Vintage O'Hara :: Random House UK

tomer :: writer John O'Hara was a keen observer of social status and class differences, and wrote frequently about the socially ambitious.

Appointment in Samarra - in December 1930, just before Christmas, the Gibbsville social circuit is electrified with parties and dances, where the music plays late into the night and the liquor flows freely. At the center of the social elite stand Julian and Caroline English—the envy of friends and strangers alike. But in one rash moment born inside a highball glass, Julian breaks with polite society and begins a rapid descent toward self-destruction.


the sentiment that lingered after reading the book is of someone being smothered to death by luxury and I wanted the composition to reflect that with a big oppressive shape closing in on a face.

BUtterfield 8- was inspired by a news account of the discovery of the body of a beautiful young woman washed up on a Long Island beach. Was it an accident, a murder, a suicide? The circumstances of her death were never resolved, but O’Hara seized upon the tragedy to imagine the woman’s down-and-out life in New York City in the early 1930s.


the sketch is from a specific scene in the book that seemed to summarize it all, the vulnerable human flesh, naked, under an oversized mink.

executions:

the big overkill :: breaking out of love

asaf :: this was one of those times. the AD was nice, the job's brief clear, and they even sent reference images. the article was about ways to break free from a romantic relationship. i started as usual with a sketch, but then was asked to do another one, and another, and suddenly found myself going full speed on a highway to nowhere.



when i finally got the sketch approved and moved to final, it turned out i missed the idea completely since they asked for a retro communist poster feel (meaning no contours, flat colors). i managed to forget this detail somewhere in between sketches, and here i was going all over it again.
with every new version the drawing lost a bit of energy, and the final result struggling to look alive. a bunch of lines on the highway to nowhere. a big overkill.

Design Museum Announces Award Winners

from the creative review blog ::

Tomer Hanuka’s jacket illustration for the Penguin Classics Deluxe version of Philosophy In The Boudoir by the Marquis de Sade

The category winners of the Design Museum’s Brit Insurance Design Awards have been announced with Penguin’s US Classics Deluxe editions winning in the graphics category and Haque’s Burble London installation taking the interactive prize

The category winners were decided by a judging panel consisting of Vitra’s Rolf Fehlbaum, publisher Lars Müller and architect and designer Antonio Citterio.

The Penguin books, also known as the Graphic Classics, is a series of re-issued well-known books featuring special covers by the likes of Chris Ware (Candide, below)

Lady Chatterley’s Lover illustrated by Chester Brown

And The Portable Dorothy Parker by Seth

In choosing them the judges commented (somewhat ungrammatically) “It’s a great achievement by its creative director Paul Buckley in commissioning a highly skilled group of illustrators and cartoonists whose creative visions have produced some fantastic atmospheric yet very individual covers with high artistic flair and design integrity.” For the rest of the graphics category (including two CR projects) see here

The Darker Mask :: book cover

tomer :: the brief : The Darker Mask is a collection of original prose stories recalling the derring-do of the beings we call Superheroes and the worlds they fight to save. But unique to The Darker Mask stories is that these plots and characters color a literary universe outside of what has been predominantly white, idiosyncratic, and male in previous homages to pulp. This is the stuff of urban legends, new mythos, and extraordinary folks who might live in a soon-to-be-gentrified ghetto, the dreary rust-belt of the city, or in another dimension. The Darker Mask offers an eclectic mix of popular fiction writers exploring worlds gritty, visceral, and fantastic.

free associations: an urban hero, a hero, captain America, suit with fish scales, like a chain-link fence, surrounding a ghetto, a sea of cement, a manhole half uncovered is half a moon, coming from under-ground, going through divides like they're not there, a secret power that can't be described with words, flickering like a flame.

later that day :

execution:

art direction: Irene Gallo, Design: Jamie Stafford-Hill

The Humana Festival :: Theater Poster

tomer :: the festival: The 32-year old Humana Festival is an internationally renowned showcase of stage premieres held each March. Many of the plays premiered in this celebrated annual event have had subsequent productions on Broadway, Off-Broadway, on film, TV and at regional theaters across the country. Three festival plays have won Pulitzers.

job brief: There are usually around 8 full productions in the festival. But there is no attempt to make the poster art reflect these specific plays. Instead, the poster image usually has to do more generically with writers, the writer’s imagination, the tools they use or "words" themselves. Images of the human mind as well as images connected to the work of playwrights today have been used. Also seen have been images that create a feeling of the energy, impact and humanity of the stage or a live theatrical performance.

