The Lurid low-brow Tiki-Art of Brad (tiki-shark) Parker

Aloha~

Here's the latest on the mug. Putting in the "Warm" highlights. Next is to fill in the "Cool" shadows.

Here's the whole thing so far.
Mahalo~

that mug is GREAT!
i want one!
and now you say you're gonna try the next woodblock in COLOR?
you're amazing man!
Now i count 3 pieces happening at once!
that's good..more art from Brad!
avoid the VOG bruddah!

Aloha Tiki Shark Art! WOW! More aweasome Paintings! Thanks for sharin, Aloha, Mooney

Happy aloha Friday!

LLTThanks Ken, I may talk to Holden again about some mugs. I gotta find the time to get some mug designs to him. Earl is in the middle of moving his workshop, but the color is gonna happen! VOG! Yeah, many TONS of Sulfur Dioxide have vented from Pele's hot house! Around 20,000 TONS of Sulfur Dioxide! It was raining yesterday, and the news advised everyone to stay inside out of the rain for the first hour or so - because it was ACID RAIN. So, good excuse to stay inside and paint!
MooneyTiki Thanks so much! I dig sharing' cause I LOVE seeing others work in progress stuff too.

Here's what got done yesterday. More mug. and the eerie green light coming from the concoction reflecting on Bela's face.

The blue fill light on the mug had to be put on Bela's hand too, so it'd make sense. Well, "low-brow-cartoon-art sense" any ways.

Here's the whole thing.

Mahalo, and have a great weekend!

Man, that's really starting to pop now Brad. Those waxy looking fingers are creeping me out! Seems like for all the trouble this one's given you it's going to be one of, if not the best? We're all waiting to see that shirt...whatcha gonna do?
MUG! MUG! MUG! Make sure the creature and cthulhu mugs are in your first series! :lol:

Aloha!
Paipo~Thanks man! Yeah, the green lighting helped make his face emerge from the night sky some more. It's getting tight, is it the best I've done? Well, I guess you always want to think the one your currently working on is the best you've ever done. Honestly, at times I felt it was the best, and at others I ... er... wasn't so sure. But, now it's really starting to make me happy. Bela's getting that weird semi-life that some paintings have. You know, like when you walk in the room and you see these big yellowy eyes, and your brain keeps thinking that there's someone, someone alive, staring at you.

The strongest time I ever had this feeling was years ago, in a artist's studio, in Venice California. He specialized in life sized portraits - done in an "old Master's" style - many many glazes of oil paint. In his studio was this huge canvas, nearly all black except for a standing, naked, girl. Some how the figure in the painting seemed more alive than the actual people in his studio. It was uncanny.

Now, Bela's no where near that level of mastery in oils, however, you walk in my studio and right away you feel his eyes on you.
(Hmmm, that sounds darned creepy! Okay, maybe the VOG is getting to me!)

Last night I did some work on #14.

Here's the second pass at the clouds.

I wasn't so sure the clouds were looking like I wanted em. So I did a quick pencil study.

Looking at the study, I did another pass over the clouds.

I keep telling myself I want parts of this painting to remain "rough". I want to see some brush strokes, and texture. (but I find myself having to stop my hand from seeking out to smooth out everything!)

Mahalo!

Aloha~

Orange you glad I'm almost done?

His ink

The whole thing.

Mahalo~

Dude!
!!!
greenish glow
blue tinge
waxy fingers....
nice
and the mug just pops like some holy grail!
Can't wait to see the shirt.....
and the new one is looking great too!
after all this precision
it'll be nice for you to loosen up and play a bit!
VOG!

TS!

Like the addition of the "ink".

How soon before this is available as a print?

On 2008-04-13 11:19, Tiki Shark Art wrote:
Orange you glad I'm almost done?

:lol: :lol: :lol:

Yes, and No. I'm dying to see the whole thing finished, but I also love the slow tortuous progression! This has been so much fun to watch!

This painting just keeps getting better.

Looks amazing man.

