Dang, been a while since I posted... been busy, painting everyday, making (I hope) some good art for my upcoming show. I'm eating lunch right now, taking a break, I'll type a bit in here...

Today Aaron Mason and I went to Artworks in Pasadena to pick up some giclees, and we decided since we'd be close by, we'd stop by Alex Gross's place to see his new work. He has a show opening November 4th at Copro Nason in L.A. so he had paintings all over the place. The new stuff is beautiful, I forgot my camera so you'll have to take my word for it (and check them out in person if you live in L.A.). Alex also has a book coming out soon. Here's a picture from a couple years ago of Alex and his cat Carlos. Just pretend it was taken today, they both still look the same.


I've been spending alot of time in the studio painting, so it's been pretty boring around here lately. Here are some things that have been going on....


A Darth Vader mask arrived in the mail one morning...


A signed AFI poster arrived in the mail. Davey Havok is a big fan of my artwork....


The new Terrarium Keeper Egg came out, available at www.potatostamp.com...


At home in our backyard we found a possum playing "possum". He just sat there, hissing quietly and drooling. Many people think these marsupials are ugly, I think they're way cute. Living in a house is so different, we're really surrounded by nature which is rad. In our apartment we were surrounded by UCR students, so its a pretty big change.


Shannon loves being able to go outside.

Some works in progress for my show...














And I don't have any screenshots but my brother got in on the "friends and family" Alpha testing for the next World of Warcraft expansion. So of course he gave me the password and key and I've been playing it too! I can't say much because I don't want to get in trouble with Blizzard (and I don't want you all to know the extent of my geekiness), but damn, there is some cool shit going down in Outlands. After my show in November I might have to dork out, tune out, and veg out and play some video games....

So, tomorrow I'm meeting up with the talented Jonathan Weiner AKA Viner in Los Angeles to show him around town. I think this is his first west coast visit, so I hope I show him a good time. We're gonna hit up some galleries and I'll be there taking photos. Check back Wednesday night, I'll try to blog it up.
He has a show at Bergamot this Saturday with A.J. Fosik, Ray Caesar, and Dan Kennedy. It was curated by Jonathan Levine who will also be there Sat. night.

Jeff signing out....

To answer a few questions from the comments- am I closer to Pasadena? We moved a whopping 1 mile further east so no, we're further now (thanks Levon!). Where in Riverside? We live nearby UCR, right at the base of Sugarloaf mountain. And I already felt like a true grown up when our daughter was born. Despite the fact that I was already 30, I felt like I went from kid to adult in one day. I guess responsibility can do that to you.

Speaking of responcibilities, I'll be taking a break from posting in here. I'm taking a much needed break from the internet. There's too many web sites I check daily, too many forums I read on and too many distractions. I'm going to be hibernating in the studio for the next 2 months. I have been so busy with things (moving, birthdays, various art projects, taxes, internet difficulties, travelling, blah blah) that sadly I haven't had much time to just sit and make art.

So I'll be doing just that for awhile. I cleared out most of my ongoing projects, I'm going to let some things slide, and just disappear into my magical lab for a while. Time for experimentation, some soul searching and risk taking. It's time to let the phone ring, let the emails pile up, leave the computer off for weeks and get my hands dirty. Time to consume intense amounts of caffeine, listen to loud music and go to sleep each night just itching to wake up and feel the creative surge all over again. It's time to make some art.

I need to get away for a bit and do my thing. As my career grows sometimes I feel like I do more paperwork than artwork. That's just sad to me. I will still post in here from time to time with news but don't have the time to give this blog the love and pictures it deserves until December when things slow down. Thanks, I know everyone understands..

Free Dog the Bounty Hunter!
-Jeff

We're finishing our weekend of moving, so here's a short blog entry. We've been living in an apartment for four years now and have finally decided to rent a house. It's almost like there's too much space now, I think it's about 3x the square footage of the apartment. We don't know what to do with all the extra room. Now we have a garage, a lawn, an avocado tree, a backyard for the baby, but the best is no more going up and down stairs! And it's quiet, super quiet at night, no one coming and going at all hours, just crickets and sometimes coyotes. They woke me up at 4am and I had a smile on my face because I like their high pitched yelps and barks. I looked out the window, looking east and the moon was out, stars were bright and just at that moment a shooting star flew by. What are the chances? Okay, I need to get back to work. Boxes to unpack, furniture to put back together and still have to clean the old apartment and try to get some of the deposit back...
-Jeff

Went to the supermarket today to use one of those Coinstar machines. You know, the ones where you put all your loose change in. We're moving out in a few days and I thought it's about time to get rid of the two jars of change we have sitting here. One of the jars has been filled up for about 8 years, and I'm pretty sure some of that change is from when I was a kid.

