Archive for the ‘prints’ Category
September 14, 2009
1 Comment
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.]
September 1, 2009
11 Comments
[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.]
August 23, 2009
13 Comments
[The Purple Cow Print. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[UPDATE:] CONFIRMED: The print party will be held at Ilili, 6pm-Late, on 8th October, 2009.
Between 27th & 28th
236 5th Avenue, New York, NY 10001, USA
(212) 683‑2929
ililinyc.com
The restaurant will be supplying food, Stormhoek will be supplying wine. Plus there will be a cash bar, if you’d rather have beer or liquor. It’ll be a fun evening. Rock on.
For those of you still in the dark re. The Purple Cow Print that I worked on with Seth Godin, one of the greatest marketing thinkers in the world, this is just a note to say I’ve set up an archive of all the blog posts about it here
Seth blogs about it here as well…
And of course, it’s for sale on the gapingvoid gallery
The other bit of news is, Seth and I will be throwing an official launch party for the print in New York City on the evening of October 8th, 2009. A chance for friends of both gapingvoid and Seth to hang out and meet n’ greet. A bit belated, maybe, but we both had very busy summers.
Details to follow shortly. Watch this space etc.
Anyway, I hope if you’re in the area, you’ll be able to make it. Thanks.
[NOTE TO SELF: What a crazy adventure this has all been so far…]
[Backstory: About Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. EVIL PLANS. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.]
August 17, 2009
2 Comments
[“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.
August 10, 2009
14 Comments
[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.]
July 28, 2009
7 Comments
[Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[UPDATE: This offer is only valid until 5 PM EST Monday, August 3rd, Thanks!]
I am delighted to report that the “IGNORE EVERYBODY” cartoon, a fond favorite of computer desktops everywhere, is now on offer as a limited edition print. It will sell on the gallery site for $ 495.00 after it is published [mid-August], but is now available as a pre-order offer of $275.00, with just a $50.00 deposit. To make the deposit, click on the PayPal button below. As always, we’ll send you an invoice for the remainder once the print is signed, numbered and ready to ship.
[$50 Payal Deposit Button etc.]
Earlier this year, Patrick Brennan was stuck in an airport lounge for several hours, waiting for his connecting flight. To kill time, he started messing around visually on his computer with the forty chapter titles of my book “Ignore Everybody”. He came up with this, then emailed it to me.
I liked it so much, I went ahead and re-worked it, in my own handwriting. Very cool.
The book began life as a blog post, back in 2004. It had a very simple premise: “So you want to be more creative, in art, in business, whatever. Here are some tips that have worked for me over the years.”
Then I made a list, and kept adding to it…
I never expected it to resonate with so many people, but it did, somehow.
The fact is, there are millions of people out there who want to do something more creative with their lives. Of course there are. “Creativity” is NOT an exclusive domain for those goofy, trendy hipster types. “Creativity” is a basic human need.
And I don’t think a life spent fighting like hell, to get that basic human need expressed and fulfilled, is a bad thing.
So I decided to make these prints, in order to have something on the wall to remind us of this, every day. Rock on.
[Backstory: About Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.“EVIL PLANS”.]
July 27, 2009
1 Comment
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”.]
July 16, 2009
3 Comments
[Me and Seth signing the silkscreen…]
Got back to West Texas last night after almost a week on the road. A quick visit to Silicon Valley for the Techcrunch Party, then an equally brief visit to New York.
I was on the East Coast mostly to co-sign the Purple Cow print with Seth Godin.
That was a great afternoon, visiting his office in Westchester County. He’s a seriously interesting guy. We talked a lot about all sorts of things…
Other highlights were the #NYCtweetup- about 50 people came. Secondly, I got to meet my editing team at Penguin/Portfolio for the first time. They seem very happy with how the book is doing, so it was all good.
[Update: Galleycat, the publishing blog, also covered the print signing:]
Hugh MacLeod (right) became Internet-famous by drawing cartoons on the back of business cards and publishing them online at his Gaping Void blog. Along the way, he gained some valuable insights into marketing and creativity which he also happily shared with readers; that was enough to attract the attention of the Portfolio imprint at Penguin Group, which recently published MacLeod’s first book, Ignore Everybody.
Now, one of MacLeod’s friends (and inspirations) happens to be Seth Godin — if you’ve been reading GalleyCat long enough, you know we’re right there with him on that — and back in April, MacLeod drew a version of the cover to Godin’s Purple Cow (on a much bigger surface than a business card). “To me the book, as a totem, as an icon, represents a huge shift in thinking that came along, almost uninvited, back in the early 2000’s,” MacLeod emailed Godin shortly after. “The drawing represents [to me] my own ability to internalize it.” By the end of the month, he was taking orders for limited-edition prints which he flew into New York City earlier this week to sign alongside Godin. The pre-order price for the prints was $495, but if you want one now, it’ll set you back $1,100.
[Backstory: About Hugh. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.“EVIL PLANS”.]
July 9, 2009
5 Comments
In about twelve hours time I head for the airport, heading for SFO for the anual Techcrunch Party. Like I’ve done for the last four years, for the event I designed a signed, limited edition print, pictured above– a play on the “Dream Big” campaign I’m doing here in Alpine, Texas.
Then it’s off to New York, NY the following day to sign prints, including Purple Cow and Create or Die.
Hope to be back home, sleeping in my own bed by Wednesday night.
[NOTE TO SELF: Why is it, that the more internet-enabled the world becomes, the more time we all seem to have to spend on airplanes? Don’t get me started…]
July 8, 2009
2 Comments
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”.]
June 23, 2009
1 Comment
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.]
June 3, 2009
8 Comments
[“Dinosaur”]
[“Hughtrain”]
[“Quality”]
[“Talked”]
A week ago I wrote that we’d be producing some new prints based on some of the cartoons appearing in my book, IGNORE EVERYBODY.
After receiving a lot of feedback from y’all, we decided on the four designs above. Here are some notes:
1. They’ll be smaller. Approx 9.5“x14”, roughly the same dimensions as my Mac laptop.
2. They’ll be more affordable. Circa $125.00 US, $400.00 for the complete set of four.
3. They’ll be of the same high-quality. They’ll be silk-screened by hand. Old School. They’ll be signed and numbered by me. Because they are more affordable, they’ll be larger editions, say, 800 or so. We could have saved money if we used digital printing, but we decided against it — hand pulled serigraphs, still.
4. Finding Space: We realized that about 35% of each edition done so far is being purchased by the same group of people. Many of them are saying, we want to collect, but we are running out of wall space. So these images are of a size that can be framed and hung on a small wall, several at a time. Or maybe people will do what I do i.e. keep the images in a small portfolio, for taking out when they have meetings, or entertaining. In any case, it seems to me that making lower cost, true high-quality, limited editions, lots more people will be able to enjoy them. No worries for those with big walls, I am going to continue to do the larger images as well.
Over the next week, I’ll be working out all the details with this new size. Watch this space.
[More: About Hugh. Interview. Newsletter. Book. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades. Hughtrain.]
May 25, 2009
3 Comments
[“Dinosaur” Cube Grenade.]
[I’m currently accepting both private and corporate commissions for cartoons, company logos, ‘Cube Grenades’, large pieces, Moleskines, speaking engagements, workshops and whatever else you might be in the market for. Please read on for more details, Thanks! E-mail: gapingvoid@gmail.com.]
‘Cube Grenades’, I believe, is where my art works the best– small Social Objects that you “throw” in there in order to cause some damage– to start a conversation, to cause disruption, to spread an idea etc. And I want to work with clients to make more of them. That’s my business. That’s my business model. Exactly.
[P.S. The Cube Grenade blog archive is here.]
1. HOW ‘CUBE GRENADES’ ARE RE-INVENTING THE ADVERTISING BUSINESS [AT LEAST FOR ME]
In September, 2009, 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. Twitter. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. EVIL PLANS. Limited Edition Prints. Private Commissions. Cube Grenades.]
2. THE ORIGINAL ‘CUBE GRENADE’ PAGE
[Originally posted here, May, 2009.]
Above is a photo that one of my friends on Twitter sent me. He basically downloaded one of my cartoons off my blog, printed it out, and stuck it outside his cube at work, for other people to see, hopefully to comment on, and hopefully, to start a conversation.
Again, this, I believe, is where my cartoons work the best– “Cube Grenades”- small Social Objects that you “throw” in there in order to cause some damage– to start a conversation, to cause disruption, to spread an idea etc.
[The Blue Monster]
The Microsoft Blue Monster is probably my best-known Cube Grenade, which is why I made it into a limited edition print eventually.
Seth Godin first put his Purple Cow book into a purple milk carton for the same reason– he guessed [quite rightly, as it turned out] that people would see the carton on somebody’s desk, inquire about it, and a conversation about the marketing ideas contained in the book would be started.
[The Purple Cow print]
And the Purple Cow print was designed the same way. OK, it might be a bit big to display in a cube– you need a lot of wall space for this one– but the idea is the same– Conversations that happen around the object are more interesting than the actual object itself.
“Cube Grenades”. Exactly. Cartoons designed to affect change as “Social Objects”. Exactly.
[Check out some of my limited edition prints over at gapingvoidgallery.com.]
