on the wonderful street art of Joshua Allen Harris. New York magazine has just done a behind the scenes piece with Joshua, following him as he creates his animals which are brought to life by the subway cars passing beneath them. Excellent stuff…

I’ve received several emails asking me about my process and how I create my artwork, so I took some shots during the production of One Nation, Under Ground to give a little glimpse behind the brush.  Many of my pieces use “gel transfers”, which are not unlike Polaroid emulsion transfers.  The main difference being with a Polaroid emulsion transfer, you soak the film in warm water to remove the exposed emulsion.  My transfer process involves building a gel medium carrier sheet, then printing the element directly to it.  Though the end results are similar, my methods offer a greater degree of flexibility and control.
Once I’ve roughed out the concept for a new piece, either with pencil and paper or in Photoshop, I begin by creating the background substrate.  In the case of One Nation,  Under Ground, I decided to work on an mdf panel, rather than canvas.  I knew the piece would involve some heavier texture work and canvas just doesn’t stand up to the scraping, rubbing and general abuse that I sometimes employ to get the look I’m after.  After eight or so layers of acrylic and collage, I ended up with this heavily textured background.

When I have a created background that I am satisfied with, I shoot it and bring it into Photoshop, where I begin compositing the various elements and textures together that make up the image. At this stage, the Photoshop composite is a merely an approximation of the final piece…in fact, I have yet to have a piece turn out exactly like the comp, which is one of the aspects of this process that I absolutely love. In the case of this particular piece, there are four main gel elements. Most of my pieces use between eight and twelve individual gel transfers in addition to the layers applied building the substrate. However, on several of my pieces, I have used upwards of two dozen individually applied gel transfer elements.
To create the gel transfer elements, I begin with two or three layers of acrylic medium which is brushed onto a polypropylene “carrier sheet”. Once the two layers have dried thoroughly, I apply two coats of Clear Gloss inkAID, which is a precoat that allows printing on a variety of porous and non-porous substrates. My main printer is Epson’s absolutely brilliant Stylus Pro 3800. It’s a large format printer that features an adjustable height, straight paper path, which allows me to print directly on very thick materials such as: mat board, wood veneer, aluminum and copper. Once the gel elements are printed, dried and sealed, they are carefully removed from the carrier sheet and set aside.

Now that all of the elements have been printed, it’s on to the fun part of assembling the image. This stage is critical in that there are a number of things that can go wrong. I have had elements tear, fold over on themselves, stick together, etc. Seldom can the element be salvaged in these cases, so the process starts over from the beginning. However, when it goes smoothly, this is where things really start to come together. If you have ever spent any time in a photographic darkroom, this is the stage where you watch the image slowly fade up in the tray of developer.
To apply each of the gel elements, I use either Golden Soft Gel or Nova Color Matte Varnish (205), depending on the effect I am trying to achieve. The actual application is the same as using white glue, brushing a liberal coat onto the substrate, then gently rolling the element into place, smoothing out as many air bubbles as possible (less to pop with an Exacto knife later).


Once all of the gel elements have been applied, the piece is allowed to dry for at least a full day. Once dry, I apply a variety of additional texturing, glazes, spatters, etc. as well as scraping, carving and distressing where the piece where appropriate to achieve my desired look. Each piece is finished with two coats of either matte or gloss varnish for protection. And there you have it, a glimpse behind the brush at the creation of One Nation, Under Ground.

Penguin has just released their reissues of the George Orwell classics Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, both featuring new cover art by Shepard Fairey.  Apparently, they are not yet available in the US, but Amazon UK has them.