JAZtoons News

Hi folks,
On the weekend I took part in the phenomenon known as Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School (Berlin branch) -the phenomenon started in 2005 by Molly Crabapple and is now providing artists in over 100 countries around the world with a new spin to life drawing.
Berlin's branch was hosted for the ninth time yesterday at the White Trash Fast Food Restaurant, Club and Tattoo Studio in Schoenhauser Allee. The premises themselves were inspiring to begin with, but as soon as we got the stamp of approval from security man "Bam Bam", we were greeted by colourful characters not quite of this era... Which was also quite tame as opposed to our models... At 2pm Mad Kate and Anita Drink (aka Juan Ofakind) turned up and kept us in constant stitches with crazy outfits and a short skit involving nylon and ketchup (and smarties... many, many smarties)
All the while the scratching of pencil/pen on paper was to be heard beneath the inspirational tunes of the 40s (mostly)
First up the (rather shoddily drawn) 1-minute poses...





Some of these poses I would have liked to have more time...

Finally onto the five minute poses...



Mad Kate made lying across two wooden chairs seem as comfortable as lying across a featherbed.

Anita Drink in her yellow leopardskin stockings doing the 'couch potato' -sans bathrobe.

After a brief break, it was on to the first contest: create a magazine cover image. Finger lickin' Good!

This was the American hero icon picture ...on a table.
-Borio, the winner of first prize, shared his bottle of Held Vodka -thanks! Well done too, Knut!
Here the moderators jumped in while the models refreshed themselves...



Juan Ofakind replaced Anita Drink for the last half of the session, and the dynamic duo performed a skit to a juiced up version of 'White Rabbit'. Juan gave birth to demon-baby Kate, who then crawled through the cheering crowd, smearing everyone with... ketchup? before showering everyone with 'poison' smarties (I was sitting in the shrapnel zone)
and eventually being killed by Momma Juan. (with a hairdryer in the bathtub)
Which brought us to our 20 minute pose:



The second contest involved drawing on a balloon -Mad Kate donned a bizarre mask and fur vest. The room was filled with studious squeaking as markers wiggled over rubber. There was one mishap, where someone poked a little too hard into their balloon...
The models made their pick of the bunch and the artists lauded two champions... One snapped up a sketchbook, the other a lovely Artbook by Femke Hiemstra -sponsored by Modern Graphics (thank you!)



The afternoon was rounded off when Johnny stepped in and posed with Kate for a nice portrait in front of the mantle.

Thank you for a great time, everyone!!!

Now for something different...
For those of you who don't remember, I work at Stenarts, a creative Team based in Berlin. We create things.

Our latest achievement is the graphic novel "RIA - Seed of Hope" (currently still only available in German -I'll be sure to let you know when the English version is released)
It's the first of four Volumes of the Lightclan Chronicles and tells about the fantastical land of Tenebra and its whimsical inhabitants, all envisioned by Thorsten Kiecker and his minions (the list is long).

Aside from stunning artwork, the comic has augmented reality features, which means if you have a webcam and windows (there are some kinks, they're working on it being available for all platforms) you can take a look at some 3D models of some of the characters.

You can find out more and see the theatrical trailer at:
http://www.lightclan-chronicles.com/

For those of you who read German, here is the shop:
http://www.stenarts.com/shop/

Hi folks!
After being on hiatus for a few *cough* months, I thought it might be time to give you a sign of life... First of all, I have to announce my Ca-bee-net as finally being finished:




This has given me a taste for woodwork and I'm considering getting some tools to make more intricate designs. I frequent the art nouveau museum here in Berlin and always leave with dreams of creating tables and chairs cut with sculptural botany intertwining deliciously. I love functional art.

Otherwise, the 15th of May marked Sketch Crawl 27 - a rather dismal, rainy day, where I did less drawing:



...and took more photos...



I would have liked to have taken Spidey to the zoo, but we had to make do with a friend's appartment (the lovely lady in the sketch, Anthea, her blog here: http://antheaodreo.blogspot.com/ )

Hi folks!
I was off to a very late start, as I only read olkazavr's mail around 3pm today. Luckily, we'd already done a crawl together before so I was able to locate her and the camera man (!?!?!?!) Fabrice? (I'm sorry, I'm terrible with names :])
It was interesting, being put under the magnifying glass, or in this case, camera lens. All the people around look at you differently. I almost blew my cover a few times, because people became nervous as to why i was being filmed and why i kept looking over to them. We'll see what he comes up with.
I joined Olga to draw at Wittenberg platz and we walked through the Christmas market, which is still in the processes of setting up.