MORE NOTES:
[More “Cube Grenades” in action. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
1. Like I said, my cartoons work best when they’re used as “Cube Grenades” i.e. small objects that you “throw” in there in order to cause some damage– to start a conversation, to spread an idea etc. But other social objects can be used as well– purple milk cartons, homemade cookies, funky mousepads, rubber toys, newspaper clippings etc. It’s the people that matter, not the object they socialize around. I don’t claim to have a monopoly.
2. Repeat After Me: Cube Grenades are Social Objects. Cube Grenades are Social Objects. Cube Grenades are Social Objects…
3. All big change in companies come from the people in the trenches, who do the actual day-to-day work. To change their behavior, you have to change the way they interact. People interact around social objects. Change the social objects, and you change the company.
4. My friend, Mark Earls once told me a story about a friend of his. The friend played a key role in the massively successful corporate turnaround recently undertaken by McDonald’s.
His friend told him, “We knew we were screwed, NOT when the nutrition and green issues started hitting the newspapers, but by the simple fact that our staff on the floor just weren’t cleaning the tables and the bathrooms like they used to. We knew THEN that our people had lost faith in our company.”
What social objects were people using, both during the company’s decline and during its turnaround? What cube grenades were being thrown about, both before and after? I bet you they weren’t the same.
5. Yes, I am fully aware that your customers are paying for the quality of the products and services your business provides, not for the quality of the cube grenades flying around your corporate headquarters. But they are all related. Everything of value that your business creates is the product of a already-existing social dynamic. Businesses are people, not machines. And people socialize around objects.
6. An Open Letter to Ad Agencies: Guys, you are NOT selling messages anymore. You are selling social objects. The work that you create will affect the cube grenades and social objects, that your clients and their customers use to interact with each other.
[More Cube Grenades. “I use them as covers for my binders strewn about my desk, to start conversations”, says the person who e-mailed me the photo. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
7. You see a guy walking out of an Apple store, looking all excited about his new Apple computer he’s carrying under his arm? Why is he so excited? Sure, he just got himself a nice-looking piece of kit, but what REALLY excites him is all of the COOL, DISRUPTIVE STUFF he’s going to MAKE with his new machine. Videos, music mixes, whatever. For his FRIENDS and his PEERS. Again, it’s the SOCIAL that makes it interesting. Apple makes cube grenades, just like the ad agencies. Just like you do.
8. People download my cartoons and stuck them on their walls by the THOUSANDS. A much smaller number spend money to buy the more expensive versions i.e. my prints. But the idea is the same i.e. a way for people to interact. As I’m fond of saying: The conversations AROUND the object are FAR more interesting than the object itself. And what is true for me is true of your product, as well. “People Matter. Objects don’t.” Exactly.
9. So when do I start charging? You can download my stuff for free, so why should you buy a print? Who says you should? I’m guessing that if one of my cartoons is meaningful enough to you, you’ll get tired of seeing it printed on the office laserprinter paper in low-resolution, getting all worn and torn, with the Scotch tape getting all yellow and crinkly. If you like the drawing enough, eventually you’ll want to upgrade. The same way, back in college, that I would upgrade to vinyl or CDs, once the cheap and nasty cassette tape of my favorite band started getting all fuzzy and worn out. The same way I gladly paid $20 to hear the band play live, rather than hear the same songs on the cassette. “Meaning Scales”. The more cube grenades I throw out there, the more meaningful interaction I create for other people, the more people will want to pay for it eventually. If I locked it all down as a cash-only transaction, it would all die a horrible death overnight.
10. My long-term goal is to make more privately-commissioned “Cube Grenades” for more clients like agenciaclick. It was a wonderful working experience for me, and I want to spend more time in that business. If you find this idea interesting, please feel free to e-mail me at gapingvoid@gmail.com. Thanks.
3. CUBE GRENADES: LIMITED-EDITION, FINE ART PRINTS
[Privately-commissioned “Cube Grenades” i.e. limited edition, fine art prints that I did for my Brazilian client, agenciaclick. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
“This, I believe, is where my cartoons work the best– ‘Cube Grenades’- small social objects that you ‘throw’ in there in order to cause some damage– to start a conversation, to spread an idea etc.”
Probably the job I’m most proud of recently, is when I was hired by a Brazilian ad agency, agenciaclick to create a privately commissioned edition of cube grenades i.e. fine art prints. See photo above.
They didn’t want these prints for themselves; they wanted to give these out to their clients, as conversation starters.
“All brands are open brands? Huh? What does that mean? Do you agree with it? Why? What does “open” actually mean? What does “brand” actually mean…?” You get the picture. The same idea that made The Blue Monster so successful. Again, it wasn’t about the message, the object. It was all about the social.
My long-term goal is to make more privately-commissioned “Cube Grenades” for more clients like agenciaclick. It was a wonderful working experience for me, and I want to spend more time in that business.
[The Cube Grenade archive is here..]
4. “THE AD AGENCY PITCH”
To keep everything on the same page, I copied & pasted the entire “Ad Agency Pitch” from May 30th below. Thanks.
[Signing the agenciaclick cube grenade a couple of weeks ago…]
Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been talking with various advertising and PR folk about the Cube Grenade idea. Here are some notes:
1. In terms of the advertising and PR industries, the Cube Grenade is basically conceived as a relatively cheap and effective Social Object to articulate the Purpose-Idea of a brand or company.
2. If the agency has an idea they REALLY want to sell to their client, they might have better luck if they first articulate the idea via a Cube Grenade designed by me, rather than the traditional “agency pitch” model. The agency’s idea is somehow articulated as a commissioned print, the print is given out as a gift, to people within the relevant constituency. The print hangs on a wall, other people see it, and if the idea is any good then people will start talking about it. That conversation will lead to other conversations. If the idea is any good, other ideas [and opportunities] will be spawned from it.
3. The Cube Grenade is not a glorified advertising poster. I’m not primarily interested in why people should buy the client’s product per se. I’m far more interested in the human dynamic, the collective human drive that makes the client’s people want to get up in the morning and go to work. That is where THE REAL VALUE is created.
4. Because the Cube Grenade is given as a gift– an act of love, as it were– AND NOT A DELIVERABLE WANTING TO BE SOLD, it will break through the cultural barriers of the client company a lot more cheaply and quickly than your standard “Big Advertising Idea”. The game here is not about “Selling An Ad”, the point is to make the client more alive, more human, more aware of their own human potential. Again, this is where is where THE REAL VALUE for the client-agency relationship is created.
5. Whether the Cube Grenade “works” or not in the end, both agency and client will find out if the thought behind it works A LOT sooner and inexpensively than executing your average ad campaign. Like all communication, the idea needs to RISK FAILURE if it’s ever to be any good. “Fail cheap, fail often”, as the great venture capitalist, Esther Dyson likes to say.
6. As I’ve said before to the ad agencies: “Guys, you are NOT selling messages anymore. You are selling Social Objects. The work that you create will affect the Cube Grenades and Social Objects, that your clients and their customers use to interact with each other.” This is why I’m talking to advertising folk. At the end of the day, we’re both in the same business.
7. To get more background reading, please visit my Cube Grenade archive here. You might also want to check out “The Hughtrain” to get a better understanding of where my ideas are coming from.
8. As always, if this idea is of any interest to you, please feel free to contact me at gapingvoid@gmail.com. Or if you know someone in the advertising industry, please send them along to this page [Here’s the link]. Thanks!
5. “OFFICE ART”
Originally posted on this blog, September, 2009: a little bit of the philosophy behind my work:
[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.
6. “Art And The Real World”.
[Originally posted on this blog, October, 2009]
[“Portfolio Number One”, hanging in a collector’s office in Germany.]
I’ve been playing around with this line a lot recently: “Art For The Real World”.
I’m interested in how art affects what some people call “The Real World”- the workplace, the world of work, the world of business. That’s what the Cube Grenade idea is all about.
My advertising buddy, Vinny Warren, grew up in a Roman Catholic household in Ireland. He was telling me that his parents would always have a few religious icons hanging on the wall somewhere. Pictures of Saints, Mary & Baby Jesus, that kind of thing.
Why? Says Vinny, “To remind us who we were.”
Art that reminds you who you are. Exactly. What applies in Catholic households also applies in places of business. Shared Meaning. Exactly. Social Objects. Exactly.
I don’t think any of this is rocket science…
[Update:] John left a good comment:
I think surrounding ourselves with icons, art, books and such to remind ourselves of who we are, where we have been and where we hope to go is essential to keeping our hearts alive. It is too easy to lose our way. My office is full of these things.
7. MOLESKINES:
[“Moleskine 42″ in a nice wooden frame. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[“Moleskine 42″ before the framing, approx 5“x7”: Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[Close-up view]
In May, 2008 I blogged about a new drawing, “Moleskine 42″.
Since then I’ve gotten a lot of requests for them. So I plan to be doing more in future.
ADVERTISING MOLESKINE:
[“Advertising Moleskine”. 5“x7”. Framed. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[Unframed. 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. I sold my first Moleskine to a collector in Paris. This one is going to somebody in the South Pacific. I love the way the Internet gives relatively small operations like my own a global reach. Thanks, Dave!.
[The Moleskine archive is here.]
[Backstory: About Hugh. E-mail Hugh. Work with Hugh. Twitter. Cartoon Archive. Newsletter. Book. Interview One. Interview Two. EVIL PLANS. Limited Edition Prints. Cube Grenades.]
