[The "Wolf vs Sheep" print. One of my favorites...]

I’m working on a new series of cartoons; earlier today I made a list of the desired adjectives to describe it:

Smart. Bright. Explosive. Witty. Acerbic. Colorful. Aspirational. Inspirational. Spiritual. Entrepreneurial. Fun.

i.e. Not too unlike the “Wolf vs Sheep” print. Or “We Need To Talk”.

I think spending all this time in the sunny West Texas desert has had an effect on me. I’m not sure all this dark, Northern doom & gloom I spent articulating rather well in my early London and New York days, is as interesting to me as it once was. Things change.

Expect to see a new direction happening over the next few months. I can already feel it growing inside me.

No going back…

[N.B.  As of January, 2010, I am no longer publishing new cartoons on gapingvoid. From now on, "Hugh's Daily Frickin' Cartoon" is the place to see them, Thanks!]

["If In Doubt". Buy the print here etc.]

This is the cartoon that was sent out with today’s “Daily Frickin’ Cartoon” Newsletter. Here’s the blurb that went with it.

Love is the easiest thing in the world to do, until it isn’t. Until we get overwhelmed by “Stuff”. The black lines in the cartoon represent overwhelming “Stuff”. The red lines represent “Love”, fighting like hell to keep alive, in spite of overwhelming odds. We’ve all been there….

I don’t know why, but I really like this one. Maybe because I identify ALL TOO WELL with the wee red bit, trapped there in the corner.

[The "Linchpin" Series- available over on the gapingvoid Gallery etc.]

Last month my friend and mentor, Seth Godin released his longest and probably most important book, “Linchpin”. I interviewed him about it here.

To celebrate the book, Seth let me design a portfolio of four fine art prints, inspired by the book, entitled “The Linchpin Series”. You can go check out over on the gapingvoid Gallery here.

What else is there to say? Seth wrote a great book. Like I said in my review on Amazon,

“And Seth then challenges us, the readers, to become linchpins ourselves. To make the leap. To become artists. To do emotional work, whatever the sacrifice may be. It’s our choice, and it’s our burden. Seth won’t be there to catch us if we fall, but to become the people we need to be eventually, well, we probably wouldn’t want him to, anyway.

Congratulations, Seth. You have penned a real gem of a book here. Rock on.”

I basically wanted to create a set of prints- “Cube Grenades” – to go on the office wall, as Linchpin “Idea-Souvenirs” to kick the viewer in the pants. “Remember Who You Are” and all that.

I hope you’ll pay the gallery a visit. Meanwhile, you can check them out below as well.

Thanks, Seth! I had a lot of fun drawing these. Rock on.

LIFE IS TOO SHORT (Linchpin 1)

Life is too short not to do something that matters, not to become a “Linchpin”. I know it, you know it, we all know it, so let’s stop futzin’ around at get on with it. Like Seth says, “Decide”.

INSANE ASYLUM (Linchpin 2)

Why do people become what Seth Godin calls “Linchpins”? Becasue to not do so would drive us crazy. Eventually we have no choice. And we’ve all been in worse places- when you know you’re capable of doing great things, being in “The Zone”, but every external marker out there indicates otherwise- that you’ll never get to do the “life’s best work” that you’re capable of. That your career will be nothing but drudgery and abuse, in exchange for what seems an increasingly meager paycheck.

And after being there long enough, the decision to become a Linchpin eventually becomes an easy one. But it can take time.

ALL ARTISTS ARE ENTREPRENEURS (Linchpin 3)

By Seth’s definition, an artist is not just some person who messes around with paint and brushes, an artist is somebody who does (and I LOVE this term) “emotional work.”

Work that you put your heart and soul into. Work that matters. Work that you gladly sacrifice all other alternatives for. As a working artist and cartoonist myself, I know exactly what he means. It’s not what you do, it’s the way that you do it.

THIS IS IT (Linchpin 4)

It’s easy to tell somebody to get into The “Linchpin” Zone. Much harder to live it. But fight like hell to get there, regardless, every friggin’ day, or else you’ll never make it.

You know you’re capable of doing great things, being in “The Zone”, but every external marker out there indicates otherwise- that you’ll never get to do the “life’s best work” that you’re capable of. That your career will be nothing but drudgery and abuse, in exchange for what seems an increasingly meager paycheck.