Aloha~
LLTThanks! Yeah, the mug is getting there. It's amazing how much enjoyment I get out of painting a tropical drink - almost as much as drinking one.
KahuGlad you dig the tattoo. If anyone's wondering it's taken from an actual tattoo design. Prints! I felt this was a very personal piece, that only I was into. (I mean how many folks are into Bela Lugosi and zombies and tiki bars all at once?) But, now that you mention it, it could become a print. I still have not gotten my last piece created as a print. I was discussing this with my printer. I wanted a less expensive print. His prices would still make them around $40 to $50 bucks. He makes artsy fartzy Giclees. So, I know the colors would be exact, and it'd be on nice paper, but is that too much? What do you all think?
It would be cool to have this one available as a print in time for "Voodoo Zombie Island". Must be some kinda cool hook up to be made there. Any ideas?
JentikiHa, well, I'm glad you're still hanging in there and watching. This has been a really long haul. I could blame my super busy day job, and guests staying in my studio, and taking care of an elderly person, and me being a perfectionist. But, instead I'm gonna blame the VOG!
Flat Black Thanks so much. I figured if I took this long on it already, might as well just focus on making it as good as I can, and damn the amount of time it takes. I do have a art show coming up in Sept, but I'm sure it'll be done by then. Maybe. :)

Here's more drink details that were done last night.

Mahalo!

On 2008-04-15 12:59, Tiki Shark Art wrote:
I was discussing this with my printer. I wanted a less expensive print. His prices would still make them around $40 to $50 bucks. He makes artsy fartzy Giclees. So, I know the colors would be exact, and it'd be on nice paper, but is that too much? What do you all think?

Sounds very reasonable (and affordable) to me! That's a bargain price for such a cool print!

Been out of the loop but missed your art and energy, Tikishark!

It's a boost seeing the stuff you've been working on.

Take care,

I.

$50 seems VERY reasonable to me. I really like this piece and if you printed it, that would certainly be in my price range.

Keep knockin' it out.

TShark~

I would say do a print, it just has a certain tiki lounge vibe that would be a big hit/classic in a home bar. And I do think it would be a hit at Tiki Oasis if you are vending there. But, hey this is all just my opinion. And $40 for a gilcee is not bad from my limited knowledge especially if he can capture the true colors of it all.

Aloha~
JentikiThanks, I guess there is gonna be a few interested parties.
Ivanchan Hey, nice to have ya back!
FlatblackThanks. Cool! Seems I'm gonna have a talk with my printer about making some prints.
Kahu Thanks! Are you going? I'm not going to make it to Tiki Oasis, (dagnabit!) but I think I know folks who are gonna be vending there. I might have an idea brewing.

O.C.D.
Obsessive Cherry Design

Mahalo ~ (cough cough) This morning the area of the Big Island known as Ka'u was evacuated due to high levels of Sulfur Dioxide! - "The VOG is coming! There's something in the VOG! Stay out of the VOG!" (how very John Carpenter, ya know!)

Tiki Shark

http://www.tikishark.com
http://www.myspace.com/Lotus_Land

[ Edited by: Tiki Shark Art 2008-04-16 11:54 ]

No, I wish I could make it this year. If you can find a way to have your art there for people to see and buy I would go for it.

[ Edited by: Kahu 2008-04-16 12:19 ]

Aloha Tiki Shark! I love the Details and the Great color you've got going in your art,Excellent stuff, Aloha Mooney

Brad, Bella is coming along nicely. Love the detail and lighting you have going on in the mug (well the whole thing really, but you are focusing on the mug right now) and his hand. Keep them coming.

Aloha~
Well, you can see the horizon out to sea this morning, so that's good - some of the VOG has blow away.
Kahu~ R U sure we are not going? How did we miss not getting to something so cool called VooDoo Zombie Island?
Mooneytiki~ Thanks! Color is always a challenge. There are just so many of 'em, and they do all kinds of different things when you put em side by side.
Frostiki~ Thanks, I'm glad you are into the detail shots, cause here's another one...

The sinister swizzle.

Mahalo~

Not only would the mug make a good mug, the swizzle would make a good mug.

WOW, what size is that painting again?

Brad- i love watching your stuff progress from underpainting to tone and highlight; too killer, dude. all the really fun stuff is starting to pop up. cheers, man!!

Man, Brad! Excellent detail and colors! Everything down to the swizzle and umbrella in the mug. Just beautiful technique and work.

Aloha~
Teakey~ Thank you! Does Holden make swizzles? I gotta give him a call. However, as was mentioned on Tabunga's thread, "Is it tiki"?
Frostiki~ It is... er... lemme go measure it ... 24" x 30".
greentikipat - Mahalo, mahalo... yeah more of the fun details on finishing up the drink! Check out the new details...
Sam~that's praise a plenty coming from you! Thanks! I'm honored!

mostly done, but I'm messing around with the straw.

Cheers! On to the Aloha Shirt soon.