May 23, 2009
54 Comments
[Me signing copies of “Ignore Everybody” earlier this week. 25 boxes, 40 books in each…]
With my upcoming book launch less than three weeks away, we decided to published prints from some of the cartoons found in the book.
The book has eighty-odd cartoons in it, I’ve made a shortlist of fourteen [See Below], from which I’ll actually print up three in the next couple of weeks, to coincide with the books hitting the shops [UPDATE: I’ve also included two or three cartoons that aren’t in the book, but maybe should have been etc.].
These prints will be smaller than the last ones [approx 9“x14” i.e. roughly the same dimensions as my MacBook] and cheaper [around $100-$125 for one, around $300 for the set]. They may be black and white only, or we may use maybe one color, we’re not sure yet.
In spite of their small size, like last time, they will be signed, and will be printed as high-quality silkscreens.
Upmarket Cube Grenades. Exactly.
Here is the shortlist. Feel free to leave your feedback in the comments, Thanks!
MISTAKENLY
WOLF VS. SHEEP
WE NEED TO TALK
I DON’T HAVE FRIENDS
WELCOME TO…
IT’S NOT WHAT THE SOFTWARE DOES
ANGELS
COMPANY HIERARCHY
DINOSAUR
IF YOU TALKED TO PEOPLE
QUALITY
GOOD FOR YOU
THE HUGHTRAIN
THRIVING IN MARKETS
May 2, 2009
2 Comments
[A “Wolf vs Sheep” print arrived at Matt Langdon’s house. The cat is immediately suspicious etc.]
[Update:] Matt left the following in the comments:
My cats love plastic, what can I say?
Fantastic print Hugh. The quality actually surprised me and I was expecting high quality.
As they say in Internet circles, w00t!
May 1, 2009
5 Comments
I took this picture when I was in Miami, while the “Wolf vs Sheep” prints were being packed and shipped. A customer asked me on Twitter for a progress report. So I showed her [and all my other Twitter followers] this photo– the print mounted on shipping cardboard, as “Social Proof”.
When you’re running an online business, where everything is articulated via digital, it’s good to offer your customers a real-time glimpse into the real world, “Where The Molecules Are”.
This is why I ask all my customers to please send me photos. It offers ME social proof, that all this is real, that yes, my idea went all the way from concept, to design, to printing, to shipping, to customers’ walls. It’s a wonderful feeling. These are my “babies”, after all– I love seeing where they end up!
This is also why I set up a Flickr photostream for the prints i.e to offer more “Proof”.
Proof is a good thing. Proof is my friend. The more “Proof” that is freely available out there, the more easy it is for somebody to trust my name, my brand and my product.
And this, of course, is also true with your business…
April 30, 2009
3 Comments
[The Purple Cow print. 39“x28”]
A few days ago, with the blessing of Seth Godin, I announced the Purple Cow Print. Here are some more of my thoughts, in no particular order:
1. I wanted to create an icon for the world I currently live in. The internet-enabled, Marketing 2.0 world. Seth’s 2003 book, “Purple Cow” seemed to sum up that world for me best. Turning into a print i.e. an iconic version of the world he spoke about, was a no-brainer. You walk into somebody’s office and see that print on their wall, you have no doubt whatsoever which worldview he’s aligned to.
2. I learned this while marketing wine: What’s interesting is not the liquid in the bottle, or what vineyard it came from, but the conversations that happen around it. Same with art. I wanted to make a print that HAD NO CHOICE but to start a conversation. A conversation about what? Not the work of art per se, but what the thing that the icon represents– the ideas in the book.
3. It’s the biggest print I have made so far: 39x28”. That’s BIG for a print. That’s a lot of purple.
4. Though I used “Web 2.0″ tech to market it, in many ways the print was a statement AGAINST what Web 2.0 seems to have been evolving into these last couple of years… a place where the shiny new tools seem to matter A LOT MORE to people than the objects people were building WITH the shiny new tools.
5. Though I’m really, really unbelievably happy with the number of pre-orders we have gotten so far, I believe the print will be A LOT MORE interesting to A LOT MORE people once they see it hanging on other people’s walls. Once they see the molecules with their own eyes. Once THE REAL conversations begin. The central thesis to Seth’s book is “Be Remarkable”. I went all meta and used his book design as a starting point to create something remarkable myself.
6. Somebody asked me recently if the way I marketed my prints [i.e. via Web 2.0] was part of the artwork itself? Well, I believe that all art is informed by its social dimension, including the commercial bit. The fact that you bought the print off a blog, rather than from a traditional art gallery, does indeed inform the story behind it. But you can just as easily take that theory so far. In the end, it’s made of paper and hangs on a wall. Theory can be a distraction. sometimes.
7. One of my great cartoonist heroes, Charles Schultz, once said, “If I were better at drawing, I’d make paintings. If I were better at writing, I’d write books. So instead I draw cartoons”. That’s exactly how I feel about my own work. I don’t see my work hanging in the Louvre any time soon. What I do see, however, and what gets far more interesting to me with time, is how people use my work fro their own ends, for helping them find their own sense of purpose. Seth’s book, or this print, won’t change your life. ONLY YOU will change your life. It’s only the job of the artist or writer to maybe give you a nudge in the right direction.
8. I am insanely grateful to Seth Godin for allowing me to run with this idea. He rules. Thank you, Seth!
[Check out The Purple Cow print over at gapingvoidgallery.com.]
April 28, 2009
6 Comments
[UPDATE: A picture of me holding up one of the Purple Cow prints. They look UTTERLY AMAZING in real life…]
[“Purple Cow” Printer’s Proof, photographed straight on. Dimension: 39“x28”, Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[The original design. Click on Image to Enlarge etc]
A couple of weeks ago I posted a new cartoon, basically a re-working of the front cover of my friend and mentor, Seth Godin’s seminal 2003 marketing book, “Purple Cow”. Like I told Seth in an e-mail:
It has occurred me many times recently, that one reason MANY, MANY people in the world are currently suffering during this current recession/crisis/whatever, is simply because they didn’t follow the advice in Purple Cow.
That’s a bit simplistic, I know, but it still has a ring of truth too it.
ALL your books are great, but Jeeze, Purple Cow is the one that really got under my skin, which is really what inspired the big drawing I did. To me the book, as a totem, as an icon, represents a huge shift in thinking that came along, almost uninvited, back in the early 2000’s. The drawing represents [to me] my own ability to internalize it.
You and I both somehow managed to find a way to currently live in this Purple Cow/Hughtrain world now, that we wrote about 5+ years ago. But now I see that same world suddenly arriving for millions of people… and it’s cold & scary for a great many of them.
Which is why I now think people now need to read Purple Cow more than ever…
I read Seth’s book right about the same time I really started to “get” this whole blogging and Web 2.0 thing. Purple Cow was almost iconic to me.
Which is why it was easy for me to envisage it as an icon.
So with Seth’s blessing, I turned this icon into literally ANOTHER icon– a very large, purple, iconic, fine art print. A “Totem”, as it were. Like Seth said on his blog, when he first announced the print earlier today:
Totem poles have been around for a long time, because they work. We need a place to tell our stories, and a reminder of what to talk about.
On a professional level, the stuff Seth talks about in Purple Cow is still very relevant. Be remarkable, Everyone is a marketer etc.- is what to me, Web 2.0 was all about. It WASN’T about yakking on endlessly about the latest shiny object or the latest crazy web-celeb stunt. It was about getting interesting ideas, products and services out to market a lot more cheaply, quickly and easily than it ever was before before. THAT’S WHAT EXCITED ME.
And that’s what this “Totem” is ALSO all about.
The print will be co-signed by both me and Seth. A limited edition of 380.
You can a pre-order one below for $495.00 below by making $150 PayPal deposit. This offer is open only to the first 100 people who respond. Once they’re in production, you can purchase one at the retail price of $1,100.00 over at The gapingvoid Gallery, my new e-commerce website that launched officially today.
Seth and I are planning on having some sort of “Signing Party” in mid-June up in New York City, to sign the prints live. If you’re in town, I hope you can make it.
Thanks, Seth, this is going to be insanely great!
[The Small Print:]
1. The pre-order price is $495.00 for the first one hundred people who order. Once the prints have been co-signed by both me and Seth, the price reverts back to retail i.e. $1,100.00
2. It will be a limited edition of 380 serigraphs, plus artist’s proofs. All prints will be co-signed and dated by both me and Seth.
3. The prints will be shipped out circa July 1st, 2009, soon after the NY print party.
[Click on PayPal $150 Deposit]
4. To secure your pre-order, please use the PayPal button above to make a $150 deposit. The PayPal form will ask you for all your details [including your preferred shipping address], which of course we’ll have for our records. Why are we asking for a deposit? To weed out the spammers, flakes and trolls out there [This is the Internet, after all], leaving only committed buyers in the mix. No other reason.
5. When asked for your details, please include your real name, not just your business name. The shipper won’t deliver it otherwise.
6. We’ll email you a PayPal form for the outstanding invoice once the artwork is printed, packed and ready for shipping.
7. We’ll be printing these to the same high standards as always i.e. top-of-the-line inks and paper, approx 39″ x 28″ in dimension. Please note this print is quite larger than the earlier editions, so make sure you free up plenty of wall space!
8. Shipping & handling [approx $45 USA, $65 abroad] is not included in the price. The buyer is also responsible for any Customs & Excise outside the USA. We ship them rolled, protected in tissue paper, in extra sturdy, 5-inch mailing tubes. If you insist on having it shipped flat, we can certainly do that for you, but it costs extra and the risk of shipping damage is far higher.
9. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me an email at gapingvoidprints@gmail.com, and either Laura or me will happily answer them.
10. Thanks, as always, for your love and support!
April 25, 2009
11 Comments
[Brian Manley kindly just sent me a picture from his Flickr stream of his new “We Need To Talk” print, framed and hanging in his office. Thanks, Brian!]
A while ago, I talked about “Social Markers”, a form of “Social Object” that places you in context within a group.
Social Markers are a prime form of social shorthand, that people use to STAKE OUT the ecosystem they’re occupying. So why do I find this such a useful term for marketers? Because obviously, if your product is a Social Marker in your industry ecosystem [the way the iPhone is in the mobile world, or Starbucks is in the coffee world, or Amazon is the book world, or Google is in the search world, or Whole Foods is in the supermarket world, or Virgin is in the airline world, or English Cut in the bespoke world etc etc] you will have an AMAZING competitive advantage to call your own.
And if the product your company makes is not a Social Marker, I guess the first question would be, “Why the hell not?” Quit your job and start over.
A few weeks ago I read an article in The Economist about how very rich Russians have suddenly started buying the art of Damien Hirst and other Western Contemporaries in large numbers.
Hirst is very, very famous. His work sells for millions. We could argue his work’s artistic merits till the cows come home… his work is cleverly designed to provoke that kind of controversy, anyway. But I’m not here to play art critic. I’m here to talk about something else.
When people buy expensive, famous art, it’s not just about the art in question. It’s also about the social dynamic that surrounds it.
When you spend a king’s ransom on a work of art, you are basically sending a message to the world, “I HAVE ARRIVED”.
“I, too, am now a member of a certain elite group. Like my peers, I too can appreciate and afford the likes of Hirst, or Warhol, or Johns, Rauschenberg, Matisse, Picasso etc etc. ”
“Art as Social Marker”. Exactly.
People buy large yachts for the same reason. Or large apartments in Mayfair or Central Park South. Or deerstalking estates in Scotland. Or golf memberships to Augusta. Or islands in the Caribbean. “Social” drives the purchase just as much as the object’s inherent utility, probably more.
As far as I can tell, people don’t buy my work to advertise the fact that they’ve arrived somewhere BIG, like these wealthy Russians buying Damien’s work.
It seems more like to me, people buy my work because they ASPIRE to arrive somewhere, one day. Somewhere interesting and meaningful, with any luck.
Wherever that place may be, I can relate. I hope to arrive there one day, too…
April 24, 2009
3 Comments
[The “AgenciaClick” prints being signed and numbered…]
[The “Wolf vs Sheep” prints, freshly signed and numbered…]
I’m in Miami for the weekend, mainly here to sign some more prints and do some more drawing…
Drawn in Alpine, Texas. Printed in NYNY. Signed in Miami. Sold all over the world, via the Internet. A global microbrand, if ever there was one…
April 23, 2009
No Comments
In my last CDF Newsletter I asked people to please send me any pictures they might have of my prints in their possession.
Larry kindly sent me two, with the following note:
Attached is my “Purple Puppy” on my far kitchen wall, alongside a Haring print I bought 20 years ago at his Pop Shop in NYC.
Also attached is “Techcrunch Party 2006″ in my old office space. What’s interesting is that it survived an major electrical explosion and fire in that building two years ago, and was the first thing I checked when allowed a brief visit while the building was closed for weeks afterward.
And, yes, I am a Crazy, Deranged Fool. Started my own small PR firm on Nov. 1, 2008, while Wall Street was imploding, replaced my prior income, and just recently exceeded it, with more growth imminent. Won’t kid you — the first two months were scary. But I stuck with it, and am merrily pressing on.
– Larry Bouchie
Thanks, Larry! If you have any print photos yourself– especially ones with PEOPLE in them, please feel free to send them to me at gapingvoid@gmail.com. Thanks!
April 16, 2009
No Comments
Chris over on Twitter left me the following message:
@gapingvoid “create or die” is a timely slogan for the country and economy. we have shifted too far over to the consumer side
Yep, I would agree…
[The gapingvoid “Create or Die” print.]
April 13, 2009
2 Comments
[Click on image to enlarge etc.]
Though this cartoon, “Create or Die” is less than a week old, it seemed to really resonate with people, and by the time the end of last week rolled around, the number of people emailing me about this image almost equaled those who voted for Wolf v. Sheep. So, being the kind of person that hates to disappoint, I decided to damn the torpedoes and go ahead and publish it, as it seems to make lots of people happy.
The cartoon was inspired by a dialog I had going with one of my clients, Dell Computers, just before Christmas. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this “creativity” thing isn’t just a Dell issue, it applies to all of us.
Like I said in my previous blog post:
In this globalized, hyper-linked, internet-enabled world, “Boring” has suddenly become a very expensive luxury.
[…]
I want to make limited-edition prints that somehow, even in a small, indirect way, helps make companies and individuals less afraid, and more willing to be CREATIVE, more willing to embrace the CREATIVITY that they already have. Because economically and spiritually, that is ultimately where our future lies, even if that idea sometimes terrifies us.
I can’t tell you what to make. I can’t tell you what your customers will find interesting or useful. I can’t tell you what’s going to knock their socks off. I can’t tell you what “Create” means to you or somebody else.
But I will tell you, I AM RIGHT about this one. Create or Die. That’s why I wanted to make this into a print. Something on the wall to serve as a steady reminder.
[The Small Print:]
1. It’ll be printed around the end of April, and will retail at $450.00. Not yet sure on the edition size, we’ll decide when it is going to print, all hand-signed and numbered by me. Using the Paypal button below to make a $100 deposit, you can own at the pre-publication price of $265.00. The pre-pub price will expire by Thursday. Any orders after that, but before the publication date can buy it for $350.00. The minute the image is printed, the price reverts back to $450.00.
[UPDATE: The PayPal Deposit has been removed.]
2. To secure your pre-order, please use the PayPal button above to make a $100 deposit. The PayPal form will ask you for all your details [including your preferred shipping address], which of course we’ll have for our records. Why are we asking for a deposit? To weed out the spammers, flakes and trolls out there [This is the Internet, after all], leaving only committed buyers in the mix. No other reason.
3. When asked for your details, please include your real name, not just your business name. The shipper won’t deliver it otherwise.
4. The print will be ready to ship in 4 – 6 weeks from today. We’ll email you another PayPal for the outstanding invoice once the artwork is printed and packed.
5. We’ll be printing these to the same high standards as last time i.e. top-of-the-line inks and paper, approx 24″ x 35″ in dimension. If for some reason, I don’t like the way the colors lay down when I am proofing it, I reserve the right to change the colors and if you don’t like the final image, you can have your deposit back, no questions asked.
6. Shipping & handling [approx $45 USA, $65 abroad] is not included in the price. The buyer is also responsible for any Customs & Excise outside the USA. We ship them flat, not rolled.
7. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me an email at gapingvoidprints@gmail.com, and either Laura or me will answer them.
Thanks, as always, for your love and support!
April 10, 2009
17 Comments
[“Hamster Wheel”. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
I’ve sold or given away a lot of cartoons to my peer group over the years.
And given the choice between the two, I have generally preferred it when they hung it in their office, as opposed to in their homes.
Not that I have the slightest objection to people hanging it in their homes, of course. But ever since I was a kid, I’ve wanted my place of work to be a creative environment, not an environment of slow, lingering, death-by-endless-drudgery. And when I think of my peer group, they always FELT STRONGLY the same way as well, regardless of what they actually did for a living.
Idealistic? Sure. Unrealistic? Often. But we never had a problem with that. We knew it was the price we paid for trying to be true to our guts.
And yes, I always liked making cartoons that reflected this “creative” streak we all aspired to professionally. And my peer group liked it, too. And this is basically where my office-centric cartoon shtick came from.
One of the buzzwords you hear a lot in the business world these days, is “Innovation”. Yes, it’s a genuinely worthy thing to aspire to. Genuine innovation creates lots of genuine value, every young intern knows this. Which is why people like to throw it around like confetti. It’s one of those words that sound good in meetings, regardless of how serious one is about ACTUALLY innovating ANYTHING.
Here’s some friendly advice for all you Innovation-buzzword fanboys: You don’t get to be more innovative, until you make yourself more creative FIRST.
“Innovative” is an “external” word. It can be measured. It generally talks about things that have been tested properly and found to have worked in the real world.
“Creative”, however, is more of an “internal” word. It’s subjective, it’s murkier. It’s far harder to measure, it’s far harder to define. It’s an inward journey, not outward. Which is why a lot of people in business try to keep the word out of their official lexicon, preferring instead more neutral, more externally-focused language like “Value”, “Excellence”, “Quality” and yes, “Innovation”.
The trouble is, of course, that approach doesn’t work as well any more. In this globalized, hyper-linked, internet-enabled world, “Boring” has suddenly become a very expensive luxury.
Do you REALLY think Apple is afraid to use the word, “Creative”? Do you REALLY think Steve Jobs goes around his office yakking on endlessly about “Value, Excellence, Quality and Innovation”? No, of course he doesn’t. Apple’s UTTERLY AMAZING design, business and marketing prowess comes from the UTTERLY AMAZING creative fire in their collective belly, not the other way around.
