Tattoos Famili: Versus

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When January rolled around 12 months ago, I hadn't thought much about what I wanted to do with my artwork this year. I had been blogging seriously for just a few months and had fallen in love with the open forum which it provided me to fuse both my voice and my art. The past few years I had focused on exhibiting anywhere and everywhere in the world I was accepted, placing my art in over 100 shows across the country and world. For 2011, I wanted to focus on building an audience here in the digital world. At the turn of the year, I made the decision to dump my static website which housed galleries for my art and focus solely on turning my blog INTO my site. I found quickly that it was a learning process and looking back I can see the wonderful evolution of the DREGstudios! site over the past 12 months, which has grown from several hundred viewers a month to 15-20K viewers per month since June! Falling in love with blogging was the best creative decision I've ever made.

2011 was the most inspiring year of my life so far for my work and passion. I'm still on the upswing and haven't managed to find a way to make a living doing what I love quite yet but you can go back through my archive of blog posts and see the fruits of my labor. Here's a look back at just a few of the major highlights of this incredible year...

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This Saturday night from 6-9PM, over twenty of the wildest pop surrealist, fantasy, and low brow artists of the Mid-South converge in this no holds barred, kick-in-your-teeth group art event. This will also be the first exhibit I have curated in a couple of years and from the looks of all the works, every last artist brought their A -game and a brutal, bloody and fantastic outcome to the simple theme I threw at them...

Each artist has one work of art displayed following along with the title of the show, VERSUS. Creators pitted forces of nature, elements of architecture, cartoons, celebrities, and icons against one another (and in a few instances against even themselves.) Every single artists represented their craft with beautiful execution, pushing my theme to the limit.

The artists choose the combatants and you get the front row seat during Nashville's Downtown Art Crawl! Click on the flier to get the full lineup and check out the sneak previews below to get a taste of what you're in for! VERSUS kicks off at 6PM this Saturday night, March 5th at MIR Gallery (44 Arcade Building / Nashville, TN)

Here are some process pics from the creation of my own entry for the show, Cyborg Steve Jobs VERSUS Cyborg Bill Gates!

Initial Sketch

ENTRIES FROM OTHER VERSUS ARTISTS

Monster and Zombie Artist Extraordinaire, Billy Tackett's Frankenstein Vs. The Cube

Erin Lord's Earthworm Jim - "Worm vs. Self" Groovy indeed

Thomas Payne's "Battle of the Cosmos"

Siamese Twins Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse by Brooke E

Brooke is a very talented up and coming artist who is getting pop surrealism on lock down with her own unique style. If you like it as much as I do, good news is there's more at www.unfriendlythings.com!

The Dragon vs. The Man of Steel by Roly Viruez (oils on canvas)

Roly is already an award-winning tattoo artist after only a few years pushing ink. He can be found at Tattoo Technique on Madison Street here in Clarksville. I don't know how long he's been slinging oils but he has a masterful control of the medium and also paints some verrrrrrrrrry nice pinup girls.

American Religion II by Jesse Shaw (layered woodcut prints)

See much more of Jesse's intensely political creations at his website, www.americanprintmaker.com.This guy has an ethic like no other when it comes to his craft. Each work is a few feet tall and takes a month or more to hand carve out of wood blocks and print. You can stare at this one for hours.

[Click HERE for an interactive map of the Art Crawl including shuttle routes, where to park, and participating galleries]

OPENING RECEPTION

UPDATE 03/06/2011

Last night's opening reception for VERSUS was one of the most entertaining nights of my life. Every artist who participated in this group exhibit really knocked it out of the park with our theme. There is a tremendous group of visual artists right here in the south making some outrageous and stunning artwork and we got a full dose of them. I need to offer a very special thanks to Miranda Herrick (MIR Gallery) for hosting our event and trusting my vision for the show. We had the perfect number of hand picked visionary creators who blew us away with what they came up with. Hundreds of Art Crawlers (thank you too for braving the cold rain!) converged through the Arcade galleries and provided many of the artists with energetic and insightful feedback on their works. I saw people pointing, jumping up and down, laughing, arguing their sides, and giving us a full range of emotional response to our artwork. The crowds at MIR Gallery on first Saturdays never disappoint. I found myself talking about each and every piece as the night progressed amidst the bedlam of VERSUS!

My finished Cyborg Steve Jobs vs. Cyborg Bill Gates. I chose a slick brushed silver frame for it that kinda looks like static along with a purple and black double matte.

My wife, Aurora doesn't take any flack from the likes of me, nevertheless from a joker like El Hombre!

Charles Bennett (El Hombre last night) with his work, "Spoils." This is another addition to his Hug Life series where men dressed in stuffed animal costumes battle to the death. Charles really brings the gore and hilarity of it all to life with his watercolors!