So at the Coinstar machine, when it tries to process a coin and it's not U.S., it spits it out. I thought this was the coolest part, seeing all the weird coins and objects that get rejected.

I found a Chucky Cheese coin, no idea where it came from. Says it's from 1990 but I haven't been there since the 80's. There was a Concourse Bowling Alley coin- I remember oing there with my brothers about 5 years ago. I also found this thick coin that said $100, and I got all excited for a sec but I think it's actually 100 pesos. Cool looking coin though..

Found this San Diego penny. It's from one of those machines that smashes a penny (that you provide) for a couple bucks. I think it's from when me and my brother Jesse stayed on Coronado Island with my Aunt Debbie and cousin Amber. 89 or 90 I think.


Speaking of smashed pennies, check these out. I'm sure many of you have made these, they're flattened by trains. You just lay out a bunch of pennies on the tracks and wait for a train to come by then desperately try to find the coins which will be scattered all over. Dimes work real well too, they get thin as knife blades. Nickels and quarters don't work as well but they're thick enough that you can hear then getting run over. That penny with the half circle notch was from overlapping 5 or so pennies. We were hoping they'd fuse together or some shite but it didn't happen.
Then I found a weird coin that looked strangely familiar. I remembered what it was as I flipped it in my hand. When I was 10 I had this notion that I could flatten out nickels and make them into quarters. Turn 5 cents in 25. I spent a day smashing and shaping nickels, trying to get them the same circumference as quarters. I was going to use them in vending machines. I don't think it worked but this is one of the nickels that somehow over the years has stuck around. And it's actually pretty close in shape to a quarter.




Last I found these rejected "jems". A washer, a gear, a bead. And my old Target pin. It used to be white and red but it looks kinda cool as it has aged. It reminded me of how much I take for granted these days and how hard I've worked to get where I'm at. Pushing shopping carts in 106 degree heat really blew, it was hard labor- we didn't have a Cartmaster 5000, we had to actually use our muscles. And very under appreciated (rarely a thank you for my hard work), but I still took pride in my work. I could have easily blown it off and said the hell with it but for some reason I tried hard to do my best. I guess I felt lucky to even have a job. I always try to think back to working out in the elements, daydreaming about the future while pushing unending lines of carts to waiting shoppers, carving a J+J in the tree by the Garden center, seeing my breath float up in the cold rainy nights. Life was simpler eight years ago. Not that I would ever want to go back in time but it's always good to look back and see what happened.

Okay, some art stuff- many people have been asking about the giclee I have coming out, called "Savior of Nature". I will have more info soon, I'm meeting with the printers tomorrow, and depending on how the first round of proofs look, I may do a preorder. I am working on pricing, it will be between $400-$500 and the edition is 50 prints + 3 AP's. I will know more tomorrow. We're moving soon so I might be out of touch the next few days, but I'll get the info out as soon as I can. Here is the giclee....

Oh yeah, ended up we had over $100 of change sitting there. I had no idea, I estimated about $20 so I was pretty happy.
-Jeff

I have a new assistant/intern/apprentice- Aaron Mason. He's a tattoo artist working out of Soul Expressions in Temecula. He'll be helping out with all sorts of things in the studio, and hopefully I'll be able to pass on some art knowledge.



Aaron and I cleaned out the studio today, organized things a bit. I don't think it's been this cleaned up since I moved in last October. We were making some space for some canvases and panels that were being delivered today.

This is a 5' square canvas and to the left a huge 10' x 3' canvas. I decided for my upcoming show that I wanted to get all the panels professionally made. I called upon the craftsmen over at Lucius Hudson to build all the panels and canvasas. Once you are selling art for decent prices I think it's time to step up and give the collectors the best quality possible. No more warped plywood and Aaron bros. canvases for me.

These are some of the wood panels. Check out how they're constructed. Super sturdy and razor straight.

This is a work in progress on Arches paper. Having fun working on paper...

