Retracing Dan's Past

Having previously lived in Missouri his entire life, my stepdad, Dan, has adapted fairly well in accepting that he is now a permanent resident of Kansas. Although there are times when he complains about the terrible drivers he has encountered with "the Johnson County tags." (I'm not sure what is so surprising about encountering drivers with Johnson County tags when driving in the vicinity of Oak Park Mall.) Still, he has learned to watch Jayhawks basketball and put up with our annual "Kansas Day" tradition.

With my brother, Nick, on spring break, Dan decided to take us to the Missouri side of the state line to see the areas where he grew up. I was happy to see the places that he talks about so often and get a better picture of his childhood neighborhood. We started off in Blue Springs, worked our way through Lake City and Fort Osage, and then wound down the day in Independence. Along the way we saw four different houses that he had lived in, and heard stories from each location. All in all it was a nice adventure in retracing Dan's past.

RFK Illustration

For my latest project I chose to illustrate one of my political heroes in one of the most famous moments in American history. I started with a video still from Bobby Kennedy's famous last speech at the Ambassador Hotel in 1968, where he had just won the California primary in his bid to become President. It is right after this moment, where he flashes the peace sign, that he walks off stage and into the hotel's kitchen that he is assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan.

The powerful thing about this moment for me is how Bobby is speaking to his self-built coalition of people from diverse backgrounds, and that he is offering an alternative to the violence and divisions that were present at that moment in our nation. In the illustration I wanted to incorporate different colors and make it somewhat abstract in order to symbolize the broad spectrum of people and ideas that contributed to Bobby and his campaign.

This whole project was done in illustrator as a vector piece of art. I thought it would be interesting to document the process as I went so here are the results. The final piece of course is at the bottom.

Shoes for Haiti

This morning I volunteered to help out with a project called "Shoes for Haiti," that a fellow designer and friend of mine, Jess White, organized. For the last few weeks Jess has worked with Gary Gribble's Running Sports and others to collect shoes for the people of Haiti. This was all done in conjunction with an organization called Soles4Souls, which has committed one million pairs of shoes for Haiti relief.

It was exciting to see so many people working together today, giving their time and energy for a country that can really use our assistance right now. The group worked for 6.5 hours, and by the end 11,335 pairs of shoes had been collected and packed to send off to Haiti. Here are a few shots from the work that went on today.

More KC

Vintage KC

My cousin, Andrew, just got a new Canon Rebel for Christmas and asked if I wanted to go shoot some photos with him today to try it out. I suggested that we go on a quest to find vintage signs and marquees from Kansas City's past. There are still a few of these relics from the 1950s and 60s scattered around the city, and I wanted to capture the zeitgeist of that period. If you ignore the modern signage and block out the contemporary architecture it's possible for a moment to picture yourself in that time.

Sherlock Holmes End Credits

Quite a few design sites have mentioned how great these end credits are, and I agree. The concept and animation are brilliant.

Warhol Sketch

Last weekend Union Station had an exhibit on Warhol. Included were some of his flower pieces, a series on Muhammad Ali, a series on "Jewish geniuses," a series of animals, and a series of mythical figures (wicked witch, Santa Claus, Mickey Mouse, and Warhol himself). At the end of the exhibit you could sketch something out with crayons and paper. You could tell that a lot of artistic people had been through because there were some nice quick sketches pinned to the wall. Others were drawings by children and some were statements on Obama or comments on their favorite sports teams. I did a quick sketch (above) of one of Warhol's more iconic poses.