Society of Illustrators - Stevan Dohanos Award - Part 1
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
I got a call on a friday that I had won the Stevan Dohanos Award this year at the Society of Illustrators in NY. I decided to fly from London to NY for a week to accept the award. This would be my first time back in the US in a year.
Asian Americans for equality. What do they do in there?
B and H photo is a crazy place. orders zip around the ceiling on these conveyer belt things. I need to buy a lens filter for my new 24mm f/1.4 L lens which i'll show later. It's amazing so lots of pics on this blog from here on out will be with that lens.
Salih showing me how to use Final Cut Pro. I'm trying to make a travel video out of all the clips i've taken. It's doable but will take a while to learn the program and learn about video, timing, music, cuts, pace and that whole universe
at the opening of the Society of Illustrators Member's Open show. My piece in the back with the red bridge won top prize, the Stevan Dohanos Award. The Society of Illustrators is the top place probably in the world to be recognized for your work in the illustration field so I was dumbfounded. I was even more dumbfounded when they gave me one of the Society's medals!
had to give a little speech. The Society owns this awesome old New York building on 63rd and Lex. Upstairs is the members bar where all the old school founding fathers and so on have hung out and jammed.
after a bunch of drinks at the Society it was off for celebratory champagne.
after celebratory champagne we were very inebriated and any old $2 PBRs would do. Many were consumed and you know the rest of the story.
Max Fish
the twighlight series owned by Mel's sister.
here's the medal! it's heavy. I never thought I would own one of these and now i have one. It's amazing.
djembe drummers on the subway
churros lady didn't want her photo taken
bedford ave station on the L
I never noticed this before in NY but it seems like there are tons of "perro flautas" now. perro flauta meaning dog flute, like what they call these guys in Spain. I mean they are the same down to the dread locks and owning dogs. what gives.
a lot of this in NY
williamsburg
the view of manhattan from williamsburg. somewhere near north 7th or 8th. Sophie has moved back to NY and Steven (we went to Oxford together the week before) came from London to visit her.
Kenka used to be my favorite place to drink. its a funky Japanese drinking hall on st. marks place. I don't know how it is now though. I will have to give it another try and see.
the cotton candy machine is inside now.
the Chinatown Dragon Fighters. The firehouse is near Mel's house.
Mel had a party for me at her house on East Broadway. Thanks Mel!
Sandra's dog pudge is sooooooo cute. he's like an Ewok/Koala Bear mix.
Van Der Doodle got noodled before he even got to the party.
which is why you see him here drinking out of a pot.
pickleback shots at 169 bar on east broadway. Its this new craze where you take a shot of whiskey and then chase it with a shot of pickle juice. its not that bad. how do they produce huge jars upon jars of pickle juice to fill the demand? are they making synthetic pickle juice now? No one else seems to think its gross.
go go dancer at 169 bar.
Posted byJason Raish at 10:50 AM 0 comments
Ding Dong Kim Jung Il is dead
Sunday, December 18, 2011
North Korean state media announced that Kim Jung Il has died today. Here is a portrait of north korean dictator Kim Jung Il that i did a few years ago. I've always found North Korea interesting and had a chance to go as close as most people will ever get to North Korea earlier this year.
the DMZ, demilitarized zone between north and south korea. I went on a tour with some US Embassy folk.
It was creepy to see the North Korean soldiers so close and checking us out with Binoculars.
We rode down one of the 3 tunnels that the North Koreans dug into South Korea. we got stuck halfway and had to crawl down the rest of the way. Were the North Korean's storming down the tunnel to get us? got a little creepy.
Posted byJason Raish at 11:35 PM 0 comments
Client Sketches and Cafe Sketches
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
The first time i've pulled out my sketchbook in ages. sketching at "Look Mum No Hands" a bike-centric cafe on old street in London. I was sketching these 2 girls in front of me and thought they didn't know but they said they totally knew i was sketching them after they asked to see it when i was leaving. halfway down the block one of the girls came running and asked if they could have it. So i hung out with them a couple times so far and made new friends in London town.
another sketch from the bike cafe.
my flatmate at the Vintage Emporium cafe on Bacon street off of Brick Lane in London. A super cool place and my flatmate knows the owner and its right down the street from our flat.
Posted byJason Raish at 6:36 PM 0 comments
Illustration Now! 4, I'm in there!
Monday, November 07, 2011
I'm in Illustration Now! 4 published by Taschen that just came out this year. It's a collection of top illustrators from around the globe, so i don't know how I got in there. I've see the first 3 incarnations of this book and it's cool to be included in this one and have two spreads. 
Left: art for Saatchi and Saatchi (NY). Middle: Hartford Courant Ella Fitzgerald. Right: Yahoo! Singapore
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The benefits of being an Illustrator
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
I'm missing out on them! I was asked to be a VIP guest at a Tiger Beer party in Beijing, a VIP at a Rides magazine party in Vegas, and the American Illustration party that i've missed every year. I'm continually in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Posted byJason Raish at 5:36 PM 0 comments
Harvest Time Illos
Monday, October 10, 2011
This was made through Kult design agency in Singapore, and it's like my 5 or 6th time working with them. All of the pieces that people like of mine were done through this agency because they let me do what i want. This means the projects get very personal and I put WAY more time into them than i should. The Client was Facebook Singapore and I had to illustrate this fact: There are more than 250 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices". There was no way i was going to draw an insane amount of figures like I did for the Bounce Dryer Bar campaign so i though of taking a cross section of people and then i remembered the personal project I have been meaning to do where I illustration people from every country i have lived in. Here are 18 people from China, South Korea, Japan, UK, and Spain (i'm not including NY). I wanted to draw some of the archetypes of people you find in these countries, the common types you see on the street everyday. Examples are, Shibuya girl, Spanish protester guy/girl, Beijing belly man, Korean acid wash jeans/jeggings girl, Chinese Pajama man, japanese salary man, etc. This is the largest piece of artwork i've made so far, it's A0 size (32.7 x 45.4 inches), but my macbook could handle it because i actually worked on each figure on its own file and put them all together in the end. eventually I will post the tweaks I have done to these characters and the blurbs i have written about them and present it to you in properly because this project took me 7-8 days working on it 12 hrs a day. The photo research alone took half of the time I think. and its all because it's so personal to me and my travels and I wanted it to look right. But for now here is the version that Facebook used.
there was a big party for the opening of the Facebook office in Singapore. you can see my art in the background. there were 6 artists in total.
this is an alternate version
spot for chicago magazine about Fashion Trunk, a new service where you can have a "trunk" full of clothes delivered to the comfort of your home so you can watch football and try on clothes at the same time and you pick what you like and send the rest back.
spot for triathletes world magazine in the UK. it's about a woman who has to drop out of a triathalon because of under training.
Posted byJason Raish at 3:47 PM 1 comments