legacy: Brian Cronin, Chip Kidd, Wiktor Sadowski (3rd and 6th images), Rafal Oblinski, Stasys Eidrigevicius. (this is a partial sampler of my top favorites).


failed attempts: 'Fear' as an overall theme / a mixer of genres


new idea- have the paper coming out of the typewriter BE a slit in the back-stage curtain through which we see the stage:



execution:

Meathaus: S.O.S. :: preview pages

S.O.S is the latest meathaus offering, published by Nerdcore. the book is a 272 page full color anthology edited by Brandon Graham and Chris McD who pitched it by asking a group of artists to "create a story as if it was the last comics you'll ever do". lots of great artists took part, including Farel Dalrymple, James Jean, Thomas Herpich, Zohar Lazar, Jim Rugg & Brian Maruca, Ralph Bakshi and much much more.


here are some preview pages->
to pre-order visit here->

illustration :: even worse than you think

asaf :: I love the free line drawing and the witty ideas of John Cuneo. he is always hitting the nail on its head when it comes to sharp editorial work. this piece, which recently appeared in the Rolling Stone was no different.

well, maybe a little bit, because it reminded me a piece I did not long ago-

illustration concepts are a funny thing. since they work mostly on contradictions it's not unlikely two completely different minds could eventually reach a similar conclusion.
when I posted my fetus illustration I was approach by 2 different illustrators, claiming they had done it before. one of them, Easy Gaon, even called me up and was rather upset, since his piece was self published in a delicate poem collection he gave me somewhere in the past. here it is -

did I steal his idea? no, because I was actually doing what the AD proposed. did John stole mine? I don't think so, but he probably came across the same photo reference as I did. ideas have viral tendencies. they come from nowhere and suddenly a little red light appears in 2 different brains. so what's left for us industrial image makers? sometimes I think it's all about fleshing it out, working on the craft. other times I give up.

and just to sum it up, a little ornament that tells the same story -

Juxtapoz cover :: and a sneak peek

tomer :: current Juxtapoz cover feature and an interview by Aesop Rock.


image on cover showcasing characters from an upcoming graphic novel Asaf and I are working on... more updates soon.

* a limited edition print of this image now available at monomyth

the Un-Men cover you'll never see in print :: censorship and good taste

tomer :: the plot does go there, but the editors felt it was a bit much.



* prints of this image are now available at monomyth

Un-Men Freak Tour '07 :: Saturday at NYC

tomer :: The Un-Men is a book that uses horror beyond set designs and plot devices. the core of the story--it's heart, is a cadaverous septic organism dripping on your polished shoe. Whalen ups the anti with every issue and when you feel prepped for closure he butchers it and hangs it to dry.
Mike Hawthorne- who does the excellent interior art, John Whalen and I will be at Midtown Comics in New York City for a signing on Saturday Nov. 10, from 5-7pm.

some sketches that never made it into finals, and a few finals that i haven't posted before.

SOS cover :: a new Meathaus anthology

tomer :: covering the latest anthology from the Meathaus crew, Meathaus SOS, edited by Chris McD and Brandon Graham.


the image is vaguely connected to Asaf's and mine contribution to the book, but also relates to the SOS idea. i tried to keep the narrative threads loose, one brother is down, the other is running away. is he calling for help? playing around? hiding a crime?

masmerim :: that's "nails" in hebrew

for all you hebrew readers out there :
dirties, a 10 pages comic book co-created by the tropical toxic team, previously mentioned on the blog, is now available in the latest installment of the literary anthology masmerim.
six installments published so far, each by a different concept (the latest is victory?), masmerim offers a selection of fresh literary segments, photos and comics.
issue #2, in the future, featured elephant graveyard, a comics by tomer.

toxic bloggers

asaf :: here is another illustration done for israeli paper Maariv.
the article talked about how popular blogs are turning into an undercover publicity device when bloggers are getting free merchandise to test and write about.

WU-TANG CLAN :: a national treasure

tomer :: the concept for this URB cover was to combine the Wu-Tang Clan with the Birth of America. the group was at the origin of hip-hop and since "defined itself by brilliantly conjured and successfully united mythology". (B. Perkins, from the article).


looking at the iconic paintings that celebrated the union wasn't doing it for me, but I was inspired by these old envelopes designs with modest two color printing and millage of pathos.


*type design by Alex Chow.

kissing liberty :: men's health germany

asaf :: this time the AD came with a specific idea in mind - Miss Liberty (the statue) and a Mr. Liberty, kissing.
I tried to create an old '30 poster feel with lots of drama, as to make that kiss bigger than life.
here are the sketches and final -