AAU Print exchange

Monkey is taking part in the Academy of Art University's 2010 Print Exchange! He is very excited to receive prints from 29 other artists in exchange for his humble 3-color serigraph that he's made. To honor the fact that we completely forgot to do a process post yesterday, Monkey wanted to share a bit about the way that the prints tend to change from concept to actual execution. He's pretty sure that's not what's "supposed" to happen, but he doesn't care and likes that bit of uncertainty anyway. Take it away, Monkey!

So here's the original illustration, done by scanning in the background paper, and using photoshop to do the coloring:
And here's the final print (although the top green tape needs to be trimmed off):
As you can see, a lot can happen between the master sketch to the actual print. One thing I realized is that because I was printing on lokta paper, the pink vegetable dye actually seeped into my white paint, thus the stripes still show through. This gives it a sorta ghostly effect, which at first I wasn't into, but I think it reinforces the concept of being jailed by the expectations and fantasies via pornography (which is why I chose the striped paper in the first place...pink jail bars anyone?).

Also, I added a lot of line work, as when I was making the screens, I ended up wanting to sculpt the form of the woman's face a bit more. The pale blue made a good shadow, but I still wasn't happy, and after sketching out a new version with the linework, I decided it should stay for the actual print.

Finally, when I started printing, I wasn't 100% sure that I knew what I wanted the woman to be thinking. After talking it over with Eve and Carrie-Ann (who also was working on her print exchange print), I decided to go with the "*yawn*" as it makes the print more open-ended than I originally I was thinking of making it, and it also makes it funnier.

I hate it when people say "the new caption was better than what I thought originally" but never tell you what they were thinking, so here are the other possible captions:

-"I'm faking it for all my fans out there"
-"I'm faking it all for you, baby"
-"I wonder what's on tv"
-"to all my fans: I'm actually faking it"

If you disagree and would have rather seen a different caption: too bad!

Paper Hat Productions Features: Alyss Estay

Featuring Alyss Estay
She is an incredibly creative, talented and articulate artist. Her fine arts serigraphs have those hard-to-execute beautiful gradient washes, subtly-mixed muted palettes, and innovative scenes. And all of it is screenprinted! To produce something of this detailed caliber takes an unbelievable amount of accuracy in registration.

We are happy to have her on our March gallery show. March 12th 8pm at SPACE Gallery, 1141 Polk St.




If you are connected on Facebook, you can RSVP here.

Center for the Book's Holiday Craft Fair today!

Come check out Center for the Book's Holiday Craft Fair later this afternoon starting at 5:30pm-8:30pm at 300 De Haro St. (between 16th St. + 17th St.). Monkey+Seal have a booth showcasing and selling some of their newest prints and ties. Along with Panda Rage and Pandamonium, Monkey has a new limited edition serigraph of Sad Panda, featuring this sad panda in the rain with the text *sniff* It is handpulled on toned paper, and will never be printed again.

3 More Days Till Handmade Ho-Down

3 more days until Handmade Ho-Down this Thursday at 1015 Folsom St. 6pm-midnight. Monkey and Seal are busy in their art studio a.k.a their apartment cave preparing for this awesome one night show.

This is the first Etsy.com sponsored craft fair that Monkey is proud to be a part of as a committee organizer. It is part of Monkey and Seal's dream to travel to different shows and exhibit worldwide and live off our art. As long as people like it and we have a roof over our heads, we're pretty happy.

Here is another sneak peek at the illustration/prints that Seal will be selling. Along with the SF Zine Fest favorites of "Swamp Treehouse," "Tree Girl," and "Delicatessen," below is one of the many new prints that Seal will be introducing on Thursday. This is the finished acrylic painting, that was featured in an earlier process post 2 weeks ago, titled Seal's 90 thumbnails. This giclee is printed on Archival Utrachrome ink on 260 gsm premium photo paper.


Monkey and Seal are also a big fan of encouraging any young and old artists to blossom. They are donating some of their art for the DrawBridge raffle. Below is one of Monkey's serigraphs. Besides the image being a fun and awesome panda shooting laser beams out of its eyes, it is a hand-pulled 3 color serigraph (fine art silkscreen print) on 11.75" x 18" pastel paper, a limited edition of 11.


Seal is donating her giclee archival print of her original watercolor illustration titled Looking for Noah. 100% of the raffle will go towards Drawbridge, a nonprofit organization helping homeless children cope with their situation through art. Let's make the world a better place, one person, one art at at time!

Weekend recap, blog feature!

