[Essen­tial Rea­ding: “Everything You Always Wan­ted To Know About ‘Cube Gre­na­des’ But Were Afraid To Ask.”]

Back on 24 September, I wrote about how Shit Creek Consulting had hired me to draw the above “Cube Gre­na­de” for them.

As a cartoon, it works. As a piece of advertising, it works. As a piece of communication, it works. As a Cube Grenade, it works. As a social object, it works. As a conversation starter, it REALLY works. I was happy; so was the client.

Like a lot of bloggers with an advertising background, I have spent a lot of time over the years asking the question, “What is the future of advertising?”

Sure, in the last decade there’s been a lot of speculation about how Web 2.0 is going to change EVERYTHING in the industry– everything from putting mainstream agencies out of business, to Google ruling the world with an iron fist. But in spite of all the talk out there, a definitive answer has always remained somewhat elusive.

I think I may have FINALLY had a major breakthrough:

These last few weeks, while I have been VERY busy working on some new Cube Grenade business, it occurs to me that the Cube Grenade concept somehow manages to get both my backgrounds in cartooning and advertising working seamlessly together.

The Cube Grenades aren’t really designed to “sell”, like traditional advertising. They’re designed to hit a nerve and start conversations. Maybe that will help lead to sales down the road, but it’s not the primary purpose. Its primary purpose takes a more indirect, perhaps more disruptive path.

So what is the future of advertising? Well, I don’t know what yours is, but mine is The Cube Grenade. If that’s what you want, you come to me. If you want something different, go elsewhere.

Some people will get this, some people won’t, but that’s probably a good thing. Rock on.

[If you think the Cube Grenade idea could help your business, as always, feel free to e-mail me, Thanks.]

[Backs­tory: About Hugh. E-mail Hugh. Work with Hugh. Twit­ter. Cartoon Archive. News­let­ter. Book. Inter­view One. Inter­view Two. EVIL PLANS. Limi­ted Edi­tion Prints. Essen­tial Rea­ding: “Everything You Always Wan­ted To Know About ‘Cube Gre­na­des’ But Were Afraid To Ask.”]

One of my collectors, Tom LaPille just emailed me this– a photo of his “Quality” cube grenade, now safely hanging on his office wall.

Like I said back in April, it’s what the art DOES that’s interesting to me, more than what it IS per se.

We’ve always seen the Kine­tic Qua­lity wor­king in mar­ke­ting, wor­king with brands. “By buying Brand X, I feel hip­per, coo­ler, sexier, more secure, more in con­trol” etc etc. But what I’m fin­ding out is, this also works with art. To me, the inte­res­ting thing about art is not the usual “Heroic, absinthe-soaked, vision quest lone indi­vi­dual archety­pal artist crap”, but how the art is USED by the per­son who has it han­ging on the wall. What’s it actually there for? Deco­ra­tion? Sho­wing off? A con­ver­sa­tion star­ter? An ice brea­ker? A way of telling a story? Something to brigh­ten up the room? A sym­bol of social sta­tus? An expres­sion of indi­vi­dual world­view? An expres­sion of emo­tion? A totem to remind one­self of something ins­pi­ra­tio­nal and/or impor­tant? Perhaps a bit of all these?

So I’m seeing two worlds collide here: The inter­nal, soli­tary part of making the art, and the exter­nal social part of how the piece of art is actually used. Art? Used? Is art actually allo­wed to be “used”? Would the Art Police allow that? Ins­tead of calling them “Patrons”, can we call art buyers “Users” ins­tead? Would you be offen­ded if I called you that? There’s no wrong ans­wer…

Anyway, as always, I love it when y’all send in photos. Keep ‘em coming, Thanks! Rock on.

[Backs­tory: About Hugh. E-mail Hugh. Twit­ter. News­let­ter. Book. Inter­view One. Inter­view Two. EVIL PLANS. Limi­ted Edi­tion Prints. Pri­vate Com­mis­sions. Cube Gre­na­des.]

[This could make a nice print, one day…]
Recently on Twitter, I wrote:

Art that brightens up the office vs Art that brightens up the home. Two different vibes altogether. I prefer making the former.

To which my friend, Kathy Sierra replied:

Good! Homes are less likely to *need* brightening the way offices do. I can brighten my home just by making toast.