Here's progress on the 3rd wood cut design. I left the Tiki Lounge lizard for the last.

VOG report - Okay, we had a nice bright sunny day here. Thought I'd let you know that, after all the complaining about the VOG.

Laters~

On 2008-04-20 22:44, Tiki Shark Art wrote:

Wow! The dude in the green haze is totally unexpected, and totally RAD, Brad! :wink: Yep, I do believe this will be another addition to my growing Tiki Shark collection! Still looking forward to the shirt!

On 2008-04-20 23:03, JenTiki wrote:

On 2008-04-20 22:44, Tiki Shark Art wrote:

Wow! The dude in the green haze is totally unexpected, and totally RAD, Brad! :wink: Yep, I do believe this will be another addition to my growing Tiki Shark collection! Still looking forward to the shirt!

Jen is right, you have to do this as a print now man! This print is starting to remind me of one where you are able to stare at it for hours because of the details and nuances.

You should just start a pre-sale list now.

Aloha,
JentikiThanks! Aloha Shirt next...I worked late into the night conferring with the mystic forces of TIKI and have now the layout of the Aloha Shirt.
KahuThank you! Staring at it till it stares back at you! (rum helps)
Hey fellow tiki tribe members, I entered 3 of my tiki paintings into an art competition. I finally got my "Congratulations" letter. One painting made it. So, next November the annual art book "SPECTRUM 15:the Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art" will be published and will have "Forbidden Island" in it.

"Forbidden Island"
24" x 48" acrylic on canvas.

I've been collecting the "SPECTRUM" books for years, so it was cool to get into it.

Congrats man on the inclusion!

Thanks Kahu~

Here's Wood cut #3. The black ink layer. Now to decide what colors, and how many, to lay in behind it.
Aloha~

Hey Brad

This wood cut is looking great, even without the background colour.

How's #2 shaping up in production?

Tikiracer~Thanks! I'm glad you like it. It's got a different vibe than the fist one, but still in that Honolulu noir feel. (Actually in my mind they are all illustrations for the same story.)
Earl has his workshop finally up and running after his big move, so he says he should have number 2 done in a week or so.
I did a ROUGH color test for number 3. It's five more plates. Two greens for the sky and three purples for the foreground. The white highlights are un inked paper. So, that would be like 6 plates to hand carve for one wood cut. I think I'm gonna give poor Earl a heart attack!

What do ya think?

Aloha!

Looks sweet. What about making the background the same colours as the foreground, for a cool monochromatice effect? The painting is coming along sweetly too :D

I agree with Hewey, maybe this would look great a bit more mono. Bit more noir. I really like the black and sand paper finish of the first one.

Saying that, the use of the blue and purple feels more like a tikishark use of colour.

Will all the colour work make the prints a lot more money?? Just I was hoping to get the complete set.

On 2008-04-23 08:08, tikiracer wrote:
I agree with Hewey, maybe this would look great a bit more mono. Bit more noir. I really like the black and sand paper finish of the first one.

Saying that, the use of the blue and purple feels more like a tikishark use of colour.

Will all the colour work make the prints a lot more money?? Just I was hoping to get the complete set.

I tend to agree with TRacer, I love the look and the feel of the other pieces that you have done. Still a great piece regardless.

I like the colors you've chosen.

Two things.

I wonder if the background green shapes would benefit from more specificity, that is, more jungle vine- and leaf-shaped silhouettes, not to any great detail, just shapes more reminiscent of a jungle forest. The green is sufficiently light enough to tolerate more complex imagery.

Also, the way the color is, the man's face perhaps could use some more detail. Not a lot. Just a few touches to highlight cheekbones/forehead, well, you're the artist. You would best know what to highlight. The point is, the way the coloring is, it seems to me his face ought to be a bit more revealed. His shirt and his collar are completely lit, so the brim of the hat seems insufficient to cast the whole side of his face in shadow.

[ Edited by: TikiFool 2008-04-23 10:44 ]

I agree with JenTiki, the image in the green mist is unexpected and very cool.

Spectrum 15? Awesome Brad... wow, Spectrum.

Hewey ~ Thanks for the feed back. Monochromatic, okay take a look.
Tiki Racer~ Will they be more. I guess, I think it'll take Earl longer. Maybe mono would be less work.
Kahu~ Three votes for mono!
tikifool~ ah somebody likes lots o color! All very good points. I just roughed in the "sky" but I like your ideas. I took out some of the lighting on the figure. Give him more of the back lite look I was originally going for. Hard to alter ink though! Painting has it over ink in that area.
Robb Hamel ~ Thanks you. Yeah that figure just sort of happened. I think Hewey said something about transparent things, and I went from there.

