As we get closer to Alex Pardee's Sweet 16 Pizza Party and Raffle this Saturday from 12-2:30 PM at G1988 (Melrose), I like reflecting back on "The Butcher Kings," and laughing at its insanity. A lot of people ask me what working with / hanging out with Alex and Skinner is like. Luckily, our friends at SPY have created a video to give you that exact experience. Enjoy.
Like a young Herman Cain, we want to bring the pizza to you! With Alex Pardee, celebrating quite the important birthday milestone with us, we invite you to party and purchase prints!
It's Alex Pardee's Sweet Sixteen Party! Join us this Saturday, for the last day of The Butcher Kings exhibit, as we release 3 new prints, and eat pizza like fiends. From Noon - 2:30, Alex and the gang from G1988 will all be chilling out, laughing and eating Italian pies. IN ADDITION to the prints, if you just show up, you'll be added into a free raffle, where we will have 16 PRIZES (one for every year Alex has been alive), which will include original art and prizes. You only turn 16 once!!!! Don't miss this, Pardee fans.
Thanks to everyone who stopped by the Venice gallery last night for the opening of Peter Gronquist's "The Evolution Will Be Fabulous." It is so insane and beautiful inside the gallery and now that the mystery has been lifted, we can show you what Pete has created.
The entire show can be shipped safely and is stunning.
But check out our friend Jean's coverage over at NotCot by clicking the picture below:
Here's a tease of the NotCot article, as all these pictures were taken by them:
The show runs through November 4th at our Venice location, so please make sure and stop by. Seeing this in person is well worth it!
And at our Melrose location, the Butcher Kings are still up and running! Our friends over at Wired wrote up the show. Click the picture below to read it:
Stay tuned to the blog and our website to learn about a special Butcher King closing party, with prints being made available for the first time! More on that later, Mort.
The boys are in town and causing quite the insanity. The Butcher Kings, Alex Pardee & Skinner, will open their 2-man(iac) show Thursday night, 7-10 PM at our Melrose location - and it's actually crazy. Not crazy in the way Prince might ask you to a dance at his concert, but crazy in the way that John Wayne Gacy may have asked you to dance before he killed you. Per request of the artists, all images have been kept secret until the opening party, where both will be in attendance, so I have very little to show you. You'll have to trust me when I tell you - this stuff in bonkos, so if you're in LA, stop by.
“The BUTCHER KINGS is f*cking hilarious. This show is the most fleshtacular event of the decade. It does for the mind what meat does for teeth!”
-Matt Maiellaro, co-creator of Aqua Teen Hunger Force
"A stunning example of how many monsters exist within the confines of pop culture and a funny brand new take on characters that have been cemented in our collective conscience."
-Pete Wentz
"Pardee and Skinner conjure up images that you might see in a sweaty dream after a night of heavy drinking and late night street meat eating. These are the images you'd never share with anyone for fear they'd think you were disturbed. Part terrifying part familiar, they are modern day clown portraits that used to hang in your family's doctor's office. In other words I love it."
-Paul Scheer, creator of NTSF:SVU:SD
When we do open up the doors on Thursday night, you'll see over 80 new pieces (all priced between $300-1,000) that completely destroy all of our memories of the pop-culture icons we have grown to love, then channel the soul of a cynical, witty, self-destructive and borderline insane man-child.
DISCLAIMER - This show contains graphic imagery and is not suitable for children.
With that in mind, I've started a new podcast (NSFW), partnering up with filmmaker, and G1988 homie, Kevin Smith's podcast network (also NSFW), and it's called "Get Up On This." Each week, I'm joined by a guest and we go over a few things, whether it's a movie, music, website, comic book, etc., that people should know about, but don't yet. Things that are bubbling in the underground and soon to hit the mainstream. Look at it as a "Cool Things" type of show. Past guests include Mike Shinoda, Jonah Ray, Casey Veggies, DC Pierson, Pete Wentz and Wallpaper. This week I had the pleasure, and absolute nightmare-ish feelings, of having The Butcher Kings on the show and the results are successful (if you consider the Titanic maiden voyage successful because it made for a good movie).
In case you haven't figured it out, this Thursday's Melrose show, "The Butcher Kings," with art from Alex Pardee & Skinner is going to be both fun and twisted.