I want to make limited-edition prints that somehow, even in a small, indirect way, helps make companies and individuals less afraid, and more willing to be CREATIVE, more willing to embrace the CREATIVITY that they already have. Because economically and spiritually, that is ultimately where our future lies, even if that idea sometimes terrifies us.
There. So now you know my secret, evil plan. You have been warned.
April 8, 2009
21 Comments
[“Wolf vs. Sheep”. Click on image to enlarge]
[UPDATE: Wolf vs Sheep $265 is now closed. The price is now $350 pre-order until the print ships, early May. Thanks for the support!!!!!]
“Wolf vs. Sheep” will be the next gapingvoid print.
The votes are in, and it is always interesting to see which image wins, and what people have to say about why. We were betting that the winner was going to be “Love Begets Love”, but between the emails and comments, it was at least three-to-one for “Wolf vs Sheep”. [Which just proves that I still do not know why people like one cartoon over another]. Even though, fewer people voted for the other images, they were no less passionate about the ones they selected, and that started us thinking… as I will explain below.
I am always reminded that I need to spell out the ‘fine print’, as follows:
1. It’ll be printed around the end of April, and will retail at $450.00. It’ll be an edition of roughly 100, hand signed and numbered by me. The first 30 people who pre-order it by making a $100 deposit using the PayPal button below can have it at the pre-publication price of $265.00. Any orders after, but before the publication date can buy it for $350.00. The minute the print goes into production, the price reverts back to $450.00.
[UPDATE: PAYPAL BUTTON REMOVED, EASTER SUNDAY.]
2. To secure your pre-order, please use the PayPal button above to make a $100 deposit. The PayPal form will ask you for all your details [including your preferred shipping address], which of course we’ll have for our records. Why are we asking for a deposit? To weed out the spammers, flakes and trolls out there [This is the Internet, after all], leaving only committed buyers in the mix. No other reason.
3. The print will be ready to ship in 4 – 6 weeks. We’ll send you another PayPal for the outstanding invoice once the artwork is printed.
4. We’ll be printing these to the same high standards as last time i.e. top-of-the-line inks and paper, approx 24″ x 35″ in dimension. If for some reason, I don’t like the way the colors lay down when I am proofing it, I reserve the right to change the colors and if you don’t like the final image, you can have your deposit back, no questions asked.
5. Shipping & handling [approx $45 USA, $65 abroad] is not included in the price. The buyer is also responsible for any Customs & Excise outside the USA. We ship them flat, not rolled. When you give us your details, please remember to include your name, not just your company name. Otherwise the Post Office won’t accept it.
6. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me an email at gapingvoidprints@gmail.com, and either Laura or me will answer them.
Though “Wolf vs Sheep” was the clear winner, there was still a lot of PASSIONATE support for the two other contenders, “Create Or Die” and “Love Begets Love” [see the comments]. We’re looking at ways to make those available to you as well. I drafted a post earlier today that I’ll publish in a few days. In part, it says:
EVERY DAY now, I’m getting emails from people, requesting that I turn their favorite gapingvoid cartoon into a limited edition print. The good news is, in an ideal world, I would do it in a nanosecond. The bad news is, it is just not economically feasible. These sorts of print editions are really expensive to make, and without a critical mass of customers per edition, it simply doesn’t work
The funny thing about my work is, that because there is so much of it, so many different images mean so many different things to so many different people. On one level, I’ve been really blessed at being very prolific, but on another level, I struggle with deciding what to images to choose for production. Yes, there are obvious ones, like “The Bluetrain”, but many, like “Corinthians”, which proved to be really popular in the end, I could have just as easily not have chosen.
There HAS to be a better way. Somehow, I need to make the selection process more open to Everyone.…
So I’m thinking to myself, wouldn’t it be cool if people could SPONSOR their own limited edition? Seriously.
We’re looking into this idea where individuals can feasibly “sponsor” the production of their favorite cartoon into print form, and harnessing the power of the Internet to get other people to join their cause. We’ll either build or own website for that, or we’ll use something like Fundable.org.
[“Love Begets Love” and “Create or Die”.]
“Love Begets Love” and “Create or Die” will be the guinea pigs. It’ll be really interesting to see what happens. Please watch this space.
Thanks, as always, for your love and support!
April 7, 2009
7 Comments
Vinny Warren, a highly respected Creative Director in Chicago [He wrote the Budweiser “Whassup” ad campaign] has kindly hung his new “Bluetrain” print in a key focal point of his agency, the conference room. He blogs about it here.
Fresh from the framing store, it’s one of just 85 signed Hugh MacLeod prints from the first in a series of limited edition prints he’s doing. This was always my favorite cartoon of his. I used to have a b/w printout of it on my office wall. It pretty much sums up how I feel generally. And I love the wildly optimistic yet utterly truthful tone. The text reads: THE MARKET FOR SOMETHING TO BELIEVE IN IS INFINITE.
This advertising connection got me thinking about something I posted back in February, 2004, during the tail end of my own advertising career, called “The Kinetic Quality”:
“The Kinetic Quality”: All products are information. The molecules are secondary.
The future of brands is interaction, not commodity. It’s not something you buy, but something you paticipate in.
i.e. a brand is not a thing, but a place.
[…]
In the old days, the three most important words in advertising were “Unique Selling Proposition”. To me, the three most important words are “By Interacting With…”
–By interacting with Gerber, she becomes a better-informed mom.
–By interacting with The Wall Street Journal, she becomes more tuned into the world of capitalism.
–By interacting with Apple, she brings her entrepreneurial dreams closer to reality.
–By interacting with McDonald’s, her busy schedule is made slightly easier by avoiding a lot of fuss over lunch.
–By interacting with Ralston Purina, she becomes more attached to her canine friend.
–By interacting with your brand, she becomes…?
A good brand is a two-way conversation.
What we bloggers know about the nature of information (a great deal) can be applied far beyond our usual diet of media, politics and journalism. Because all products are information. All products are ideas. The molecules are secondary.
Back when I wrote that, I was an advertising creative i.e. selling other people’s stuff. Now I’m selling my own stuff i.e. my prints. And the same rules still apply:
–By interacting with gapingvoid, Vinny Warren [or whoever] becomes…?
The short answer is, roughly: “Better able to articulate his own worldview to himself and to people around him.”
That’s the idea, at least. Which of course, is THE WHOLE PURPOSE of art in the first place: Self-expression through third-party “Social Objects”.
Anyone who’s ever owned an iPhone or a Harley Davidson will know exactly what I’m talking about…
[Sign up to the gapingvoid “Crazy, Deranged Fools” Newsletter here.]
78 Comments
[UPDATE: “Wolf vs Sheep” will be the next gapingvoid print. Details here.]
In case you haven’t been following, I have been updating a few images from my back catalogue [which numbers over 5,000 drawings, the last time I counted] and turning them into limited-edition silkscreens.
It has been a great experience. It’s allowed me to reacquaint myself with the images, that in some cases, I haven’t really thought about for years. It brings back some old memories, and puts my mind to work in a new medium: How to translate 2″ x 3 1/2″ business card-sized doodle into large, 2-or –3-foot images.
As I spend time with this, I can’t help thinking about that age-old, never-quite-answered question, “What is Art?” How is it different, how has our relationship changed with it from even say, a couple of decades ago? Especially with the Internet evolving our sense of “Media” at such a lightning pace?
I don’t have a definitive answer to this, but I do have a few thoughts on the subject:
The artist whose work best summed up for me the Modern, post-World War Two, 20th-Century world that most of us were born into, is the late, great Andy Warhol. A fantastic magazine illustrator in the 1950s, who got into the imagery of televised, mass media in the 1960s. VERY mass-media. Who appropriated the visual language of a mass-produced, top-down, broadcast, CORPORATE world. The visual language of Madison Avenue, the visual language of Kellog’s Corn Flakes, Heinz Ketchup and of course, Campbell’s Soup. And we look at his work with the same sort of detachment as a TV commercial, or a can of beans in the supermarket. And we NEED to remain detached, or else this rather loud, glamorous, oppressive, consumerist worldview would bury us, would turn our brains to corn syrup.
Then along comes the Internet. A place that doesn’t do shotgun-media,“Broadcast” well. A place where if what you’re saying isn’t engaging, isn’t hitting people on a intimate, human level, it doesn’t get seen, it doesn’t get shared, it doesn’t exist.
Which explains why, as a relatively dedicated citizen of the Internet, I am far more interested in what a piece of “Art” can do for you, once it is on your wall, than what I got out of creating it. What it can do as piece of communication between you and the people close to you, not as a piece of academic Art Theory. I like the “Social-bility” of the work. I like creating “Social Objects”. And this to me, of course, is what the Internet also runs on. This, to me, is also what the new internet-enabled, post-TV world is all about. Instant, Human Connection.
And where does this “Human Connection” come from? Easy– from talking about the world you and I actually live in, not the world the “Theory Police” live in. Yes, that one. The messy one. You know EXACTLY what I’m talking about…
And yes, that’s what cartoons have ALWAYS been about to me, long before the Internet was invented, long before I even knew what Art Theory was. As I’m fond of saying, “It isn’t rocket science”. Real, Human Connection never was.