Blue

green

sepia
I like the mono. What do you think?

Mahalo for all the good comments folks!

Color me crazy — but I really really like your original color scheme.

The black light violet against the aqua green, for me, popped the foreground.

Now it all looks sooooo flat and the background seems like an empty sound stage.

Just one opinion...

mono is the way to go....strong line work...bold shapes.....perfect!!

how about a close up of that zombie skull mist!!!! Me digs'em!

JUST PRINT ONE-COLOR AND HAND-TINT SOME!
A nice sepia wash will OOMPH it up!
Plus you can do any ol' colorway your want that way....
and you can sell em as "hand-tinted by artist"!
:)

Keep it simple I reckon. It's gonna be a lot of extra work for your print guy to add in colour layers, and we're buying this for your great sense of design and the crisp linework more than anything else! I do like the look of some of those samples you posted, but if you are gonna go the colour route, I suggest maybe doing some bigger screenprinted (maybe too much work for woodcut?) pieces on heavier stock (and charging accordingly!)

I got my prints yesterday and they look amazing as they are - the black ink and the natural looking paper work really well together. I had to make sure my hands were clean as I couldn't stop pulling them out of the envelope to look at them. Finally I have some Tikishark art!

Here's another opinion - take it for what it's worth.

I really like your original color scheme, but I do understand that it will be much more work. I also kinda like the monotone in green, but I would like it better if you did what someone else suggested and maybe put some shapes in the background to give it that "foliage" look.

On the other hand, Kinny's idea of hand coloring each one Rocks! Then everyone would be it's own little piece of original art. Kinda like what Munktiki did with their "Rotting Skull" mugs, where each one had different colors, or different features to give each it's own "personality."

p.s. - I second the vote for a close-up of the green mist ghoul!

Yeh, Im much preferring the monochrome look. I love how they have very different vibes, just through the use of colour - eg. the blue evokes a feeling of a cool night with light breeze, the kind of night where the clouds move across the sky quickly, revealing patches of stars as they move. The green has a real tropical feel, like a sticky humid jungle in the middle of the day, where it's that enclosed you're just surrounded by green. The sepia one has a cool moody vintage feel. A red/orane print one would have a great volcano vibe.

I think I like the look of the blue one the best. The night vibe works the best, seeing as the main light source is coming from the tikis feet, not from the sun. The small light accents on the guys hat suggest tiny bits of moonlight is also lighting the scene, and this also makes sense given the blue background too (like a landscape under moonlight).

On 2008-04-23 16:19, JenTiki wrote:
I would like it better if you did what someone else suggested and maybe put some shapes in the background to give it that "foliage" look.

Yeh, thats a top idea :D Would also address the issue of the background looking "flat" too.

p.s. - I second the vote for a close-up of the green mist ghoul!

Yeh, I 3rd that! :D :D and how about a size reference in the pic, so we can appreciate the detail?

Wow, thanks everyone for the great feed back. It really helps me figure out where to take the wood prints next. While I like everyones suggestions, the monochrome idea made me step back and think why I was attracted to doing the wood cuts in the first place. It was because they are so beautifully retro. So non computer enhanced. So, less is more. Making a Wood cut into a full color print then pushes it into the modern realm, and heck, I'm already doing full color giclees with full color. I'd rather they remain something unique and unusual and ...er...wood cutty. Anyways, I'm still waiting to hear back from Earl on his thoughts - since he's going to to be doing the carving. We'll confer and see whats what. But again, thanks everyone!

As requested, here's the close up of the zip fizz zombie raising outa the drink.

This is what happens when you pour a zip fizz into rum.

and, yes, I went crazy and totally repainted the umbrella. Now it's more "Shag-a-dellic"!

Mahalo~

Brad. Your work just continues to inspire me man. Not to mention I have to constantly pick my jaw up from the floor and wind my tongue back into my head. I would KILL to have a print of this Latest painting. Friends seem to be in disbelief when I show them my detailed work, but then I mention they should see yours.

Actually, I was wondering if you might be able to help me figure out a layout for a piece of mine I've had to put off because I can't think of how I want to do it just yet.

Brad,

Is there evil czech absinthe in that drink? Is that is what is making the green phantom zombie come out of the drink. I like the new umbrella, better detail in it and the color plays better that the green one did.