The Fine Art Blog of Daz and Holly

Well the zine project is off to a great start! Over 50 people have received their copy of Faerie Zine #1 (in various incarnations as I worked on it!) and some people really liked it! I’m sure everyone appreciated it that received it but it obviously isn’t everyone’s cup of tea but the art project was to do it! Spread the love! Below is art from the next copy out in a month or so! GoBzine Publishing rules!

You can get your own free underground art zine by writing to Darren Daz Cox box 1111 Pekin Illinois 61554 USA Planet Earth. (I know, how excellent to have box number eleven eleven right? The universe loves me and wants YOU to get cool art for free in your analog mail box!!)
Eventually, as Riverfront Media gets settled I will have color copies of zines aand poster sized prints available for whomever asks!

There was no thought, no conscious intention even, just peace and harmonious feeling channelled through to the hand from the soul…
The one below was from the same pages of the wonderful sketchbook I bought on sale at Hobby Lobby in Pekin (yea! I love that place!!!). It is using a variety of art materials and is a prototype for larger paintings!

Soon after that yellow bird appeared on the drawing above, I saw a bright yellow bird in the parking lot at my day job and he inspired me (along with his greener colored mate!).

and if you realllly want to hear it, here’s a link to a song I made with my band Homer Simplex (in the Riverfront Media studios at the Speakeasy Art Center 353 Court st. pekin Illinois) to inspire Dave Omega Moses to write some new material since he is a really awesome singer/songwriter! Dave Omega Get Off The Couch
and if you need to read the lyrics for that 30 seconds of musical genius*…
this song goes out to Dave Omega you need to get off the couch
pick up your banjo make your fans go wow wow wow
put down the star wars dolls stop drooling on boba fett
you’ve watched so many Netflix movies you’re turning in Shrek
you used to write some real good songs but now you a lump
so get off the couch dont be a silly chump – Dave!

I am working on getting royalty free audio material for our 24/7 streaming radio station (for arts related projects and community service that Riverfront Media is initiating with me as the program director!). I will have a bunch of short stories and poems as well as original olde time radio Theee- a-Tor!

Oh and I almost forgot, here is my latest inspirational poem!

This world is a mirror of how you feel
it reflects back symbols of you
so BE the change that you want to see
and find out that this is true.

If sad why stew and make the world blue
and hating just makes your fate worse
and you CAN get the whole world to smile with you
but you will have to smile first!

*the amount of genius in this song is mostly due to Apple and Garage Band on my Macbook!

I have a really big jpg version of this picture (click link below pic!) that you can download and print if you wish, or continue to swirl the motifs in an image editing program!
I love love love this picture, it celebrates that first warm, warm day of spring when you suddenly smell flowers and you want to dance! (and some of us actually do!)

http://99daz.com/art/springdancer.jpg
I’m really proud of my Springtime Dancer pic, that feeling of that first warm spring day where it feels almost hot to your winter skin…yes!!! you can download the huge jpg file to print or look closely at the detail or even modify it in Photoshop if you wish, there are no strings, just do it!!!

 I’m really excited about the High Tech Expo "Tech This Out" that will be at the East Peoria Illinois Event Center may 9 – 10. My independent media company, Riverfront Media, is one of the companies with a booth and we’ll be doing demonstrations on how to film with a professional HD video camera and how to edit a movie in real time using mega fast MacBook Pro laptops. We are teaming up with Independence Media, who own four of our local radio stations and they are playing commercials for the Tech This Out over and over so it should have a huge turnout! Check out our latest commercial here!

I will also gave a demonstration on how to use the liquify filter, a neat tool in Photoshop, to make great digital art. It’ll be fun and I hope I can inspire some people to try their hand and mouse at this high tech form of art!

In case you haven’t seen liquify filter art before, here is an example. Random pixel pushing! 100% created from scratch in photoshop!

Above, sweet digital art by Darren Daz Cox – The best artist in the world (it’s my blog I’ll say what i want!) and below, "Dawn of Spring" my latest oil painting in progress!

"Dawn of Spring" by Darren Daz Cox

oil on gallery wrapped canvas 12x12x1 inches. There is nice quality glitter and liquid gold leaf to add some magic!  

Unfinished as i wait for it to dry before the next layer of oil glazes!