Yeah, it’s a painful place to be. But it doesn’t last forever, not if you don’t give up. Not if you don’t succumb to all the overpriced, “treadmill-enabling”, external markers of success- fancy houses, cars, schools, vacations and “stuff” that you can’t really afford, that you don’t really need nearly as much as the guy in the next cubicle says that you do.

THE LINCHPIN PORTFOLIO: ALL FOUR FOR $200.

What a deal, what a steal etc. All four, 11″x14″ each, proper archival paper, inks and printing tech, all hand-signed by me, for the price of a moderately-OK-but-not-great meal for two in Manhattan. And of course, for hardcore Seth fanboys, there’s the “Purple Cow” print from early 2009.

[Click on image to enlarge etc.]

[Note To Team:] I’m thinking this picture REALLY needs to a print one day. Preferably soon. Yes? It fits in VERY nicely with “Remember Who You Are”….

[About Hugh. Cartoon Archive. Commission Hugh. Sign up for Hugh’s “Daily Frickin' Car­toon” Newsletter.]

["Small Places". The cartoon I sent out to the "Hugh's Daily Cartoon" list a day or two ago...]

The unofficial tag-line for the gaping Gallery is “Remember Who You Are”. We’ve been using it internally for a while now. It goes back to what I said on the Cube Grenade page:

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 are.”

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.

My work has never been about getting the approval of the New York art gallery mafia. My work has always been about “What Really Matters” to people, especially to my peers.

Which is is why I’ve not minded sending out schamaltzy, cutey-pie “Love” themed cartoons on my email list this last week.

Valentine’s Day might be corny, it might be crassly commercial, it might be vastly overdone…

But Romantic Love is important. It matters. And by taking the trouble to send your loved one a Valentine’s card or whatever, you’re reminding both yourself and the other person that yes, you haven’t forgotten that it matters.

Hence why it fits in nicely with “Remember who you are”.

Once Valentine’s Day is over I’ll return to my usual heartless, cynical shtick, of course. Just in case y’all were worried…

[Bonus Link:] “When life gets really tough, just remember the white pebble. Just remember who you really are. Just remember the person that only God can see.”

[P.S. Big Props to Vinny for helping to move my thinking forward. Dinner is on me next time, Buddy!]

Really pleased about this. The “Not Delusional” cartoon that I posted a few weeks ago is now available as a print…

[About Hugh. Car­toon Archive. Com­mis­sion Hugh. Sign up for Hugh’s “Daily Car­toon” News­let­ter.]

[Buy the print here etc.]

Back in Blogging’s glory days of 2007 (Man, that seems like a LONG time ago), my client, the Stormhoek winery was sponsoring the famous annual Techcrunch Party in Silicon Valley.

To add some fun to the event, we made up 1000 signed, limited edition commemorative prints, which we handed out free to the guests.

Of all the Techcrunch Party prints we made over the last four years, I probably have the most affection for this one. The image is of a map of the San Francisco area, with a blue “X” marking the exact spot in Menlo, CA. where the party took place.

I’ve always like maps, I’ve always liked the relationship between a 2-D, visual representation and the actual terrain. Bear in mind up to that point- Summer, 2007, I had never ventured to Silicon Valley before, I could only imagine what it must be like to be there. It gave the piece a rather fanciful intensity, I reckon.

Though we gave most of the prints to Mike Arrington and the Techcrunch crew for the party, I hung on to a few of them, thinking they might be valuable one day, or failing that, they’d a great little momento to a most remarkable time in Internet history.

Turns out I was right on both counts. Rock on.

[About Hugh. E-mail Hugh. Hire Hugh. Buy Hugh’s Art. Car­toon Archive.]

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.]

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.]

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

[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.
We’re throwing the party in a Lebanese restaurant in Chelsea, I’ll also have some of my other works on display- both prints AND original drawings. And yes, they’ll be for sale. So it’ll be a bit like an art opening, with perhaps more emphasis than usual on the people attending [not to mention, food and drink], than the actual art itself. Stormhoek, naturally, will be supplying the wine.
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.]

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

[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.

[Welcome To...]

[I Don't Have Friends.]

[I Choose This Life.]

[Mistakenly.]

[C.F.A.]

[Vanished.]

["Portfolio Number One".]

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

[Visit my print gallery here.]

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