I still take on the occassional illustration job, though they're getting rarer and rarer. This is a book cover that I'm working on, very different from my gallery work- more fantasy /sci-fi, it's a lot of fun for the dork deep inside me. That's my actual sized sketch and tiny color comp. This job is late and I need to finish it soon.



Ah shit a paper cut. Except it's from a cardboard box which slices deeper. Right under my pinky nail. Stings. We are moving soon, and I'm starting to hate cardboard boxes.

Noooooo!
Steve Irwin "The Crocodile Hunter" has died! I was always amazed at how that guy had never been maimed by the crocs or bitten by a rattler, looks like he was done in by a stingray. News reports say he was pierced through the chest by the stinger. I imagine there's potent poison in Australian stingrays. Guess he died doing what he loved...

Just workin'...
For those who don't know my next solo show is at BLK/MRKT gallery in Culver City. It opens November 18, 2006. It's called "Cold Ice Age" That's the main thing I've been working on these days, and I'll start posting some pictures and in-progress shots.

Been doing some new stuff on paper- acrylic washes on Arches paper. It's real heavy duty paper I bought way back when I was a student, I think it's for print making (or maybe watercolor). Anyways, it's a nice change- paper is less forgiving so more of a challenge. I'm also working on some canvases for the first time in years. I still love painting on wood but you gotta change it up sometimes. Don't want things getting stagnant. I'll try to get some pics up here....


Pieces in progress- I like to hang them on the wall to get a good look from across the room. The Arches paper has a strange scent when it gets wet. I don't like it. I also have to re-flatten the paper when they're done so they can be properly framed.



When I work on a solo show I usually start by writing things out- jotting down notes, ideas, concepts, goals, and pin it all up so I can reference things while working on the sketches. The sketches are loose, I leave a lot of it to be determined on the piece as I react to colors and values. I like to work on all the sketches together so the whole concept of the show flows well into each piece. I also usually make a floorplan so I know how much work I should be aiming for.



Here's the fat cap Dunny I'm supposed to have finished. Geez, I've been swamped and I totally screwed that up, thought the event was October for some reason. Kid Robot's gonna hate me. I'll still finish it and give it to them for their next event.



Finally let the mylar ballon from Shannon's party free. Jennifer says whales sometimes eat these things and it kills them. True?? She wanted me to pop it instead but I guess the little kid in me just had to watch it rise into the sky.



Shannon fell asleep while eating! Guess she had a long day!

Also:
Here's some more blogs I've been checking out:


Souther and Saelee

Eric Nakamura and Martin Wong of Giant Robot magazine

Chris Ryniak

David Chung

Josh Cochran and crew

The Hundreds

James Jean

And, uh, I'll leave you with THIS, wow. Lots of pictures and some scaaary stuff. Whoa, female to male sexual reassignment...

I love prints!
by Jeff Soto.

We had dinner at Shaunna and Mike’s place last night and I’m always amazed by their growing art collection. They just picked up a small Bwana Spoons piece that’s really cool. I should have taken a picture. They have some really nice prints framed (Sorren, Viner, etc) and I always think about getting some of our prints framed some day.

Prints are cheaper than buying an original so it always opens up the door to collecting artists you otherwise can’t afford. I buy and trade prints pretty often, my collection is growing but nothing is on display yet, mainly because in our apartment there’s not too much wallspace. Here are some from our collection...


My first set of prints I bought. I don’t know anything about the artist but I believe they are wood cuts. I bought them from the Comicon in 1998 (I think), and wanted to meet the artist but everytime I came by he was off somewhere..



My next print was from Plankton Art Co., also known as the husband and wife duo Allen and Susan Crawford. I just thought it was a great print and bought it from “Tin Man Alley” the first time I made some money from my paintings. Later on in Philly I got to meet the Crawfords and they were really cool people, down with nature and all that. After the Plankton print I started trading and buying and collecting and now I have drawers of them.



Here is my studio wall where I display some of my favorites. They should really be in flat files or in frames behind UV protected glass. I put up some of my own prints so I can look back and keep the new prints related in stye or color. L to R- Jeremy Fish screenprint, Sammy Harham screenprint, Kozyndan, Dre Day!, Ryan Jacob Smith screenprint, Mr. Cartoon screenprint, Biskup Juxtapoz print, Michael Sieban screenprint, my Pressure Printing piece, Ben Woodward unicorn, Shaunna Peterson giclee, Meathaus screenprint, some of my screenprints, a Caroline Hwang screenprint, and a Shepard Fairey screenprint.