Did you know that a MacBook Pro is also the fastest windows computer? shhh don’t tell the PC people as they might be sad haha! I love traditional art as well as the latest high tech way to express my creativity and find it useful to work in many mediums as each one has it’s joys and challenges.

I would like to show you how I make my digital art at the *electronic drumroll*

Tech This Out – Technology Expo

Date: 05/08/2009 – 05/10/2009

From http://peoriawifi.com (below)

 

Brought to you by Riverfront Media, Independence Media & AboutPeoria.com

•

May 9- 10 2009

•

East Peoria Event Center

 

What is Tech This Out?

• The largest and only annual technology showcase happening in Central Illinois.

• Showcase of technology and how it has and will continue to change our lives well into the future.

• This is the virtual magazine that brings businesses and thousands of consumers together to interact and explore

technologies that businesses located in Central Illinois have to offer.

Why Participate?

• Consumers!!! Thousands of them!!! Will see your business & product in the 2 days of this showcase.

• No need for you to expend in your own advertising, we will do it for you.

• Affordable and convenient way to get ahead in your sales goals in this troubled economy of 2009.

• You can sell, sell, sell on site from your booth and retain 100% of your sales!

How do we plan to bring in the consumers?

• This is the first of its kind technology exhibition mostly comprised of businesses located in Central Illinois.

• Interactive competitions and CASH prizes! This includes texting contests, Guitar Hero contests and other contests that

involve new and innovative programs and gadgets.

• Independence Media is providing the advertising and promotions for this event as top priority and as the showcase to see.

• Demonstrations of unique and up and coming technologies that the average consumer hasn’t had the opportunity to

experience.

Benefits

• Exposure, Exposure, Exposure!

• Opportunity to network with other businesses

• Show a side of your business consumers may not get to see or experience.

• Low cost in reaching thousands of potential buyers.

• Only three direct competitors at most in your category.

• On site sales, demonstrations and gain in long term residuals through on site promos, i.e. coupons, flyers, brochures.

• Fun family atmosphere.

•

Tech This Out pays for 100% of the advertising

 

 Yea, it’s an honor to share my art with you again after a brief period of uncertainty! Here’s a sketch I intend to make into a ‘lowbrow’ oil painting! Pencil sketch soon to be an oil painting!

Models include Buddy the bird and Youdle the bear and my guardian angel.

You can download the bigger size on my Flckr account Gobzine  if you wish!

 

Salvador Dali as an angel – pencil sketch by Darren Daz Cox

It’s funny how I really can’t draw things that aren’t organic, curvy and cute, at least when I just let my mind wander the results are generally pleasant even they are surreal. I don’t have a lot of nightmares and I remember my dreams just about every night so perhaps this why but I think it’s because I consciously chose a target audience for my art and that audience is not how I was when I was an angry young man. Before I was an angry young man I was a pretty damn happy pre-teen who really wanted to learn how to draw, and who wrote poems and stories and read a whole lot of science fiction.

 Here’s another sketch I did randomly, the found bird. It would be really special if a bird you had let out of a cage found it’s way back to you! Pencil on paper and colored in Photoshop.

The Found Bird, just some cute art to make the world a better place by positive intention.

this groovy monster appeared randomly when I mirrored the art! yea for monsters!

Oh and the coolest thing ever, well, not ever, but pretty awesomely cool, my friend Jenni from when I lived in Hong Kong scanned a copy of our 1981 yearbook and it had a poem I wrote in there that makes me happy!

My Best Friend by Darren Daz Cox age 12

My best friend is kind of weird
he has no hair, eyebrows or beard
He even has light blue skin
(No don’t tell my next of kin!)
What I tell you is no lie
My best friend will never die,
He’s a mutant from the stars
who has a zombie ranch on Mars
(he keeps them in check they say
by feeding them plutonium hay.)
We met at a lunar convention
while I displayed my new invention.
To study humans was his intention
to study him there’s no need to mention.
I told him of the Earth so green
He told me of the places he’d been.
We talked and talked until we were through
Then I went home and he did too.

 I’m really proud of this poem because it’s very me and very Spike Milligany who wrote my favorite poem …

Porridge

 

Why is there no monument
To Porridge in our land?
It it’s good enough to eat,
It’s good enough to stand!

