Society of Illustrators - Stevan Dohanos Award - Part 2
Sunday, January 08, 2012

Dim sum at Dim Sum Go Go



"pink china", the restaurant across the street from Mel's house



I saw this twice this week. I thought they were just burning garbage which is kind of crazy in NYC but mel said it was some kind of ancestors tradition.



party at Tara Jacoby's house.



Robert McGinnis painted her! He's the artist that did the old school james bond posters and the breakfast at tiffany's poster among other things.



on the way to brooklyn bowl



inside brooklyn bowl





they have a dance floor and a salsa orchestra that night.



the young illustrators crew.







got my hair cut at astor hair.









i am seeing china-centric magazines in the stores now too. China is taking over, watch out now



meatball shop is awesome.



Rockafeller center tree



bottom of central park



from the offices of Discover Magazine.



Williamsburg xmas lights



Ghost Bikes are painted all white and are left at the place where a person has died in a bicycling accident. I have seen a few of these around. I notice them because I have been hit by a car and hospitalized with a fractured skull and I bike too. RIP Nicolas Djandji, age 24. From Ghostbikes.org - Nicolas Djandji was born on November 8, 1986 in Alexandria, Egypt. His childhood was highly nomadic; Djandji lived in Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Australia, Indonesia, and Argentina before his family relocated to Texas, where he attended high school. He attended the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland, studying Painting and Illustration. Djandji moved to New York in 2009.

Posted byJason Raish at 8:39 PM 0 comments    

Spider Magazine - Gorilla Blues

A while ago I did 3 illustrations for Spider Magazine (which has illustration on almost every page). The story is titled "Gorilla Blues" by Trinka Enell and it's about a big blue gorilla who loses his way to Florida one snowy night and is helped by a little girl.








getting this perspective right was so hard and it's still not right.









I was in 3x3 magazine's Illustration Directory 2011

Posted byJason Raish at 8:25 PM 0 comments    

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