Full page for Canadian Business Magazine

This one is for Canadian Business magazine, a map to the best and worst"tax havens" around the world. So listen up rich people! You can read the corresponding text here.

For these kind of tasks, I love to have as much layout info as possible, so I can draw around the text and make it fit well. (Click to view the elements larger).

Many thanks to art director Glenn Taylor!

Guantanamo Bay for The New York Times

Got a new piece in the New York Times today, on the letters page. It's about renewed calls to close Guantanamo Bay.

The finished piece is partially inverted and I worked with a separation to make the borders uneven. So some assembly was required in photoshop, but in the end it's just a simple drawing.

Read the letters that go with the article here. Many thanks to AD Alexandra Zsigmond!

MoCCA Fest 2013 Report

I had a great time at MoCCA 2013 and felt a greater energy this year. The exhibitors were in a better mood, and so were the attendees. My sales were very strong, especially on the first day which was my biggest in-take on a single day ever.

I've been now tabling for about a year flying solo post-Rabid-Rabbit, and it's nice to establish somewhat of a track-record, with people I saw at New York Comic Con or Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Fest, coming back for more.

Income-wise, illustration prints and my graphic novel Peanut were the heavy hitters, (since they are more expensive). But I also sold more BEHOLDER books than any MoCCA before.

Visitors at my table included students from classes I taught or visited, people who went through the SVA MFA Illustration program, and of course many colleagues from the comics and illustration world.

The Society of Illustrators did a fantastic job, it was great to see the enthusiasm with which Anelle Miller and her team were running the show, and had added already a few touches of their own. I liked the wall dividers who partitioned the show into more digestible portions and created focus while walking through the aisles. The cafe, the get-together for exhibitors, the gallery and the awards for the best self-published comics were also really nice ideas.

Thanks again to the Society of Illustrators for doing an amazing show, to the other exhibitors and of course to the attendees, who hopefully had as much fun as I. See you next year!

Prints for MoCCA Festival– this weekend!

Along with my graphic novel PEANUT and many mini-comics from my BEHOLDER universe, I'll have these nice prints at my table, for your convenience. Hope to see you there– MoCCA Fest is tomorrow and Sunday!

American Illustration Chosen

This piece was Chosen in the latest competition of American Illustration– it will not appear in the book but on their website. The competition is a tough one, so this is still a great honor. Thanks to the jury!

Ruins Girl has also won in the Annual Communication Arts competition, it's very nice that my personal work has met with such enthusiasm.

Getting ready for MoCCA Festival 2013

It's that time of the year again, MoCCA Fest NY is next weekend, and I am participating again, with a lot of new stuff! First of all, I'll have copies of my graphic novel Peanut with me, so it's the perfect occasion to get your signed copy directly from the artist.

Debuting at the fest will be my latest mini-comic Journey Into Misery 5, a 44-page extravaganza that brings some of my weird storylines to a conclusion. Very happy with how it turned out, and hope you'll like it, too!

And as an extra-special bonus, I'll have prints of my Ruins Girl with me, for the first time.

Besides that, there will be all the other Beholder Books so you can complete your collection, and some of the previous illustration prints.

This year will be the first time that the Society of Illustrators runs the festival, so it will be very interesting to see how / if it'll change the look and feel of the event. Personally, I'm excited that two of my favorite institutions have now merged together.

Hope to see you there!

Table C94
April 6th & 7th, 2013

11:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.
The 69th Regiment Armory
68 Lexington Avenue, NY, NY

Uncle Sam for The New York Times Sunday Biz

I had the pleasure doing another piece for the New York Times Sunday Business section, this time it was about the budget deficit and questions about national debt. I've never done an Uncle Sam so I was kind of excited to pay homage to Montgomery Flagg's iconic character. For that, I used multiple ink wash overlays to create a painterly effect. 

It took a while to tweak the visual till it was just right. Uncle Sam is carrying the burden of national debt, but he's still managing.

Below are the final pencils for the piece. Last minute, I changed his stance to give him more strength and energy.

Many thanks to AD Veronic Ferre, our first assignment together was great fun!

New York Times Sunday Biz Cover

I have a piece in today's New York Times, on the cover of the Sunday Business section. It's about nutritional supplements and the lack of oversight over them; and the responsibility that retailers such as GNC have towards their customers. You can read the whole article here.

Below you can see my sketches and how the piece evolved. Sometimes it takes a bunch of drawings to get to the core of it. The idea to break the border came to me just before I started inking.

Many thanks to Art Director Minh Uong!