Ugly Cabaret

Dog Days of Summer

So...fair warning. This is where things start to get weird....

Santo Spirito

Back in October of 2017, my better half and I took a trip to Italy for a little better than a week. A handful of days in Rome followed by a week in Florence was just what the doctor ordered and turned out to be one of the most powerfully transformational moments of our lives. 

This image is a sketch I did on our final day in Florence. The AirBnB we stayed at had only one window in the entire apartment. This was our view from our lone window in the bedroom. Santo Spirito is just across the Arno via the Ponte Santa Trinita (the next bridge north of the renowned Ponte Vecchio) and is the name of this basilica, the attached convent and abbey, and the piazza it sits upon. 

The Basilica di Santo Spirito is Brunelleschi's plain-fronted church from the 1400's and houses, among other treasures, one of Michelangelo's earliest works, a wooden crucifix that, at a glance, you'd likely never attribute to the master. During his early years, he performed anatomical studies of the corpses that were released from the abbey at this church. In return, he carved an incredible wooden crucifix which occupies a gallery of its own in this quintessential renaissance church. 

These days, the basilica is visited primarily by locals for services, so when we finally decided to explore the oddly undecorated church in our square, we were blown away by the church and its collections, as well as having the place largely to ourselves. The main source of traffic for this church is in fact students. At all hours of the day and night, students and travelers gather on the ample steps of this church to socialize, drink, eat (seriously, the best pizza I've ever had anywhere is served out of a 20' x 20' corner shop a block and a half from here) and generally enjoy the square. 

If you find yourself in Florence, make it a point to visit Piazza di Santo Spirito, grab a pie from Gusta Pizza (be prepared to wait a little - there's always a line out the door!), pick up a craft beer from the first trattoria on the square (can't remember the name, but look for a stylized version of the basilica on the label - the beer is brewed right in the neighborhood!), and then grab a step in front of Santo Spirito. Trust me, it's worth it. 

Of course, part of me deeply regrets tearing this page out of my sketchbook to leave as a thank-you for our host, Allessandro. But then I pull up the message I got from him the day after we left, gushing about it, so I guess it was a page well-spent! 

Happy Little Comics

Yeah, my inner critic is seriously this vocal and this combative when I finally do sit down to get something on paper. So in the style of Chuck Jones, I decided to fight back...

Yet Another New Beginning...

So...earlier this year, I started making some comics, mainly to combat by creativity blocks and prove my inner critic wrong. I did a series of 10 - 12 at the time and then promptly forgot about them. Recently, I was flipping through the sketch book where I made these and they (well, some of them) were enough to earn a chuckle from me. Which is unheard of for me; I NEVER like the stuff I draw.

So in the process of leaning ever more towards professional illustration full-time, it seemed like a good idea to start cleaning them up and getting them out.

Over the coming weeks, I'll be giving this set of comics a quick clean up, mainly for legibility, and getting them up here, over on Tumblr, and maybe even on Facebook. This first set deals mainly with my own internal conflicts and the arguments I have with my inner critic anytime I set out to put pencil to paper.

Hope you enjoy and keep an eye out for a new website and a Patreon page in the coming weeks!