I have tons of prints, I couldn’t show them all it’d be a long blog. Here’s some drawers.


Rachel Sumpter on top, Dave Cooper, Ryan Jacob Smith, Scott Saw, Jeremy Fish..



This one isn’t a print but an original from the Robots have Feelings Too show I curated. It’s in the flat file waiting for a frame. Painted by James Fish.



An Alex Gross etching. This is one of my favorite prints, will be framed for sure some day. His work was just in Juxtapoz an issue or two ago. I was kinda disappointed he didn’t get the cover, (no offense to Blane Fontana) this was the second time Alex has had a major article in Jux and not got the cover. I love the mag but c'mon guys. Ah well, maybe next time.



Kozyndan prints are always fun to look at and really examine for a while. Anyone know if they have a blog? I could see that being really interesting...



One of my biggest inspirations from my youth was the British artist/illustrator Patrick Woodroffe. Not my favorite piece from him, but I found this print on eBay pretty cheap and I was happy to have a signed piece. I wrote him a long letter a while back and though he replied back in person, he seemed super busy and didn’t answer any of my questions. I don’t wanna say he was rude, but he was very quick and to the point, and I wonder if he even read what I had to say. Oh well, usually people you hold up on a pedestal for so long turn out to be, well, normal human beings that are busy just like you and me. It’s all good, I understood where he was coming from. Still one of my favorite artists of all time.



Ben Woodward and Jim Houser collaboration screenprint. Ben gave this to me when I visited Space 1026.


These were some postcards Ben screened by hand for a show at New Image Art back in 2001. Gold.


Some prints from Pressure Printing, Scott Musgrove and Jim Woodring.



Ryan Jacob Smith prints. I loove this dude’s stuff. We went to school together and I wish he lived closer. I think, even though we paint very different and are working towards different artistic goals there is something that we share, maybe we just pull influences from similar sources (we both have old textbooks and Time Life books).



These are prints from Michael Wong a NY photographer who came out to shoot me. We did some trading.



Sammy Harkham, artist and editor of Kramers Ergot made this beautiful print. It kinda freaks me out, it’s called “Wedding night”. There’s blood, sweat, urine, various bodily fluids apparent. I didn’t want to ask him what it was all about.



Here’s some stuff from the 2006 Comicon. Mark Todd with Skeletor, Unlovable by Esther Pearl Watson (those two have made frequent appearances in this blog..) and a Mars One litho.



Some Souther Salazar prints. Really cool. He gave these to me when I visited last week. I need to repay the favor and hook him up with some of mine.

Yep, those are some of my prints. There are a lot more but I'm probably boring the readers as it is.
-Jeff

PS.

Thanks for all the support with the apparel situation. At this point I really think the only way to combat companies ripping off my designs is to start my own line. I'm hoping to start working on it after my BLK/MRKT show in November. I want to make quality products- shirts and probably just hats and sweatshirts at first. Keep it small you know, limited editions, see how things go. Maybe sell off Potato Stamp at first and then to smaller boutiques. I just want to keep some integrity to anything bearing my name so I want to do this right. Thanks!

Nothing exciting going on, just working on my November show. Felt like posting some very random images from my iPhoto files...


Construx rule. Anyone remember these? I still like to build with them. And you can find big lots of them on eBay.



Bathroom at CBGB's NYC. Nice privacy with the toilet there, and up high kinda like a throne.



My dad with a sick crow. They found it gasping in the gutter, we wondered if it had Bird Flu.



When my Grandpa Jim passed away four years ago we found these hidden guns when we had to go through his stuff. I miss him.



See the lizard hanging out? Camoflage in action at Joshua Tree. Nature is pretty cool.



Brother Jesse with gigantic bloody gash, Morro Rock in the Sequoias.



The best Star Wars costume ever. Low tech Fett. Comicon (2003 I think).



Mummified Bobcat at Grand Canyon Caverns in Arizona. Poor kitty fell into the deep cave and broke it's femur (compound fracture). The cold conditions of the cave mummified it.



Downtown Los Angeles seen from a flight to Portland. I like how you can see the ocean. L.A. is huge.



Bellpeppers and onions are always good. And pertyful.


-Jeff