So, with this brave new world in mind, we’re thinking of publishing one of the three following cartoons:
1. “Wolf vs Sheep”. This is a re-working is one of my historical favorites. I first drew it when I had just to moved to New York, in 1998. It was about what I saw as the choices that people are confronted with in the rat race. They were fascinating times and elicited other favorites of mine, like “Company Hierarchy”.
2. “Love Begets Love”. Virgil’s famous quote. I drew the cartoon as a contender for the Stormhoek Valentine’s wine in 2007. It never made it onto the bottle as a label in the end, but a lot of people loved the drawing.
3. “Create Or Die”. Though I only posted this cartoon for the first time a few hours ago, I’ve so far received about 20 emails from people expressing serious interest in it as a print. I never saw that coming, but what the heck, up it goes…
We’ll publish one of the three, depending on the feedback we get. If you have an opinion either way, please feel free to leave a comment below, ping me on Twitter, or if you think you’re in the actual market for buying one, send me an email. Thanks.
The silkscreen print will be roughly the same size [approx 24″ x 35″] and of the same high quality as “Corinthians” and “We Need To Talk”. The price and number of the edition will also be in the same ballpark.
Please let me know your thoughts. All very exciting. Thanks Again.
April 1, 2009
4 Comments
Today was “Print Signing” Day. Spent most of the morning signing “Corinthians” and “We Need To Talk”. Rock on.
As you can see, “WNTT” is red & white. It was conceived as a purple & blue print, but as I e-mailed to people who had pre-ordered one:
As you will remember, it was envisioned as a mostly purple print, with some blue and black.
It looked good on the computer screen [i.e. lit from behind]. The trouble is, it didn’t look so good as a printed proof. It simply didn’t work. Somehow the purple didn’t gel with the other colors. It all looked kinda muddy.
So we messed around, as you can see in the second photo above. We took out the purple, just to see if that helped.
Then we changed the original blue to fire-engine red, we also tried orange-yellow.
And the red.… simply put.… looked SMOKING HOT! I’m writing this down in Miami. The WNTT edition [red] just arrived here in a wooden crate, and it looks utterly fabulous. Trust me; the photo doesn’t do it justice.
[The prints, 30 seconds after opening the crates…]
I know that the purple image above was what you planned on buying, and you may in fact have had your heart set on something purple. I totally understand that. Then again, Art is a work-in-progress. I didn’t know exactly HOW things were going to turn out until I was actually in the printing studio. C’est Le Guerre.
I’m signing the prints tomorrow and shipping them out this week. If you’re not happy about the new red color, I understand completely, and I will gladly refund your money in full, or credit you with a later print edition. It’s totally your call.
The vast majority of people were cool with this, a lot of them actually said they preferred the new red version. One person did have her heart set on purple, so we gave her a refund, fair enough. One other person agreed to take a “Corinthian” in its place. So it all turned out rather well, all things considered.
The prints are being shipped out tomorrow, so expect to see yours in the mail in the next few days. To be honest, I’m over the moon with how well these two editions turned out. These are very exciting times. Thanks, as always, for your love and support. Rock on.
March 25, 2009
10 Comments
[“Open Brands”. Commissioned by Agencia Click, Sao Paulo, Brazil. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
I’m delighted to announce my first privately commissioned gapingvoid print.
A couple of weeks ago I was invited down to Brazil by Agencia Click to do a bit of public speaking and some consultancy work for them. While I was at it, they also commissioned me to design a print for them, something that articulated their “Open Branding” idea. So I designed the drawing above, which goes into production next week.
The black lines represent “The World”, as it were. The red lines represent “The Brand”. In “Open Branding”, the brand is “Everywhere”, not “Controlled” or “Isolated” somewhere specific.
I took their idea, filtered it through my own visual language to create a third thing, an image that captures the “Purpose-Idea”.
I did pretty much the same thing with Microsoft and The Blue Monster…
I love this kind of work. It allows me to do my drawing thing, while still getting my brain out of the studio and out into the real world. Not to mention, I get to visit Brazil! Heh.
Thanks to Abel and Jeff for making it happen. Rock on.
[NB: If you’re in the market to commission a limited edition print, feel free to email me at gapingvoid@gmail.com. Thanks.]
March 19, 2009
4 Comments
[Bluetrain customers posing their prints online etc…]
Yesterday the “Bluetrain” prints started arriving in the mail. So far the reception has been really positive…
What started out as just an idea on my blog last December is now becoming reality.
Yes, I am very happy. Thanks to Everybody who supported this wee project. Seriously.
March 2, 2009
5 Comments
[“Corinthians”. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[UPDATE: The “Corinthian” pre-orders are now sold out. However, we do have some still available at the retail price i.e. $450. Click on PayPal button below to make a $100 deposit. Thanks for the support, Everybody!]
[Click on Paypal button to make $100 deposit etc.]
I first heard 1 Corinthians 13 read out in church when I was about nine or ten. Like a lot of things in the Bible, as a kid I found it puzzling at first. And over the years, it kept on giving new meaning to me. It never got old.
Paul’s most-quoted passage from his letter to the Corinthians is one of those things in the Bible, like Psalm 23, that just gets better and better, the longer you live.
In Anglican circles, it’s pretty much required reading at weddings. I remember when they read it at my sister’s wedding, ten years ago, and how much happiness and depth it added to the occasion.
Anyone who has ever had it read out at their own wedding will know– it’s powerful stuff. Which is what inspired me to make a drawing out of it.
When we asked people for feedback on the next gapingvoid print, “We Need To Talk” came out the winner. It’s now in production and the pre-orders are now sold out.
That being said, there was a lot of backchannel interest with “Corinthians”, as well. It was by no means a distant second. Not to mention, it was a damn fine design and the message is timeless.
So what they heck, we decided to make Corinthians available as a limited edition, as well.
Here are the details:
1. It’s going to be a smaller edition. Instead of an edition of 85 like with “Bluetrain” and “WNTT” We’re doing an edition of 50. [UPDATE: BEcasue demand for this print far exceeded our expectations, we made it an edition of 75 in the end.]
2. Once its printed, it’ll retail for $450 [plus shipping & handling]. Like last time, you can pre-order the first 30 in the edition at a discount, i.e. $250 [plus shipping and handling]. To secure your order, please use the PayPal button above and make a $100 deposit. The PayPal form will ask you for all your details [including your preferred shipping address], which of course we’ll have for our records. Why are we asking for a deposit? To weed out the spammers, flakes and trolls out there [This is the Internet, after all], leaving only committed buyers in the mix. No other reason. This shall be our standard practice from now on.
3. The print will be ready to ship in 4 – 6 weeks. We’ll send you another PayPal for the outstanding invoice once the prints are packed and ready to be shipped.
4. The print will be the same size as the others [i.e. large, approx 21“x32”], hand-signed by me, and it goes without saying, the same high-quality inks and papers will be used.
5. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop me an email at gapingvoidprints@gmail.com, and either Laura or Me will answer them.
I’m excited about this one. This Biblical passage has always meant a great deal to me, and as I’ve been delighted to find out via blog comments and emails, it turns out it means a great deal to a lot of other gapingvoid readers, as well. So it’s looking like it’s going to be a great little project.
Once Again, thank you for your love and support. Rock on.
[PS: To keep up-to-date with the prints’ goings-on, please subscribe to my “Crazy, Deranged Fools” Newsletter, Thanks.]
4 Comments
[UPDATE: I’m happy to report that the “We Need To Talk” pre-sales are all already sold out. The design goes to print sometime in the next week or so, and the plan is to get the editions sent out to their buyers toward the end of the month. Thanks Again!]
Dear Crazy, Deranged Fools,
I’m happy to report that the orders for my latest edition, “We Need To Talk” have gone very well. So much so that, besides what I’m keeping for myself, we only have four of them left! If you’re interested in acquiring one, please send me an email to gapingvoidprints, Thanks. All the usual details– price, shipping etc can be found here etc etc.
So I’ve been in the fine art print business thing for about two months. Here are my notes:
1. I suppose the first thing I’ll say about it is, yes, I am UTTERLY AMAZED about how well it’s going so far. Sure, I never started this venture with any intention of failing, but still, the response has been off the scale. I have honestly never seen anything like it. I’m kinda shell-shocked, to be honest, but in a good way…
2. I am truly grateful for everything; it would be insane not to be. Still, in the back of my mind, I am wondering to myself, is this just Beginner’s Luck? How long will it last? Could it all come crashing down tomorrow? I’ve seen that happen before, and it’s not pretty. Oh well, make hay while the sun shines, I suppose; that’s all you can really do.
3. I’m VERY glad I made the decision, early on in the game, to not to spare any expenses in the production department. The finest inks, the finest papers, the finest printers etc etc. When the Bluetrain prints arrived last week for me to sign, I remember opening the box and just being INSTANTLY STUNNED by how well they turned out, how pleasing both to the eye and to the touch. It was a truly happy, satisfying moment for me.
4. Choosing which design to turn into a print is actually pretty nerve-wracking. Producing an edition costs several thousand dollars, and no matter how good you think your gut instinct or market research is, YOU SIMPLY DON’T KNOW what people are going to do [versus what people SAY they’re going to do] until your money’s already been spent; until it’s too late to change you mind. “We Need To Talk”, is actually a pretty good example of “nerve-wracking”. It was a risky– it’s not exactly a message you’d want to give your wife for her birthday, nor a message you’d want to hang in your office in order to motivate the troops. That being said, it has a certain edge to it, which some people really relate to on a visceral level. Besides that, I had some strong, personal reasons for wanting it made into a print, so I made the call. I’m just glad it all ended well.