Hello! It was an eventful weekend for the M+S team as on Saturday, Monkey went to the Book Arts Jam to sell his serigraphs. After getting there, he realized that the Book Arts Jam is not really his target demographic, but sharing a table with Macy Chadwick of In Cahoots Press and artist Paola Horevicz made the time fly by. Monkey got to meet the lovely ladies of Pod Post, and friends Tom (Two Fine Chaps) and Megan (Aviary Press) were there as well (and Monkey also hitched a ride back with Megan - thanks again!). Monkey also had the debut of some of his newest prints - Panda Rage and Pandamonium!

Panda Rage - 2 color serigraph on Canson cover - limited edition of 11 - $25

Pandamonium - 3 color serigraph on pastel paper - limited edition of 11 - $25

As soon as he can get around to taking some decent photos (sorry about the glare - it's from the plastic sleeve they're in), we'll have them in the shop. In the meantime, if you really, really need your panda fix ASAP, contact us and we'll get you your copy right away!

Saturday night was super-nap-time for M+S as Seal had stayed up all night before preparing her latest works (the watercolor was shown in our latest Saturday process post), and Monkey was up packing and labeling his prints (good thing too, cuz we got a lot of orders over the weekend, yay!). We did manage to finish off the latest of the Japanese dramas that we watch, but nothing really productive.

Sunday was catch-up day, with Monkey packing prints, buying some paper for some new screen prints, and getting some painting done. Seal started thumbnails for her next illustrations, and both are catching up with laundry and cleaning the studio/apartment.

We were also featured on the Handmade Ho Down blog Monday, as Monkey is one of the committee members putting on the show. You can find out more about the genesis of Monkey + Seal over there!

Overworking

Hi all, sorry for the late post...Monkey has been fighting the flu, and Seal has been taking care of him, so the idea of sustainability has definitely come to mind.

Both being workaholics (Monkey by far being the worst), M+S need to constantly remind themselves that the world doesn't end if you have to call in sick to work, or if you only can finish 50% of a project. Yes, there are consequences (you miss a day of pay, you get a lowered grade, etc.) but if you constantly push yourself too hard, too fast, too long, you'll eventually burn out and then you'll be out of it for days.

Monkey has been unable to really do anything for the past three days now, which is not the best timing since he's trying to prepare some new prints for the Book Arts Jam (where he'll be exhibiting at the Academy of Art table) due to his illness. After trying to work his dayjob while sick, he ended up going home early one day, then he slept in the stockroom for an hour the next day, and finally he decided that he couldn't come in.

Life goes on, people may be inconvenienced, but the longer you are sick, the longer the minor inconvenience goes on. It's best just to take a full day off or two, rest (don't do other stuff!) and recover.

This is not to say that there aren't time when going all out 200% isn't necessary, but that shouldn't be the way of life. Monkey thinks you should definitely push your limits as necessary and as much as you can, but know your limits so you just don't push too far. Be sustainable!

Monkey + Seal Giveaway Raffle!

Hey everyone! Monkey + Seal recently saw our first holiday card display (yikes!) and got in the gift-giving mood. Sooo, we have decided to hold our first raffle! Yay for you! Yay for free stuff! What can you win? Good question!

The prizes are:
3rd place - A free copy of The Monkey Zine!
2nd place - A free copy each of The Monkey Zine, The Bad Date Zine Issue 1 & Issue 2!
1st place - Your choice of any single print of Seal/Eve's that's in the shop!
Grand Prize - Either a free "Cryptids at Night" serigraph by Monkey/Ri.S.K. (value of $75) or a $45 gift certificate to the store.

Woo hoo! We're giving away over $100 worth of stuff! If you're as excited as we are, know that the contest is going to end this Sunday at 11:59 PM PST, with winners announced here at the blog on a special Tuesday post!

Here's the scoop as to how to enter:
Fill out our survey for 5 entries!
Any purchases on our Etsy site from Friday til Sunday night (11:59pm PST) gets 5 entries!
You get 2 entries for following our blog!
Fan us on Facebook for 2 entries!
You get 2 entries for signing up for our newsletter (from the sidebar on our main site).
You get 1 entry for posting a link to your favorite item in our shop and telling us why in the comments below!
If you saw our twitter post about our contest, retweet it for 1 entry! (limit 1 RT per 3 hours).

That's 18 potential entries you can have! More if you're a twitter-a-holic! Also, if you're already a fan on FB, or are following are blog, you don't even have to do anything - we'll already count you in!

Soo, good luck everyone, and we hope to see such a flurry of Monkey + Seal activity that we can barely contain ourselves! Have a great weekend!

Print sale!

We're currently running a sale on our Etsy shop. We're pricing this Jackalope serigraph (fine art silkscreen print) at over half-off to get these suckers out the door! Go go now!