before (my original drawing)
after (with Kenny's addition)
In Kenny's words: Jon MacNair contacted me to join a kind of chain mail thing for artists...you add your name to a list, send it to six or so artist friends, send an artwork to the person on the top of the list and you would receive a bunch of art in return. Unfortunately I had just received the same request a few days earlier, so I declined but offered up the idea of simply collaborating together on a small drawing. My feeling was that I was a little out of my league...Jon's precise and elaborate renderings of fantastical scenes, creatures and mythic persona felt way beyond my blunt, brushy and chaotic ramblings! On the other hand, really the whole point of collaborating to me is to get yourself beyond your comfort zone. The drawing that I sent him was empty enough that I felt sure that he could populate it with his magic...I would just build the stage. I had been drawing flags on poles and was curious to see how he would react, if he would add some kind of banner and I patterned the ground as a nod to his sometimes baroque and decorative renderings. His treatment of the pole as a tree form was a brilliant transformation of the emblematic eagle topped form into a mysterious mythic structure. My creation on his half completed drawing was, as usual, a scene of cacophonous chaos: amidst the floating fire/octopus guy a prisoner/politico dude singing like Tom Jones gets splarged by a amphibious tank. This was a fun collaboration and I am greatful for the fact that Jon was willing to give it a whirl. I think it truly exercised both our gray matters to the max!
Kenny titled this "It's Not Unusual"