Whether we’re talking wee cube grenade laser copies or something much larger, like The Purple Cow Print, when I launched the gapingvoid gallery earlier this year, that was my intention– to make art for the workspace.
This desire goes back to my early years working as an advertising creative. There was always cool stuff– fine art, posters, graphic design, cartoons– hanging up everywhere. Stuff to amuse and inspire us, stuff to tweak our brains in the right direction. And though its effect on the agency’s bottom line would’ve been hard to measure, somehow it worked– or at least, helped.
Why can’t all offices be more like this? Is there some law that requires certain types of businesses to maintain a dull, gray, machine-like, life-sucking visual environment? You could ague that maybe for some companies, sure, but that’s not a world I’ve ever aspired to belong to.
“Office Art” tends to come in two main categories: 1. REALLY expensive. 2. REALLY cheesy.
I wanted to make office art that was neither…
[Afterthought:] Of course, a lot of my collectors work from home, therefore their offices are in the house, not in an office building. But the prints were made with the workspace in mind, not the “living” space, regardless.

[Backstory: About Hugh. E-mail Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. EVIL PLANS. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.]

[“Mistakenly”]

[“Nobody Cares”]

[“Vanished”]

[“CFA’}
[Click on images to enlarge etc.]

[UPDATE: These prints are now also for sale individually. Go check out gapingvoidgallery.com to see more.…]

After the very successful launch of Portfolio Series Number One, we’re happy to announce the launch of Portfolio Series Number Two.
After consulting with y’all recently about what designs to use, we narrowed it down to the four designs you see above.
Same deal as last time: They measure 11“x14”, and can be framed and hung, or kept in a portfolio to view or use for meetings and then put away etc. They are all hand-pulled serigraphs, and printed on Rives-Arches paper. All four are taken from cartoons that appeared in my book, IGNORE EVERYBODY.
You can pre-order them for $300 for the set of four, by just leaving a $50.00 deposit using the PayPal button below. We’ll send you an invoice for the remainder when they’re printed an ready to ship.

[$50.00 deposit/pre-order PayPal button etc.]

Portfolio One used black and red. This time we used mainly a black and blue theme. This group of cartoons I selected comes out of my New York days, when my tone was less about business– more personal– and more about being sardonic and hanging out in bars too much. Blue is the perfect color for that…
They came out looking well. I’m excited! Hope you like. Rock on.

[One of the cartoons from the book etc.…]
After the great success of the “Portfolio Number One” launch, we’ve decided to do another one i.e. Portfolio Number Two.
And like last time, all images chosen will be taken from my book, IGNORE EVERYBODY.
So if you’ve read the book already, I’d love to hear your feedback. Which cartoon(s) from the book do you think would make good “cube grenades”? Please feel free to leave a comment below, Thanks!

[Visit my print gallery here.]

[Backstory: About Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. EVIL PLANS. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.]

The “Dinosaur” print is now for sale up on gapingvoidgallery…
Derived from the old maxim, “Never try to teach a pig to sing, it wastes your time and annoys the pig.”
Limited edition, signed and numbered, printed with the same high-quality inks and papers as the larger stuff etc.
A nice cube grenade for any office. Rock on.

[Backstory: About Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.“EVIL PLANS”.]

[Buy the “Hughtrain” print individually here.]

Another “Cube Grenade”, Hurrah!
A while ago, I announced that we’d be making smaller prints available, based on the cartoons found in IGNORE EVERYBODY.
On June 11th, the same day the book came out, we announced our first efforts: The “Ignore Everybody” Portfolio Series Number One.
Four silkscreens, 11“x14”, limited edition of 100, signed and numbered, $320 for the set.
So again, I’m delighted to report that we’ve just made the “Hughtrain” print available for purchase individually. $100, plus S&H. Here’s the blurb on the gallery website:

It’s probably my most famous cartoon. It pretty sums up my marketing philosophy. Like my friend, Seth Godin said:

“You can’t drink any more bottled water than you already do. Or buy more wine. Or more tea. You can’t wear more than one pair of shoes at a time. You can’t get two massages at once…”
So, what grows? What do marketers sell that scales?
I’ll tell you what: Belief. Belonging. Mattering. Making a difference. We have an unlimited need for this.”

