Mural Design Part III : Parting Postcards

This will be my last story about Old Navy but it will be a non-fictional story. I say that because it will only be my version of what happened from April to May of 2014. During the beginning part of April my dad was released from the hospital but had to get chemo treatment and dialysis 3xs a week for 6 weeks . I was less than 2 months out from moving to Texas and attempting to get things prepped for that. I had an interview in Dallas that didn't go well and i was told there wasn't an operations manager position there for. Work had become extremely difficult to manage and function. I felt attacked from all angles at week. At one point in time i simply wanted to leave this unfinished and quit both the mural and work. However after talking to my girlfriend and my mom i made the decision to finish my obligations. After 12 years of service with Old Navy I'm not as bitter now as i was original. Everything that happened showed me this wasn't the place for me. 

The last huge pic of my very simple sketches as well as to prove that this all was done with a cheap Wal-mart brought paints and 2 paint brushes. I'm not a great man but hopefully i do great deeds. 

Mural Design Part II

This story that i tell you is an untold story that i haven't publicly told in full until now. My co-workers and not even my manager knew the truth of it all. From the end of Feb through the entire month of March my father was in the Portsmouth Naval Hospital. At first it was a simple minor infection from a surgery that landed him in the ICU.  At the time i juggled working full-time, went to see my dad after work on my days off, and  worked on the mural all at the same time. For 2 week the doctors didn't know what was going wrong with my dad minus the simple fact that whatever disease he had was attacking his major organs. There were times that i wanted to break down and give up but i didn't. I ultimately escaped in my artwork. I'm extremely thankful for is that i had an outlet that allowed me to lose myself. I believe it helped the piece because i didn't focus on the store being down 2 key  managers, customers, co-workers, and my dad was having medical concerns.

mural design part I

This mural started off oddly enough as one small one up on a new Old Navy location that was close to our building. The company decided to build another store less than 5 miles away from our store. The two stores would be closest locations with the same design within the entire Virginia Beach market (which isn't common in smaller market). Some of our associates and leaders went over to help open up that store and which was similar to our own with one exception. The exception being the break room for the associates. Every associate that came back to our location bragged about how nicer their break room was compared to ours especially because their store had a mural. Our leadership team  took offense to hearing that over and over again. Until ultimately my store manager suggested we make our own mural.
The original planning started off in late Spring and the associated had between 2 themes to chose from "superheroes" or "beach theme." Ultimately the beach theme won out after multiple attempts to get a complete consensus. I wanted to do a collaborations of sorts with another few photographer in our store but that fell through. One September morning i went to the ocean front and took some reference photos. During the fall and winter the natural needs of the business left little time for me to start of this construction. Shortly during the turn of quarter 1 of the year, i wanted this to be my last parting gift to the store. Almost a year out i had decided that i would be moving to Texas. On the tail end of one of my lunch shifts i pulled about a piece of chalk and began sketching out what would be a mural design.

Run Forrest Run: Graffiti

I remember watching Forrest Gump and thinking this was an iconic movie. It still is a powerful movie because it shows that anything is possible. There are many scenes that i can recall but the one that i thought would be fun to put a twist on was the "run, forrest run!!" scene. As i mentioned early i am a fan of graffiti so i thought i would play around with the nuts, bolts, leather, and metal holding his leg brace together to create a Pop Art piece.

Sasha Grey (pic & sketch)

Sasha Grey is formerly know as an adult actress and widely known for her natural  beauty. I' believe that everyone has a comeback stories even an adult actress. She  recently received national news for wanting to read to kids in school but the community complained because of her former lifestyle. I do believe people should be given a opportunity to change and repay their debts because we all aren't perfect. This story reminded me of the outcry in the Atlanta area when hip hop artist T.I wanted to speak with the kids and the community spoke out against that. T.I, who had just had a run-in with a police pointed out that he couldn't speak  to the kids but they would allow someone who's admitted to doing drugs speak to children any time he wanted to. He was referring to former President George Bush Jr.

another tumblr /instagram friend

Sorry i don't know her real name but Her IG: kittenisodd. She's a cute and funny girl that i found on Tumblr (even if she's a cat lady, I'm sorry but i'm not a cat person). She takes tons of selfies and most of them would make interesting subject matters to draw. But i wanted to do something slightly different this time around i would want draw her simply just the way without all the bells and whistles. This pose spoke to me and i had toned paper so it made sense to draw 2 color pencil study.