We then ducked into Hugendubel, a bookstore, and drew the browsers as they perused the pages and sipped at coffee.



We worked our way to the upper levels and looked down at the cafe corner. I also drew Fabrice and Masha, another late-comer. Great atmosphere, guys, thanks! Also looking forward to what everyone else did here.



By the way, SC is 5 today! Congratulations!

Hi folks, the ca-bee-net is almost complete, after my efforts last night with a screwdriver and hammer. The 'structure' is roughly 2m high, and will probably withstand an airstrike... In all, we now have a lot of space for conserves in the kitchen. All that's missing are the doors for the front. I still haven't decided on a design, but it will involve cutting more shapes out of the wood.

On a side note, I'm finally allowed to talk about Stone Age Kings, a browser game we at Stenarts were working on earlier in the year. My part was whipping up about 140 odd icons (not including all of those which were scrapped) so, if you are into browser games and have at least rudimentary German skills (there is unfortunately no translation yet) you can play the game at stoneagekings.de

Those were the cries of the Lilliputians as Royal de Luxe's amazing deep sea diver marionette moved amidst a crowd of thousands over the Moltkebrücke in Berlin. The day is the third of October - the German day of Reunion. Twenty years ago The Wall came down and a country divided became whole again.
Jean Luc Courcoult's company Royal de Luxe treated Berlin spectators to a fairytale spanning four days, involving two of their giant marionettes -well, one is a giant, the other one is lovingly called the 'little' giantess.
I unfortunately wasn't able to be enchanted by the deep sea diver's niece, but there are plenty of photos on the official website: http://riesen-in-berlin.de (the site is available in English as well as German)
Merci a Royal de Luxe!

Hi folks, here's my latest project in the first stages. I'm making a cupboard for the kitchen. One of my flatmates asked why I was paying so much for wood when I could buy a decent piece of furniture from Ikea. Good question -so I decided to put my own spin to it. Here are the first pictures:

First of all, this is my new friend, Li:















In the last post, Martin asked for more details on the terrarium and its construction. The dimensions are LxWxH (with legs) = 167x68x100cm

I got my inspiration and instructions from www.pogona-world.de (site in German):
http://www.pogona-world.de/Terrarium--s--R.ue.ckwandbau.htm
Their Website has a wealth of information about Pogona Vitticeps and if you still have questions after sifting through this resource, the Brunners happily answer any outstanding questions.

To summarise the materials, the exterior is a mixture of wood (Spruce and OSB board -once upon a time a loft bed ;))
The stone structure is actually styrofoam covered with layers (and layers, and layers, and layers) of (FLEXIBLE) tile mortar. I've got three lamps, one UVB Exo-Terra Reptiglo 10.0 as well as two spot lamps (50 & 100W) for warmth, though I'm thinking I need to swap the 100W for at least 75W, I'm still working on regulating the temperatures. There's about 30L of red Sand in the terrarium as well as a root to climb and bask on.
I also bought a Golliwoog plant, which was a great idea, not just because it's a good source of water and vitamines, but it makes a great place to sit and nibble away. I love the sound of the leaves being chewed off. *munchmunchmunch*

Hi folks!
Just a note to let you know -IT IS DONE!!!
My biggest construction project is now ready to be put into use. I just have to wait til I'm back from my holidays before I find a little scaly friend to move in with me. *Excitement!*

Am Wochenende haben wir das 'Ja' Wort unserer Nachbarn Antje und Benno miterlebt um uns unmittelbar danach voll zu fressen und bis in die Erschouml;pfung zu tanzen. Das ganze fand in Glaisin/Gorlosen (Mecklenburg-Vorpommern) wo die beiden aufgewachsen sind, statt. Auf dem Bauernhof Antjes Eltern feierten wir das Brautpaar in einem großen Zelt mit Speis und Trank.
Vielen Dank für die Möglichkeit, mit Euch zu feiern, und ich wünsche Euch viele Jahre Glück und Liebe!