On a plinth in London
A statue we should see
Of Porridge made in Scotland
Signed, “Oatmeal, O.B.E.”
(By a young dog of three)

Spike Milligan

 

 Jenni was a mutant slave and I was the ruler of the mutants in our school play at St. Georges School called The Second Coming, which was an awesome sci-fi spectacle and the finest thing put on stage since, no, it was the best play ever.

My sister Sonja was also in the play as well as my friends Jamie Anderson (big Judas Priest fan!) and Alex Speed (first guy to suggest Led Zeppelin as a cool band to me hehe!).

I have some really awesome memories, am very happy right now and look forward to an awesome rest of my life!

 

 

 

I like to use birds as metaphors for the soul in my art, it’s an old fashioned concept but it suits me.

The canvas was spray painted gold then oil paint was put on which causes the gold to turn liquid again and make some amazing shapes.

The bird is silver but the way the light was when I took the photo made it look cyan, so I was playing around in photoshop to correct this and desaturated part of the picture to make the bird look silver again. Suddenly the project took on a new meaning, after all, I haven’t done anything in black and white in years.
I might do a black and white painting soon I really like the greys there. I’m going to have some b/w pages in my zine as we all remember the b/w cheapo xeroxed zines from back in the day but these days the quality is so much better and some things look better in black and white. Taking an art form and making a new version of it appeals to me.

It’s funny how I almost always make a complicated sky, I’ve been trying to figure it out. Is it some kind of reflection of inner turmoil in my mind or something? Kids generally create a sky as a solid color with a cloud or two for flavor, my skies are writhing contrasts of light and darks with shiny gold or silver haha!

I think it’s because I’m always try to capture something dramatic, those moments when you feel little below the gigantic rolling sky.

 It’s good to be on a creative streak again and I am proud that I have finally transitioned from the relative safety of pencil sketches and liquify filter random happy accidents to oil paint on canvas which is what I said I would do about five years ago on a my DeviantArt site haha!

I am so totally a Taurus in that I am stubborn and I feel my art power as a juggernaut and when I get in the zone some cool things that result, things that make it all worth while for me, even though I’ve sold less paintings than Vincent Van Gogh did in his lifetime haha!

Here’s a painting I did the other day, totally at random except for the choice of a pot of white paint, a lid for the pot that turned out to have been for the yellow paint as it had yellow paint on the lid, and two small brushes, one of which, I found by happy accident, wasn’t properly cleaned from the blue paint it still had a bit of on it. The dark lines are from a grease pencil (works perfectly with oil paint!).

The random became serendipity and I totally love this painting! I know, somewhere in the universe, perhaps on a planet similar to this one or perhaps just down the block from me, someone will love this painting too and it makes me deeply happy to know that someone will look at this painting and be happy, if only for a moment.

The Girl and the Bear oil paint on canvas board 8×10 inches (unfinished) by Darren Daz Cox.

Another painting that is still unfinished but getting there is this one…

Moon Falling, oil on canvas about 5 ft x 3.5 ft (unfinished) by Darren Daz Cox

And even bigger than that one…

 

Spirit Journey, oil on canvas (in two pieces) about 8ft tall. Unfinished so far. By Darren Daz Cox

Here is the pencil sketch for the original idea I had for the painting that I’ll probably re-visit many times as it hits my brain’s art g-spot to think about clouds that look like animals and why people do that, somehow it is part of the big answer to the meaning of life (or just cool).

Cloud Girl pencil sketch, (on my desk at work to inspire me) by Darren Daz Cox

I’ve still been sketching with pencil but these days the majority of those have gone directly to people in my immediate circle because it gives them something they can share with others to build a bond, whether they are laughing at it with their friends or admiring it, the result is the same, it is an object that they can focus on while building human bonds, it’s a win/win thing!

Here’s a sketch that didn’t go to anyone in particular because it’s a little too creepy to give this to someone and it’s basically unfinished but it’s here for historical accuracy to show another facet of  my ouvre. I feel obligated to draw some faeries to balance out the angels I’ve been drawing as I don’t want either group to think I’m taking sides! (you might want to read my blog post of faeries vs. angels to understand what I’m talking about here http://99daz.com/faeries-vs-angels haha!)

Random Faerie Representin’ , pencil sketch by Darren Daz Cox

I love art and I love to make people inspired and happy, it is what I was put on Earth to do. I have always been an artist and I always will be.