Inter :Graffiti Piece (pic & sketch)

I'm not a graffiti artist  nor do i claim to be. I am a fan of the style of writing and creating designs pieces based around it. It may seem hard to believe but i don't smoke and i never smoked. My dad smoked and i always disapproved of him smoking. I also think women who smoke is a highly unattractive quality but that would be going on a rant. I haven't done a graffiti piece in a while and this image seemed powerful enough to create one with. I also snuck in a little hint about my thoughts of artwork as well as my nickname if you look closely.

General Zodd is Disappointed

It's no great mystery due to my last couple of drawing that i fully heartedly disapprove of Superman Man of Steel that came out last spring. It was disappointed to me and the large part of the disappointed had to do with General Zodd's upper management approach to taking over the world. He allowed his henchman/woman to do all the true fighting and dirty work in the movie. For those who aren't aware this movie is like of a remake/re-envisioned version of sorts and the original Zodd actually had a more hands on approach. In my comical mind General Zodd would not be happy with  new General Zodd playing with cats while everyone else is fighting/ 

Fellow Artist: Kristena & Tony

So these are some of my friends from my Tues night drawing group. This is also 2 totally different impressions  of drawing. 

Lola (pic & sketch)

Instagram has introduced me to plenty of amazing people. Some people that aren't even on the same coast or continent as me. Lola is an aspiring model and photographer from the west coast. Her blue hair stands out and her facial expression made this pose a must draw on my list of many things to create. I wanted to capture her expression as well as work with a very limited color palette. It would be to easy to use 20 color pencils to create this and working on color scale was important.

Tong Po: "You Bleed Like Mylee"

Another brain creation of my good things Kimani and Art. One of the biggest martial art stars of the 80s and 90s was Jean-Claude Van Damme. He made a lot of movies around that time and one of my personal favorites was the movie Kickboxer. I remember my dad taking me to the movies to see it and all the comedic parts going right over my head. Years later i would watch it with my best friends and we could comically pick apart each scene. One of my favorite lines was said by the main villain Muay Thai fighter Tong Po during the final fight of the movie. He licked his rope bandaged fist covered in glass and uttered the words "You Bleed like Mylee!" hinted to the rape of his girlfreind in the movie. That line always stuck with me. More recently the movie popped into my head again but i decided to draw it.

Enrique The Bow-tie Dreamer (pic & sketch)

Enrique is one of my good friends from Old Navy. I admire him for 2 major reasons. One of those reasons is he's a great single dad that as all parents should would do any and everything for his son. I don't have kids nor am i sure that i would be a great dad but still i respect that. The largest reason is that he's following his dream to be a stand-up comic. The hardest thing to do as an adult is to still have a dream. Even now i can say i'm compromising my dream just  helps to support my dream. Truthfully i don't want to sell jeans and t-shirts forever. "Am i good at it?" Yes somedays i am but it's not my desire. My dream is to be an artist and it has nothing to do at all with being featured or in a gallery. I don't even have to sell 1 single piece for the rest of my life because it's about the raw emotional of creating. The idea of saying i have a voice and this is what i have to say.

Another Remake? "Freeze Creep"

I'm very hard of  the concept of remaking a movie. Very rarely can you create a movie that's better than the original. Sometimes it can and does happen but overall the horror genre that does a better job of it. Over the past couple of years movie studios have subjected us to such bad decisions as  Karate Kid and even more recently Carrie and Oldboy. I understand it's hard to have lightning strike twice. Some critics might say they aren't remakes but re-envisioned movies. Other argue that technology has finally caught up to where it should have been when the movie was originally released. I personally loved Robocop because as a kid watching it, it was cool. The concept and idea of a robotic cop that upheld justice was appealing. Also movies when i was a kid weren't as hypersensitive as they are now. I wanted to go watch Robocop, Predator, Terminator, Commando and other rated R movies and my dad generally would take me to them. There wasn't any need to water down the product to have larger box offices or creating family friendly products because the movies alone sold themselves.
I've seen the trailers for the new and improved Robocop and as much as a fan of the series i was i don't think i can bring myself to pay movie theaters prices to watch this adaptation of it. So in my most pop-art appeal i explain my thoughts of the idea.

