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Economic Indicators
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 11:27 am on June 11th

We just received our tax rebate check yesterday,and I opened the envelope with mixed emotions. Because we are a family of five, it represents a nice chunk of change, and there's never a shortage of ways to spend, but on the other hand, it also represents failed ecomonic policies, and a bandaid for the fallout of corporate greed. These are indeed tough times and from what I'm reading
things are looking to get alot worse before they get better. As a way of venting, I've been devoting some sketchbook time to the issues of the economy and gas prices. Here are some drawings. Oh, and by the way, I am thinking of banking the check just out of spite.

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Fuel Efficiency Gizmos
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 12:11 pm on June 4th

Here's and illo I did for Sue Foster in today's Wall Street Journal. With gas prices reaching skyward, there are all kinds of new gizmos on the market to improve fuel efficiency with names like Fuel Saver 7000-MPG and Cyclone Fuel Saver. I perused a number of sites for these products and damned if I can make out whether or not they actually work. Sue wanted an image of a car equipped with all the gizmos driving by a gas station. It gave me the opportunity to incorporate some turn-of-the-century engineering engravings. And since I had a bunch of spray mounted copies left over, I spent some time in the sketchbook making more machines of dubious nature.

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New Paintings!
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 1:13 pm on May 1st

This painting was inspired by a Nova show on Intelligent Design vs Evolution. I for one am proud of my simian heritage.

I got off to a slow start this year as far as painting goes. I seems like I spent more time shoveling snow that at the easel for several months. Also, one of my galleries requested that I experiment with dressing up my paintings a bit, so I ended up building a wooden box that goes flush with the plywood edge. In the beginning, this took a hell of alot of time, but as I got more proficient, it got so that I could do this relatively easily and accurately. This treatment gives the paintings another 1 1/2 inches in depth and when painted, they look pretty slick. Hopefully the added dimension will entice collectors to crack their checkbooks. I've posted the latest here.

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Glass House
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 11:40 am on April 23rd

I've been developing a new, colorful, abstract illustration style that allows me to step outside the "Little Guys with the Big Eyes and Big Noses" thing. Luckily ,Soojin Buzelli has been giving me assignments to pursue this direction. This illo accompanied a letter entitled "Glass House" and was on the subject of termination of death benefits. Not a particularly appetizing subject. Soojin has told me in the past to not worry about being so literal, so I started sketching the idea of glass houses in general. Here's what transpired.

I started out with my usual style before going "off road". Soojin approved the lower left one.

When I was in NY last month I spent a day in the MOMA, and was taken by a room of wire sculptures that were lit with spotlights. I can't recall the artist's name. Upon my return I drew a number of sketchbook pages recalling the look of those sculptures. Why not try it out on an illo assignment?

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Thank God That's Over!
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 9:59 am on April 16th

As a person well acquainted with the concept of deadlines, I submitted all the makings for our tax returns to my accountant weeks ago. When I hadn't heard back from him, I finally called him last Friday to make sure everything was cool. He hadn't even started them. We've got plenty of time says he, they're not due until next Tuesday. It all came down to the wire yesterday. I had to take time out of work to get signatures for two of my boys who are scattered all over the state as well as shuffling funds for payments. And then there are those little yellow please sign and date stickers, which by the way have very poor adhesive qualities. As a way of decompressing after that ordeal, here are some ruminations. I WILL be looking for a new accountant.

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Sketchbooks
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 10:35 am on March 6th

Last year Danny Gregory contacted me about a book he was writing titled "An Illustrated Life: drawing inspiration from the private sketchbooks of artists, illustrators and designers". This is the book I've been waiting for. As a way of promoting the book, which is due out in October, he has been interviewing different sketchbook artists as podcasts. Well I'm the third of what promises to a very cool series. Click Here (Then click on the little pod target in the upper left hand corner. It takes some time to load)

As a way posting some pertinent graphic content, here are a bunch of frontispieces from various sketchbooks.

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Monkeys and Guns Redux
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 11:40 am on February 7th

Between work, painting and shoveling snow, I've been continuing to work on this series of cartoons about Monkeys and Guns with the hopes that maybe someday I'll have enough good ones to do a book. Your kind comments about the last bunch I posted got my wheels turning, so to speak and prompted me to continue this. Perhaps the future political landscape will be receptive to this kind of shennanigans.

I've already started laying out the comp in Blurb, which if you haven't checked it out is a great way to produce a book. I put together a book of my paintings and sketchbook pages last summer and found it easy to use. Although the color was a hair off, the finished product was quite impressive.

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Happy New Year!
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 4:33 pm on January 2nd

I'd like to wish my fellow Drawgers the best for a healthy, creative and financially huge New Year.

My new calendar is for most part out the door. If you didn't get one and would like one, please send me an email. This is the 25th year that I've done a calendar, which aside from making me feel old, makes me feel proud that I've been able to survive in this crazy industry. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that there's never a shortage of material. My sister informs me that I'm a bit heavy on the personal electronics, however. Here are some of my faves.

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New Paintings
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 5:04 pm on December 13th

Boo!

Here are some new paintings that I've managed to get to between work, family (3 teenaged boys running amok) and exercise. I recently had a bump in my spirits when I received a certificate from The Society of Illustrators that one of my paintings, Flaming Skull Visage won a Silver Medal for the Uncommisioned Category. I know what you're thinking. Hey, didn't A. Richard Allen win the silver in that category? Apparently there are more than one silver handed out for that category. I've corresponded with Richard via email and we've decided not to rumble for ultimate bragging rights. We might raise a glass, however.

New paintings are here.

Flaming Skull Visage

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Guns and Monkeys
Posted by Hal Mayforth at 12:10 pm on November 8th

I was speaking with RAG the other day and he was busy developing a line of Monkey images for this year's Surtex show. When I sat down to draw in my sketchbook this morning, I had monkeys on my mind. Where the guns came from I don't know. Well, yes I do know. A reproduction of a 1906 Sears and Roebuck catalog. While I was drawing these, I got to thinking that Monkeys are pretty good metaphors for the child within us and our primal lust of weaponry. Here they are in the order I did them.