I hope you’ll check it out. Thanks!
[Backstory: About Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.“EVIL PLANS”.]

{Cartoon inspired by this blog post.]
[Backstory: About Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.“EVIL PLANS”.]

[Buy the “Quality” print individually here.]

If this doesn’t make a good good “cube grenade”, I don’t know what will…
A while ago, I announced that we’d be making smaller prints available, based on the cartoons found in IGNORE EVERYBODY.
On June 11th, the same day the book came out, we announced our first efforts: The “Ignore Everybody” Portfolio Series Number One.
Four silkscreens, 11“x14”, limited edition of 100, signed and numbered, $320 for the set.
I’m delighted to report, that we’ve just made the “Quality” print available for purchase individually. $100, plus S&H. Here’s the blurb on the gallery website:

A couple of decades ago, Ford had a tagline for its car commercials: “Quality is Job One”.
Well, that may be fine if you’re a big, old car company, but it never quite grabbed my imagination. I figured if you’re a young, small company, or a person wanting to make a difference on a tiny shoestring budget (like I was), stronger words might be more appropriate. Events proved me right– this ended up being one of my favorite cartoons of my blog readers.

I hope you’ll check it out. Thanks!
[etc: About Hugh. Interview. Newsletter. Book. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades. Hughtrain.]

[This quote was an excerpt from my last CDF Newsletter.]
[etc: About Hugh. Book. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades. Hughtrain.]

One of my Twitter followers sent me this photo.
He had just started working at a new job, was walking around the office to get familiar with his new home, and saw this…
One of his colleagues had used my cartoons to make a big ol’ cube grenade, about blogging and social media.
Now if I can only get these people to start buying the real thing… Heh.

[The printer’s proofs. Click on image to enlarge etc.]

[“Dinosaur”]

[“Hughtrain”]

[“Quality”]

[“Talked”]

[Update:] You can purchase the Portfolio here.

Last week I blogged about a series of small prints I was working on, based on the cartoons in the new book, “IGNORE EVERYBODY”, which as y’all know, launched today.
These cartoons above are some of the most viewed, and have collectively been downloaded hundreds of thousands of times. I know they adorn lots of cube walls, been made into stickers and of course, blogcards.
These four reflect a lot about what I was feeling at the time I drew them, three or four years ago. How we all have a need to find “purpose”, and the stuff we do and the people we interact with each day, in order to find “it”.
So today, being a day that for me is a lot about finding my own purpose, I’ve decided that it would be a poignant moment to make these available for people to own. You can throw away your yellow’d download and own the real thing instead, signed and numbered by me. An edition of 100, sold as a set in a portfolio, for $300 [Plus Shipping & Handling]. In a few days we’ll be offering the individual prints for about $100 each.
These are smaller versions of what we have been doing up until now. They measure 11“x14”, and can be framed and hung, or kept in a portfolio to view or use for meetings and then put away etc.
They are all hand-pulled serigraphs, and printed on Rives-Arches paper. For those of you thinking about collecting the work long-term, this is a good, affordable, and fun place to start. I hope to be making lots more of these portfolio editions in the future. Thanks.

[Hat tip to Kilgore Trout, of course.…]

[etc: About Hugh. Interview. Newsletter. Book. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades. Hughtrain.]

[“Advertising Moleskine”. 5“x7”. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
Dave Whittle, an advertising executive down in Australia, commissioned me to draw him a Moleskine, based on an old cartoon print-out of mine, that he had hanging on his office wall.
A Cube Grenade. Exactly.
Yes, I’ll have it framed, like this one.
It was a fun project. It turned out well. I am pleased. Thanks, Dave!.
[gapingvoid commissions…]

Rich Peterson sent me the photo above, with the following e-mail:

Short story about the attached image. I work in an R&D team in a large company. We use these badges to get into the office, get into various conference rooms, etc. Without it, you’re basically hosed (can’t even get into the parking lot). No big deal, but unlike companies where they’re used as name badges as well (with the employee’s photo and name on it) our badges are completely generic. Until Now.
One last note — a few others in the office have asked me for a copy of mine, so it’s spreading

[The Cube Grenade archive is here.]