Pictures from my solo show "Age of Enigmas" at Antler Gallery

Some pictures from my third solo show with Antler Gallery in Portland (August 2014). I made one of my largest pieces to date and got an enthusiastic response to the work. In addition to my own work, I did some fun collaborations with artist friends Ian Anderson, Jennifer Parks, Trudy Creen and Mark Burt. I always enjoy doing these shows. Not only because it's great working with Antler Gallery, but also because I get to see many familiar faces at the reception. Looking forward to my next solo with Antler!

10x10 Anniversary Show at Rotofugi

I was thrilled to be invited to participate in the 10 year anniversary show at Rotofugi Gallery in Chicago this August. I had a great experience showing with them back in December with my solo show, so it wasn't a tough decision in saying yes. Unfortunately, because I was getting ready for my solo show at Antler gallery at the time, I knew I'd have to submit a previously exhibited work. I had this Ichthyocentaur piece which had been shown in Portland, and luckily it was the exact right size for the show (all works needed to be 10" square). I guess somebody liked it though because it was sold :)

Music Fest NW

 This was a piece I created for the Music Fest NW this summer in Portland. Artists were paired with musicians and bands and then asked to create a 12" x 12" fictional album cover. My band was Man Man. I can't really describe their music very well, and as a result, I can't really describe the idea behind this piece very well either. Just wanted to create a kind of weird but not too dark image for the cover.

MY NEW WEBSITE!

So after THREE long years I finally got around to making a new website. Long story short, with my old site, which I created originally in dreamweaver, I was unable to update it. It stayed the same for 3 years and that really bothered me. Also, I continued to have bandwidth problems with constantly caused my site to go offline month after month, year after year. Anyway, I ended up using Square Space to build my new site. I kind of had to start over completely, but that was fine because there was actually a lot of content on there I didn't feel I needed anymore, and some new stuff I wanted to add. My new site has an updated illustration section, a gallery section of my personal works, some hand-drawn lettering, a misc section containing 3D work, videos and collaborations, a bio page, F.A.Q. section, a complete cv, and links to all my social media, my shop and email.

Have a look for yourself!   -  www.jonmacnair.com

"Age of Enigmas" at Antler Gallery

Last night was the preview show for my solo here in Portland. Great turnout! Lots of friends came. This is the third year in a row Antler Gallery has hosted my solo show. Wonderful folks! Tonight is the official opening, coinciding with last Thursday art walk on historic Alberta St. Please come and check out the work if you are in the area. Would love to see you there! :)

Custom skate deck

This is the skateboard I painted for the Artist on Board show at Refuge in Portland. It is painted with black acrylic with the natural wood showing through, coated with a high gloss varnish. 

Thylacine Print!

This guy is now a print. Get 'em here!

http://society6.com/jonmacnair/Thylacine-Tasmanian-Tiger-ULK_Print?show=promoters#1=45

Artists on Board - skateboard art show!

I am participating in this show, coming up here in PDX very soon. Check it out if you are into boards or amazing custom decks!

12" Otaku show in Tokyo

I am very happy to be part of this show, curated by Hellion Gallery and exhibiting in Japan. The concept of the show was to pair 20 Portland artists with 20 Japanese bands/musicians and have them create fictional album covers. My guy was Tavito Nanao. If you want an idea of his music, have a look at this video. This song in particular is the one I drew inspiration from in terms of the sound.



I call this piece "Feline Adrift" - 12" x 12" - India ink on paper - 2014

The "Tall Trees of Portland" book release and exhibition

If you haven't heard, there's a new book in town and it's called, "The Tall Trees of Portland". Matt Wagner, owner and curator of Hellion Gallery here in PDX has put together a hardback publication featuring some of the best visual arts talent Stumptown has to offer. Each artist has a handwritten questionnaire in the book, as well as several pages displaying what they do best. I was honored and excited to be included among these fine people, many of whom I have gotten to know over the two years I have been here. There was an book signing just for the artists, and a first Thursday exhibition featuring work from all the people in the book. Below is a nice photo of all the artists (with a few missing) as well as some pages from my spread in the publication. Thanks again to Matt Wagner for undertaking such a large task and putting this thing together. Amazing! Definitely check out the book if you live in town or online such as on Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

Spring update

Just wanted to give a quick update about what has been going on as of late. I finished two more album covers last month. One was for a band called Sincerity and their newest release, "The Authority". The other was for a show in Japan called "12 Inch Otako". For the show in Japan, Portland artists were given an artist or band, samples of their music, and then had to make a fictional album cover for that band or artist. Pretty fun idea! After I completed that, I needed to paint a skateboard for a show here in Portland. I've only done one other skateboard before, but it was more fun than the first one I painted. Still, a lot of hard work. I'm not yet a master of the brush (when it has paint on it). Anyway, that show will open next month. Now I am beginning a whole body of work for my solo show at Antler gallery at the end of August. Still in the ideas phase of things, which can be the trickiest part I find. Anyway, will be posting some progress pics of things as I move along. Keep an eye out on here (or instagram or tumblr) for that. Until then………    :)

Usurper "Human Waste" vinyl release

Here is some album artwork I completed recently for Usurper's latest release, "Human Waste". It's always wonderful when you have a lot of freedom when doing an album cover, but sometimes it can be hard to know where to draw your inspiration from for the imagery. In this case, I used some of the lyrics as a guide. The line was something about cancer breeding, cell by cell. I went off this and decided to create a human-like figure that is deformed and anomalous in appearance. Compared to many other album covers I have done, this one was really fairly simple. Below are some progress pictures of the artwork, as well as my original brush type used for the final version.

"Revolver"

I had the chance to participate in a group show with Antler called "Revolver", that allowed me to do a collaboration with fellow artist friend Ben Kehoe. Ben and I had side by side solo shows at Antler back in August and were game for the collaboration! We decided to do a painting. Admittedly, painting is much more Ben's thing (he is a master) and drawing is more mine, but we figured we would find our way somehow. Ben tossed out a bunch of ideas as a starting point and I made a bunch of sketches which I then sent to him via email. We decided on one and from there I purchased a gessoed board on which I started to sketch out the image in pencil. I think the process was fairy organic. Ben and I have similar types of narratives in our work, although his is more humorous in my opinion, so it wasn't hard to mesh our sensibilities in terms of the slightly ambiguous story we wanted to illustrate. In our piece, a large creature breaks off the branch/antler of a pyramidal  building/figure, thus rendering the figure powerless, left to vomit up a river of blood as he suffers a long and painful death. Nice right? His worshippers mourn at the base of the structure in utter despair. We appropriately titled it "Dissolution of the Oracle". After I got the whole thing sketched out in moderate detail on the panel, I mailed it to Ben who managed to finish it in a number of weeks. We had a snow storm in between him sending it back to me, so it got kind of tight with the deadlines, but we made it! After receiving it back, I added line-work over the whole painting and also some more shading in certain areas. Armed with a liner brush and some golden liquid acrylics, I did the best I could not to obscure or deface Ben's great work. I hadn't done much outlining in paint before, so I was a tad nervous, especially over someone else's work. Anyway, I think it turned out pretty great!

The show was also part of a gallery swap with Hellion gallery in town. So, Antler and Hellion held their show at each other's spaces. Half of the show was artist collaborations such as Ben's and mine, and the other half was small works based on themes from previous Antler shows. In my opinion it was one of the best group shows they have curated so far!