I know we've kept this show in a shroud of utter secrecy, but we figured we'd let you in a little. Here's a statement from the Kings themselves:
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When Skinner and I met in the late 90's, the Internet hadn't yet been integrated as a common marketing tool for artists and musicians, and the actual outlets that WERE available for us to spread our imagination and artwork out to were limited to friends, family, schools, the local comic shops and the occasional small cafe-galleries and musical acts that catered toward non-traditional artwork. The bi-product of being undeniably driven by the passion to create without having outlets for either critiques OR validations, however, was that we both created our artwork strictly for ourselves and to make US happy. Over the course of the last decade, as the Internet has become a more common and extremely useful tool in all aspects of art appreciation, execution, networking, and entrepreneurism, Skinner and I have attempted to adapt our thinking and artistic approaches in conjunction with this accelerated technology, but on numerous occasions we have also caught ourselves falling victim to this new widespread accessibility to our artwork.
The Internet provides such a rapid firing of both criticism and praise that, over the course of the last few years, has made both Skinner and I almost TOO aware of what people will like or dislike when our work is displayed publicly, causing us to recently questions just who we are no creating art for. Are our imaginations subconsciously aware more so now of what others will think about our art? Are we now being secretly driven to create something that more people can "relate" to in hopes that we will in turn get more Twitter followers and more Facebook likes and somehow transcribe that invisible validation to more monetary success? In short, Skinner and I both realized that, for whatever reasons, we were taking ourselves too seriously.
Well, f*ck that.
We missed creating art with the sole purpose of making ourselves smile and laugh. We missed no caring if we "lose a follower" by offending someone with a drawing of a demonic dick if that dick was fun to draw. And trust us, dicks are fun to draw. And they are hilarious.
So in an attempt to re-unite our fearlessness, and to simply have fun using our separate memories and inspirations as our tools, Skinner and I present to you, "THE BUTCHER KINGS."
Using existing pop culture icons that we adore, and mutually drawing inspiration from various sources including Gary Larsen's 'The Far Side', Jack Kirby, Wheel of Fortune, Carrot Top, Filmation Cartoons, Robot Chicken & Aqua Teen Hunger Force, we imagined what would happen if all of a sudden the memories of every pop culture property has begun to be torn apart by an unknown force and, in order to save the memories from total eradication, had to be gathered and reassembled by someone who was goofy, cynical, socially inept and slight insane. That person...is us.
Enjoy.
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Well, don't say you weren't warned.
Disclaimer: A lot of the artwork that will be displayed in this show are of an adult nature. Since a majority of our shows at Gallery1988 are child-friendly, we suggest this is one that the little ones should sit out.
I don't even really know what to say. Today, I was lucky enough to see a small preview of the work that will be on display at our Melrose location starting October 6th and I haven't really spoken to anyone since. Alex Pardee and Skinner, who have taken the idea of a 2-man show to brand new heights by living with each other and working non-stop next to each other for the past 2 weeks, have created what might be the craziest, and most impressive show I've ever seen. This one is going to be tightly wrapped in secrecy, because the goal of the show is to see it's massive undertaking all at one time, and give you the ability to buy some incredible affordable art (keep in mind, the last time we did that it was Olly Moss's show, so expect more greatness).
You won't be seeing much before the show, outside of some more photos, and a video or two, but I PROMISE YOU, you will not want to miss this show. Alex and Skinner will be at the opening reception on October 6th, from 7-10 PM at Melrose. On the scale of 1-10, this work is just ridiculous. SHAKING MY HEAD.
We've entered Garbage Pail Kids week, as we ready Friday's show at G1988 (Melrose) and our screening at Cinefamily on Saturday. The opening reception will run 7-10 PM with many of the artists in attendance, so make sure you swing by. And what's a reminder blog post without more previews?
Alex Pardee (this is one of 3 Alex created)
Zack Unzipped by NC Winters
The Bungaloo
Stay tuned for more!!! And prepare yourself to be blown away.
Thanks to everyone who stopped by the Zerofriends booth during San Diego Comic-Con to get their Crazy 4 Cult book signed! And thanks to all the artists who participated, and Alex Pardee and the Zerofriends staff for housing us! We'll see you again next year.
Check out G4's recent coverage of this year's Crazy 4 Cult exhibit. The show runs throughs the end of July, so make sure to swing by the Melrose location.