Richard Sherman: The Predator of Cornerbacks

The most talked about person of today's Superbowl is Richard Sherman. His post game interview was full of emotion and charged with energy to the point he made the biggest headlines. Richard's comments to toward SF's wideout Crabtree sounded more like playground trash talking or what some compared to be a pro wrestling promo. After this moment i expected one of my fellow Instagram artists to have a field day with this topic and situation but instead there was nothing. I waited and i waited for something amazing to happen but it never came. Therefor i took a stab at it myself and believe me this isn't even anywhere close to what i wanted to do. The original concept changed and morphed into something new which at times can be both a bad and good thing.

"Yeah Boyyyy!"

This is the birth child of my 2 best friends in the world Kimani and Art, they still having a huge influence over me. The back story is good, trust me. As a teenager we would have movie marathons on weekend nights.  One of such marathons was we watched Phantasm. Rightfully so Phantasm is a classic horror movie because the funeral home is viewed as a real place of horror. We can only assume what things happen to us after death?! As we watched the movie we joked about the Tall Man and his stiff (Learch from the Addams Family) delivery of movement and lines. The most iconic line being "Boy!!" which he bellowed out as he chased little Mike around the town.
Flava Flav is more recently known for his Celebrity House, Flavor of Love, and Strange Love reality TV shows. However i remember him from being part of the social active hip hop group Public Enemy. It took me sometime to fully understand how important they were as a group in the 1990s. Still i can remember almost on cue with every track Flava Flav would say "yeahhh, boyyy!"

The Wedding Gifts

My sister got married last October and part of her wedding request she wanted a gift. I had done a caricature for my younger sister the year before as a wedding gift. Therefor to keep up with tradition my other sister wanted a drawing of her and my brother-in-law as well. I didn't want to do another caricature but a pencil drawing. and this what the result of it was. 

mr grinch (the real reason why i hate christmas)

i know i haven't post anything art related in a while regardless if i draw almost everyday or not. However this post will be one of the honest post about my past and my feelings towards the holidays. It's no great mystery that i dislike and i even go as far as to mention that i hate the holidays. Each year it comes around and this wound that once was a scab picked at and opened again. An extremely large part of lack of joy has to do with a broken heart. A broken heart that almost a decade later still hasn't been able to be fixed.

I was dating a girl that some would say out of my league. Her parents and previous boyfriends had been able to shower her with gifts and affection. At the time i been working part-time at Old Navy a little over a year, i was also a full-time college student. Between driving from Portsmouth to Chesapeake to Norfolk in any given day or combination i was broke most of the time. The holidays came around and even with my lack of money i began to think of ways to make Christmas special for her. On her short wish-list she wanted the retro Gameboy Advance. Honestly i couldn't afford it even if i tried. Christmas time finally came and i got her gifts (multiple things) i can't even remember what they are now. At my parents house she presented me with a candle and Ikea couch pillow. I know holidays is all about the thought. The thought that someone took the time to think about you during the holidays. Her gifting idea seemed more like something you would give to someone who showed up at your house on Christmas un-expecting rather than someone you had been dating. So there i was sitting on my couch looking at a pillow and candle feeling less than what i feel any person in a romantic relationship should ever feel like.

The second story is the one i have a hard time forgetting. It might be true that romantic relationships can be one sided sometime but no one ever hurts you the way the ones closest to you can. My relationship with this girl had been one of the longest ones at the time. We once tried the long distance dating even thought she living in Europe. At the moment i mentioned above we were just friends who kept in close contact. In September i finally got my tax refund money and roughly around that time we discussed that i would come see her again over the Christmas break. This time with the hopes of working things out. We still spoke regularly over the next couple of months but  in November and she informs me that she had a new boyfriend. She dismissed the whole concept of me coming to see her altogether because she loved this guy and wanted to give it a fully focused attempt. When these words poured out  i wasn't even upset about the non-refundable tickets. I was more upset with the fact that everything i had emotionally invested in was being torn down and broken right in front of me. It was one of the few times in my life that i begged for understanding and clarity. I couldn't understand why she would do this to me especially at what i thought was my lowest moments. I didn't go to see her but instead barricaded myself in my room and slept those would be trip away.

Honestly i have forgiven both women in these situations. I don't hold any ill will to anyone of them but i haven't forgotten yet. These stories are deeply rooted in my feelings towards Christmas. Each time of the year i get a little sadder than normal makes things extremely difficult this time of year. It seems that almost ever shift so far this year i've had someone yelling at my about things i didn't do, or complaining about their shift/schedule. For me at least this isn't the holidays nor is it my definition of happiest time of the year.

Sketch Challenge 4 : Part III