5. I fully expect these prints to one day be worth MANY TIMES what they’re selling for now. Which is why I hold onto a few of each edition– I’d be crazy not to. Art can be a very risky investment, of course, but when it pays off, it pays off EXTREMELY well. Looking at it from a brutally objective standpoint– do the math: My equity as an artist is worth a LOT more today than it was, say, five or ten years ago. I see no reason why that trend won’t continue, at least for the foreseeable future. What stocks in your portfolio can you say the same about? Just askin’…
6. All the experience I got setting up English Cut in 2005 – 2006 is suddenly paying off. We have a lot in common: a small, high-end, niche market, a blog to keep up, with a LOT Of emails to deal with. But this time, I’m not beholden to somebody else’s product. This stuff is all mine, now. I’m quite excited, frankly.
7. Probably the most salient piece of advice I came away with from Le Web in December came from Gary Vaynerchuk: “If you have a great product, and you love your customers, you WILL succeed, end of story”. I totally get that. That being said, I believe the latter is much harder than the former, on an executional level. Love is great, but Love is hard. Make of that what you will.
Thanks Again, As Always, for Your Love & Support.
Yours In Crazy, Deranged Foolishness,
Hugh MacLeod
February 24, 2009
7 Comments
[Me signing the “Bluetrain” prints earlier this evening…]
Dear Crazy, Deranged Fools,
Ok, so that’s the Bluetrain edition signed. Tomorrow I take them to the art packer’s, in order for them to be packed flat and shipped via UPS to their new owners.
From here in Alpine, Texas, to London, Hong Kong, Boston, Paris, New York, Austin, Seattle… all 100% enabled by our little, evil friend, The Internet. This is EXACTLY what I meant when I talked about The Global Microbrand, back in 2005. All happening for me now etc.
For those of you who have ordered one, please expect to receive an embedded PayPal button in an email from me, during the next couple of days. We were first waiting to see much an actual print weighs when fully packed, so we’d know how much to charge y’all for shipping. Thanks.
Yes, it has its complicated moments, but it’s all very exciting… I hope y’all feel likewise.
Thanks Again for Your Love And Support,
Yours in Crazy, Deranged Foolishness,
Hugh MacLeod
[PS: Check out the latest limited edition coming out: “We Need To Talk”.]
[PPS: Sign up for The “Crazy, Deranged Fools” Newsletter here…]
2 Comments
Dear Crazy, Deranged Fools,
After receiving a lot of feedback from y’all about the three choices, we decided to go with “We Need To Talk” as the next gapingvoid limited edition print.
Here are the basics:
1. The print will retail for $400 [plus shipping & handling], once it goes to print. You can pre-order it for $250 [plus shipping & handling], BUT ONLY if you’re already signed up to the “Crazy Deranged Fools” Newsletter [Sign up here if you haven’t already]. This pre-order offer only extends to the first 45 prints in the edition.
2. The print will be a signed, limited edition of 85, same as “Bluetrain” Dimension will be the same as “Bluetrain” as well.
3. If you’re interested, please email me at gapingvoidprints@gmail.com with your name, shipping address and a phone number for the UPS delivery guy.
4. The prints will be shipped flat, packed by a professional; not simply rolled up in a tube etc.
5. For more details, either e-mail me or go to yesterday’s blog post, Thanks.
This has been a pretty exciting 24 hours. Already a quarter of the edition has been pre-ordered, even though “Bluetrain” hasn’t even shipped yet.
Somebody emailed me this morning:
I believe the only viable future for artists (or most anyone else) is DIY, collaboration and cooperation. the existing systems, structures, paradigms and rules don’t work (never have actually, except for a chosen few, who worked hard to create the illusion that these things applied equally for everyone, lying bastards).
I wrote back:
Thanks. Yeah, the trick here is me trying to bypass as many established art-world systems as possible, in order to make [A] a point and [B] profit.
I have a lot of artists watching me at the moment, wondering if I can actually pull it off. It’ll be good for us all if I can.
We live in interesting times…
Thanks SO MUCH for your love and support,
Yours in Crazy, Deranged Foolishness,
Hugh MacLeod
February 23, 2009
69 Comments
[“We Need To Talk”]
[“1 Corinthians 13″]
[“SMS Important Thoughts”]
[UPDATE: Please e-mail me at gapingvoidprints@gmail.com if you want to pre-order, Thanks.]
Well, the plan is to start sending out the Bluetrain prints this week. It took a while to get the right fine art printer in place, and get the silk screens just right. For those who are unfamiliar with the process, we chose the somewhat labor-intensive process of silk screening, so I had to proof the edition and make sure each image was perfect. Anyway, they are being flat packed (shipping tubes could damage the print if people wanted to store them long-term) and hopefully shipped late this week
[“Bluetrain”]
Here are some notes on the next Edition:
1. Above are the three contenders for the next limited edition– “We Need To Talk”, “1 Corinthians 13″, and “SMS Important Thoughts”. The one that rings the most bells win, so let’s hear your comments below, Thanks.
2. Like last time, it’ll be a signed, Limited Edition of eighty-five, plus some artist proofs. Once they’re gone, they’re gone.
3. This edition will retail for $400 apiece. Like last time, we’ll be offering a discount to those people who pre-order before the actual printing– $150 off– so $250 each [Plus shipping & handling]. Except this time there’s an added stipulation– only people who have signed up to my Crazy Deranged Fools Newsletter will be able to pre-order. So if you’re a CDF member, please be watching your email inboxes in the next few days, or feel free to sign up now, Thanks.
4. The print will be silk screened on pH neutral, French-made, archival paper– just as The Bluetrain was. Dimensions will be proportional to the images above with the rectangular ones being about 25“x36”.
5. If you have any specific questions or issues about the edition, I have set up a new email address to handle all the print-related business: gapingvoidprints@gmail.com. Please address all queries and/or issues there, Thanks.
6. WHY THESE PRINTS RETAIL FOR ONLY $400.00 When the Bluetrain went up for sale, a number of people mentioned that they thought it was too cheap. Lots of people think that ‘good’ art needs to be expensive. That used to be true. We are all used to the idea that the web can make things more efficient and cost effective, but there are few products where this is more true than with art. Here’s why:
The art market is set up where there are ‘artists’, ‘publishers’ and ‘galleries’. As expected, everyone along the way needs to make a margin. The artist gets paid for his image, the publisher finances and contracts for the printing, and then markets the prints to galleries. It is a ‘charming’ 19th Century system. Unfortunately, everything gets very expensive. Quickly.
We’ve chosen to self-publish, and sell through the blog, even though I have been approached by many galleries over the years. I just don’t think that people who want to collect my work should have to pay for publishers margins, high real estate prices in trendy neighborhoods, gallery employee payrolls, free wine for the hangers-on, markups on the framing etc. All of these things jack the prices up.
Next thing you know, instead of paying $400 for a print, you’re paying $1500-$2000. Go hang in Chelsea [Manhattan] if you don’t believe me. Sure, fine art is traditionally expensive– it’s a luxury item after all, an indicator of surplus wealth etc– but with the Internet now so evolved, does it have to be this way? I’m not just talking about the old– fashioned, “We passed the savings onto you” angle. It’s more like, since you’ve invested in my work, I owe it to you guys to do my damnedest to see that your investment pays off over the long-term. And that’s more likely to happen at $400, than at $2000; do the math. Even if you’re never going to sell it, even if you got it at a steal, knowing that it’s worth far more than you paid for it makes you feel far better than the alternative. Of course it does.
Is self publishing risky? Sure it is. Am I planning to sell my work for far more than $400 in the long run? Of course. But, I do know that [A] there is nothing like a good deal and [B] the folks who support me early on will, in the fullness of time, be very happy that they did.
7. Yes, I will admit, taking the plunge into the art business is a nerve-wracking experience. Crazy, Deranged and Foolish, I know. I don’t care, frankly. I’ve worked damn hard for many years to get to this point. Fuck ‘em if they don’t like it.
As Always, thank you for your love and support. Rock on.
[PLEASE LEAVE YOUR VOTE IN THE COMMENTS BELOW. THANKS.]
January 23, 2009
2 Comments
Like I said in my previous post, last week I signed off on the first “Bluetrain” prints. Loren Feldman was in Alpine at the time and filmed it. He writes about it and posts the video here. Thanks again to Loren for the kind words.
Since then, I am happy to report, all the prints have been produced. Now it’s just a question of getting them down from the printer’s shop in New York City down here in Alpine, Texas for me to sign. Then shipping them off to the people who ordered one.
We’re also getting the PayPal thing set up as we speak. It’s all going according to plan.
I am completely exhausted and jet-lagged from my trip to Brazil. I had a whale of a time. This weekend I plan to do little else other than sleep and vegetate, then get back on the ball, early Monday morning.
Thanks Again for all the support y’all have given me over the last couple of months. This new phase in my life has been intense and exciting. I have no idea where it’s going. I just know it’s currently running on all eight cylinders. Hope I can keep up the momentum. rock on.
January 5, 2009
2 Comments
[“Bluetrain”- the new gapingvoid print. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
So yeah, the Bluetrain print sold out, two weeks before it even goes to press. No, I never saw that coming. Wow.