We're just a few hours away from Crazy 4 Cult 5...so while we run around the gallery, arms flailing, trying to put the last touches together, here's your last preview from SlashFilm. CLICK THE PICTURE to see A LOT of pieces, including ones from JC Richard, Iron Jaiden, Dan Goodsell, Max Dalton, Veronica Fish, Jeff Boyes, Kevin Tong, Scott Derby, Chris DeLorenzo and MORE.
AND if you're on your way to the Melrose gallery tonight for the opening (7-11 PM) you'll be getting some pretty sweet swag from our friends at GelaSkins have created special, limited edition FREE iPad and iPhone skins with Alex Pardee's Cult Skull on them that you can take home tonight!
They are awesome, and they're only available while supplies last tonight!
Click the picture above to see SlashFilm's exclusive art sneak preview of Crazy 4 Cult 5! The preview includes work from Matt Owen, Dave Perillo, NC Winters, Alex Pardee, Mike Mitchell, Jim Horwat and Eric Tan.
As you can see, this is going to be a sequel that rocks. Don't miss the opening, this Friday night, 7-11 PM at the Melrose location.
We're in full printing mode right now at the G1988 Venice! New Crazy 4 Cult prints are coming by Scott Campbell, Alex Pardee, Roger Barr, Scott Belcastro, and Sarah Soh!
Mark you're calendar - Crazy 4 Cult opens July 8th at our Melrose location!!
Last night, we challenged our Facebook page followers to get us to 3,000 "likes" by Monday and it ended up taking less than an hour. The results of this challenge was that we revealed the 5th Crazy 4 Cult poster in the now storied tradition! Past artists who've created poster images for the show are Christopher Lee, Andrew Wilson, Scott C and Mike Mitchell. And this year...
It's ALEX PARDEE! A G1988, and worldwide, favorite, created this awesome poster for Crazy 4 Cult 5 and we'll be selling them starting July 8th at the opening reception, for a new price, cheaper than any poster from the past few years. We will also have a highly limited giclee print of just the skull image, no text.
So honored to have had Alex create this for Crazy 4 Cult, especially the same year as the book release! Needless to say, it's going to be a fun year.
AND if you haven't "liked" our Facebook page yet, you're missing out because we'll be doing more sneak peeks, special offers and cool stuff over there soon.
Back in the gallery installing our next show "Under The Influence: He-Man and the Masters of the Universe" which will open THIS FRIDAY night, from 7-10 PM. And the entire gallery will be transformed into Castle Greyskull, which is most likely something that no one has ever said before. That whole process starts tomorrow. In the meantime, figured what better time to give you more previews.
First up, in addition to Alex Pardee's big Skeletor piece which was unveiled during Comic Con, the man himself created a handful of small watercolors depicting some of his other favorite bad guys. Here are 3 of my favs...
Triclops
Clawful
Faker
Fresh off her awesome 88point5 show, Allison Reimold depicts her version of the classic good vs. evil battle - He-Man vs. Skeletor. This one is incredible in person...
And fresh off his outstanding success during the LOST Underground Art Project with his Crash poster, Eric Tan switches up the style with an edition depicting Battlecat. This is an INCREDIBLE print and they'll sell out fast. TRUST ME.
For the first time at Gallery1988, artist Project Detonate delivered a fresh piece of everyone's favorite pest, Orko. We hope to work with Detonate more in the future, cause this is one of our favorite pieces in the show.
Kiersten Essenpreis is basically batting 1.000 at this point. Every piece is more witty than the next. here she shows us what He-Man and Skeletor might do on their days off, focusing on some major grooming tough spots...
Another new-to-1988 artist, Australian Meggs, has contributed a stunning piece - as this isn't the first time the artist has pulled influence from the toy line/cartoon.
Staring at these pieces, and MANY more, sitting on the floor right now, waiting for Greyskull to be built, is a pretty fun way to past the time. I tell you. All for this Friday! More news coming about this show, including a possible toy reveal that involves one of your favorite shows on a certain network that airs cartoons.
AND, one last thing. We want to thank everybody who voted and Kid Robot, as their 2009 Robo Award Winners were announced and Gallery1988 was named "Outstanding Art Gallery" of the year!
We are total flattered and stoked. Thank you guys and we hope to have 2010 not let you down (win, it won't, wink).