 

All art on this bog post by Darren Daz Cox world’s greatest artist in the world!

People often ask me to draw things for them but don’t realize that their casual demands leave me puzzled and will most likely not be fulfilled any quicker than it took Michelangelo to finish the Medici chapel.

 

People are rarely shy about asking me to do something for them that requires me to draw power from God and inspiration from the world. Sometimes they’ll just open a conversation by asking if i’ll  draw them something  specific, an angel with a camera for a logo the lovely photographer Tina T-Pain’s business and a dragon for Skinhead Linda’s business, a piece of tattoo flash (cherubs holding a banner) for C-Charles and another (shooting stars) for one of my art models, Beff. 

 

But you would never go up to Stephanie Sugarcookie and say "I’d like you to bake me a dozen chocolate chip cookies" or to Monstertruck Rick and say "I’d like you to adjust my Gran Torino’s carbourator"  or ask Dave Omega to write you a song on his banjo about skipping merrily down the f*ing lane with your one eyed cat. 

 

I know you guys do it out of love and that it’s a compliment and even though I really would like to please you, even if I thought it would make me happy by making you happy or get me material goods and/or services rendered or even to score points with a girl I want to get to know better, the fact is I can’t draw on demand, and If I’m not drawing on demand for them I most likely will not do so for you. 

 

Don’t bother to bring money into the equation as yes, given enough money I’d draw you something but as we know from quantum physics, intention is key, and my intention would be to get the money not to stretch my creative powers. If you paid me to do art you’d get faux-art but a machine might not be able to recognize the difference since the same hand made it.

 

Writer John "Mr. T Experience" Phillips said I could paint the cover to his new book, and gave me some specific things he wants and I really want to, and I will try, but……

 

Anyway, here’s my latest random digital piece of art, the Magic Snail, all hail the magic snail!

Click this one for my flickr account where the huge version lives and is ready to download. Feel free to use the liquify filter on it to make your own swirly trippy pyschedelic art!

The Magic Snail by Darren Daz Cox coolest artist in the universe.

Here are some detail jpgs to add more awesome art to the search engines and the word "zing" so when ever you search for that word you have a chance to see my cool art too.

 

Pyschedelic bunny artwork baby! We need more of this!!!

I really like this magic indian totem looking mask that randomly appeared in my artistic randoming. 

I have some awesome awesome pencil sketches I’m dying to show you but I don’t have electricity in my house anymore to make the scanner work, it’s been a week and no word on when it will return but yea for Copper River Coffee shop and it’s free WI-Fi, awesome staff and yummy green tea and muffins.

Have an awesome day my friends and remember to be creative!

Here’s another magic snail Pic I found! 

Franz von Bayros (1866-1924), Ex-libris of Sweet Snail There is more cool antique erotic art on the Flickr page of  gunther.stephan !

never seen so many so close up! Keensburg NJ USA

Warcasm Awesomesauce robot dancer pens, pencils and markers by Darren Daz Cox

 I love to watch paint dry, that sounds like a joke but the process of drying paint can be fascinating when the paint changes shape and color as it dries which is the case when you use clear acrylic medium and elmers glue (trust me, it has synergy with acrylic paint).

The picture below makes me very happy, and I call it The Happy Cloud, in homage of the mighty Bob Ross of course.

here is the painting from a different angle plus another one with the glass bead texture paint I used for the cat in this one.

The painting above, is dry but the texture is smooth and wet looking which is very enjoyable to touch. There is glitter embedded in the clear paint. This one started as pencil and then markers directly on the canvas, randomly but with the quantum intent to inspire and produce happiness.

I have several more canvases ready for the paint stage (a couple are shown below) that are just markers on the canvas so far, the clear acrylic gel and or white school (Elmer’s) glue will absorb some of the pigment from the markers and add even more character to the painting. I will use oil paints for the elephant and for the bird, at least, maybe in some other spots too but I don’t want to over plan the art as i want the experience of making it to be fresh and enjoyable.

