The James Jarvis drawings that Dan Nadel posted this past week on the Picturebox blog are a revelation.

An homage to Goya’s “The Sleep of Reason Produces Monster” from Day 1 of the James Jarvis posts.

A colored page from Day 4 of the James Jarvis posts. These posts on the Picturebox blog are promotion for a full-color book that Jarvis has out, De Profundis.

Pure, unfettered cartooning. The impulsive, inky scratching of them reminds me of Ralph Steadman …

This is Steadman’s homage to that same Goya etching. I posted it so large because I stitched it together from two scans I did of Gonzo: The Art, a Steadman art book.

… mixed with a little bit of Maurice Sendak and of course, Pierre Alechinsky.

Alechinsky, “Alvéoles.”

Alechinsky, “Volcan ensorcelé.” Both of these paintings are from the website of the Alechinsky retrospective at the Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. Check out this Alechinsky post by Derik A Badman or my previous Alechinsky post for more examples of his comic-like work.

Steadman was one of my biggest early influences and I love Alechinsky so Jarvis’s work really speaks to me. I’ve been experimenting with modifying my wanna-be Moebius-and-Brinkman hybrid style to something more spontaneous and cartoony. I like working in MangaStudio but sometimes I just want to get away from glowing computer screens and put nib to paper.

Here are two examples of me doing just that, in these drawings that I did for Monster Show 6 at Domy Books in Austin:

I was thinking about the TV Tropes entry on the Quirky Miniboss Squad when I drew this (warning: TV Tropes is a link-infested time suck).

This drawing is dedicated to my buddy Grant Davis.

Disclaimer: these drawings may or may not be in the Monster Show 6. I’m going to have something in there but I don’t know what yet. Come to the opening from 7-9pm on October 29th (costume encouraged) to see tons of monster drawings by all sorts of amazing artists. If you’re in Houston, there’s also a Monster Show there.