Since I announced that it was sold out, I’ve gotten a lot of emails from people asking me please, please, please, if a spare one turns up, could they buy it from me?
Well, like I said before, I kept a small number aside for myself, but I really want to hang on to them. At the same time, I don’t like people being disappointed.
So I decided I’d sell ONE MORE from my private stash. But who to give it to? The guy who asked first? The guy who knew me the longest?
Not being able to make up my mind one way or the other about who to give it to, I just decided I’ll put it on eBay, and let people bid for it. I’ve already done well enough from this wonderfully insane adventure, so to keep the good karma coming, whatever it sells for, high or low, I’ll give the proceeds to charity.
I’ll let y’all know when it’s up. Thanks Again. Seriously.
[UPDATE:] As for the people who have already ordered a print; we’re going to press hopefully in the next few days. I’m really behind in my e-mail [I blame the Holiday Season, mostly], so I should be contacting y’all shortly. Thanks for your patience AND your support. Rock on.
December 29, 2008
8 Comments
[Update: Video of me signing the first artist’s proof.]
[“Bluetrain”- the new gapingvoid print. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[Update: Bluetrain is already sold out. Thanks, Everybody!]
The print is an edition of eighty-five. So far seventy-five are accounted for, including the few I’m keeping for myself. Sales were pretty brisk right up until everything closed down for Christmas. I’m still a bit stunned about how well this wee adventure has gone, frankly.
So now I have ten left for sale. Full details are here.
For the last ten, the price is $250 each, which far less than I think we’ll be selling the next edition for. Hope that’s OK with y’all.
Again, THANK YOU ALL for supporting this random act of insanity on my part. Rock on.
[UPDATE:] By the time I had finished writing this very short post, the number left was down to eight prints. 15 minutes later, that number was down to seven. Wow. [UPDATE:] One hour later– only five left. w00t. [UPDATE:] Fifteen minutes later– only four left. Eek! [UPDATE:] Five minutes later– only three left. Ummm… [UPDATE:] Next Morning– SOLD OUT!!!! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!
December 23, 2008
6 Comments
[Update: Video of me signing the first artist’s proof.]
[“Bluetrain”- the new gapingvoid print. Click on image to enlarge etc.]
[UPDATE: 30th December. “Bluetrain” is now sold out. Thanks, Everybody!]
On December 4th, I announced I was going into the fine art print business, pretty much full-time, if all goes well.
Like I said earlier, the first edition will be coming out in mid-January.
I also said that the first twenty people who sent me an e-mail could buy the print at $175– once the print is made, the price will be around the $250-$300 mark.
To be honest, at the time I thought twenty wasn’t a very conservative number– I was thinking if ten or twelve took me up on the offer by Christmas, that would be pretty amazing.
As soon as I posted the offer up on the blog, I went out for dinner. By the time I came back two hours later, 24 people had already taken me up on it. Within 24 hours, the number was closer to 40.
Not bad for a limited edition of only 85, don’t you think? We’re talking about people buying something “Sight Unseen”- something that RARELY happens in the art business.
As for the kind people who e-mailed early, but not early enough to make it on the “First Twenty” list, I thought it would be unfair on the “First Twenty” to give them the same discount. But at the same time, it would be a shame not to do something to reward them for being early adaptors. Hmmmm… You can see my dilemma. So in the end, I told them they could have one for $200– it’s still a pretty good discount. They seemed happy enough with that, so all well and good.
The second thing I did was to let the First Twenty vote on which image they wanted to see printed up. I gave them a choice of three designs, the image above, “Bluetrain”, won the majority vote, so that’s the one we’re going with.
About the piece in question: It’s called “Bluetrain”, because yes, it’s largely colored blue, and also because it’s a re-working of the head cartoon in my business manifesto, The Hughtrain, which of course, was in turn named after one of my favorite books, The Cluetrain. “Blue Trane” is also the name of one of my favorite jazz albums. So it all fits together, somehow.
It’ll be a fairly standard poster size, approx 18x24”. They’ll all be personally signed and numbered in pencil, by myself. We’re also using a specialist fine art printmaker in New York City for the job, not a general commercial printer.
I decided to use color simply because I didn’t want to just blow up the original, black & white, bizcard-sized cartoon to poster-sized. I wanted to make it look totally new and different, yet totally the same and familiar. As for the “Pop” sensibilty, well, I am a cartoonist, so go figure…
Since that first big splash of interest from the First Twenty, we’ve had a steady stream of people signing up. There’s only about 20 left unsold in this edition, so if you’re still interested in having one of them, please send me an email as soon as you can [Thanks!]: gapingvoid@gmail.com
I hope y’all are as excited by this new venture of mine as I am. As always, thanks for your support, none of this would be possible without you. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
[UPDATE:] ONLY THREE PRINTS LEFT! Price IS $250 for the last ten.
December 19, 2008
9 Comments
[Click on image to enlarge etc.…]
This is a close-up section of one of the new litho’s I’ve designed. This section covers maybe 20 – 25% of the entire area of the piece. Just giving y’all a teaser etc.
Been spending a lot of time learning about printing, and the printing business over the last couple of weeks…
December 4, 2008
9 Comments
1. Sometime in the next few weeks I shall be releasing my first big, proper edition of signed, fine-art lithographs.
2. These will not be sponsored “social objects” from Stormhoek, Microsoft or whatever. These will be for sale. Cash. Moolah. Via this blog. No galleries.
3. They will be high quality. Very high quality.
4. I plan on using color for the first one, maybe black and white in the future– though I haven’t really thought that far ahead yet.
5. It’ll be an edition of 85 prints. I’m not planning on selling them all. I want to hold on to some of them, for posterity’s sake.
6. They’ll all be signed and numbered by hand, by me.
7. I plan to be blogging a lot about the whole process in the next few weeks. As with any new adventure, a lot of stuff still needs to be figured out long-term– I hope by talking about it with everybody, it’ll help me make better artistic decisions.
8. Though my work covers a lot of different themes and emotional states, for this first one I’ll be focusing more on the business-culture, Hughtrain sensibility. I want the print to be the kind of thing you’d want to hang up in your office.
9. This is not some groovy little side project for me. This enterprise is going to be a major part of my life over the next few years. Just letting you know.
10. We’ll be printing them up in mid-January. If you want to get in early, I’m going to make 20 prints available; you can pre-order one before the printing date for $175. Just ping me an e-mail. After they are printed the price goes up, to around the $250 – 300 range.
11. Thanks Again.
[Update:] Just got back from dinner. Tired. So far I have 24 requests for the 20 pre-orders. Looks like I may have to disappoint 4 people. Long day. Going to bed. Will talk in the morning. Thanks, Everybody!
December 2, 2008
9 Comments
[The Techcrunch Party print from 2007.]
I’ve been spending a lot of time this week, researching and talking to fine art print shops. Like I said a few weeks ago, I’m planning to spend more time in the print business.
This development has been a long time coming. In the last twenty years, I’ve drawn thousands of cartoons and shared them with tens of thousands of people, which has slowly built up what I believe to be a reasonably-sized commercial market for my work.
Besides that, I’ve been living in the West Texas desert for over nine months, and I’m finding drawing cartoons is far more aligned to that way of life, than being an “internet marketing guy” or whatever. Like a painter friend of mine told me the other week, “There’s not much to do out here, except make art and drink beer.”
Being a full-time cartoonist is still not something I ever plan on doing, but life has been pulling me more and more in that direction for a while, almost against my will. Maybe one day I’ll get tired of resisting it, who knows?
Wish me luck, anyway…
November 24, 2008
3 Comments
My friend, Gary Vaynerchuk of Wine Library TV fame and I have been talking on and off for the last while about me doing a lithograph for his wine business, in a similar spirit to all those Stormhoek lithos I did back in London.
Finally, yesterday, I stopped my dilly-dallying and just cranked it out. Voila!
Like I said a few weeks back, I’m getting more into the fine art print business. Social Objects at their finest. Rock on.
I hope Gary likes the design…
October 28, 2008
24 Comments
[Me working on “DesertManhattan”. Photo courtesy of Deborah Smail.]
After a couple of years of thinking about it, I’m finally moving forward in the lithograph department. Here are some initial thoughts:
1. Yes, I’ve done lithographs before e.g for Techcrunch, Stormhoek and Microsoft. Those were produced digitally, for high-numbered editions [one thousand or so]. This new effort will be much more high-end and exclusive. We’re talking very small editions [say, 25 or so], done not via digital, but by old-fashioned etchings on metal plates.
2. We’ll be using the highest-quality paper and inks we can find, bar none. We won’t be sparing any expense.
3. The pieces will all be framed by hand, using highest-quality woods and mats. No industrial factory-framing for these babies etc.
4. As of today, I have no idea how much I’ll charge for them. My plan is to put the first few ones onto Ebay, let people bid for them openly, and see what happens. I reckon this will establish a solid, relatively transparent market price, a lot better than mere guesswork ever could.
5. The size will be roughly the same as my recent large works on paper i.e. approx. 23x29 inches etc.
6. I haven’t decided what image, or what style of image I want to use for the first run. Do I go with my familiar cartoon format say, something like this, or do I go with something a bit more “arty” say, something like “Fred 44″? This is a conversation I hope to be having with y’all over the next few weeks, so please feel free to leave a comment below, Thanks.
7. Yes. I am SERIOUSLY excited about this project. Rock on.