Here, below, is the current phase of the Cloud Angels painting, the tiny glass beads in the clear acrylic medium allows the light to make excellent effects!

and here, below, is another one in progress that is making me happy, I call it Happy Red Monster

and here, below, is a photograph to show you the scale of some of my current paintings in progress (I have dozens in progress)

 

 Welcome to the best art blog in Peoria Illinois USA The World ever. I am happy to share my awesome art with you! I sketch randomly and am thrilled that my randomness turns into pleasingly happy things. You might find it cheesy but some people really enjoy it and I enjoy drawing it.

Birds on an angel wing. Pencil sketch with Adobe Photoshop Liquify Filter by Darren Daz Cox.

I have a strong feeling about having a guardian angel, not in a religious way but something that’s always watching me and encouraging me.

I’d like to make a resin sculpture of this one day I think.

 Welcome to the best art blog on the internet, did I mention that I am the best artist in the world? Not only in the world but the universe and not just the universe, the best artist in all the infinite parallel dimensions! I might not be a household name or have achieved acclaim, fame and/or fortune in this universe, but I’m still the best and greatest artist that has ever lived! Wait, where are you going? Art is subjective so we are all allowed to say what I said above!!

I’m still cranking out the stuff for my new art zine called GoBzine, which by the way I own gobzine.com and have for quite a while! I was the first person to have the word gobzine indexed in google and over the years there have been several other gobzine things pop up, as weird as that sounds since I totally thought I invented the word!

Here’s a pic of one of the centerfolds in the new gobzine (minus the 99daz.com !)

Spring frolic girl centerfold for the new Go B Zine. Psychedelic and trippy art!.

I enjoy re-interpreting the standard themes in art, in this case (above), the ever popular landscape.

I used oil paints on canvas with glue and glitter. It has quite a lot of texture that doesn’t quite show here.

It’s a strange but beautiful painting to my eyes.

Yea My latest sculpture! starfish painted gold and gold painted rods, easy to re-arrange and make new star systems!

I love the unfinished 100 year old wood walls of my house!

 

My awesome artist friend Lysh aka Scroobilus Pip wrote this comment after I mentioned that I was enjoying drawing things directly from my imagination rather than from using a photograph to copy from, "I sometimes wish that I could draw just from my imagination. I’ve read that it comes with practice. I’m going to challenge your assumption that you would already know what the picture would be if you used a reference photograph. I frequently use reference materials when drawing but I NEVER know what the picture is going to be. Perhaps it is a question of whether the reference material is there to copy, or there to give you a start. Or if you are a bad copy-er like me and just somehow deviate"

I didn’t mean to make it sound like drawing directly from your imagination in any less valid or creative than using a model or photographic reference, after all, that would be saying that Edgar Degas was somehow capable of ‘better’ work, which just isn’t the case.  His famous "bathers" were from photographs and they are perfect!

I’m not perfect, none of us are but we can be happy in the moment. Life is just a succesion of ‘nows’ rather than the past present and future, and as John Lennon famously said, Life is what happens while you make plans to do something else.

I have many different styles and phases of my art and  I get well intentioned ‘art career advice’ from people who assume that because I’m not selling any art or showing my art in galleries on a regular basis that I’m somehow not reaching my full potential. The advice I generally get offered involves me deciding what style I should concentrate on and then cranking out a portfolio of art that all looks similar, then, with a little smoozing and luck I can sell my art for a modest price and perhaps work towards the ultimate goal of being self sufficient and be a marketable brand etc blah blah blah.

You know, I’m perfect right now, in this moment I love my art and I do not feel the need to cater to anyone except the inner children of people who might cross my path. I did some really sweet drawings recently for my (also really sweet) friend Marisa, some of my best pencil work and you’ll never see it (unless you walk by her cubicle at work haha). The point is that I gauge my success on how quickly I can take inspiration and create things out of my head to make someone happy.

 Oh, and just because I don’t sell anything and I’m not in an art gallery doesn’t mean I’m not a successful and famous artist, in some ways I’m the most famous and successful artist in the world, after all you’re reading my blog and looking at my art (I have printable sized work on my Flickr account for you to download and print without any strings attached). have an awesome and creative day my friend!

Cat Yea! acrylic and feathers on canvas by Darren Daz Cox

It Is Complicated – pencil and digital paint by Darren Daz Cox

I joined Bloggersbase.com today here’s my url http://bloggersbase.com/users/Daz/  I trust Jeff keni Pulver so I’ll see if it’s fun or not!

oh, and according to compete.com, 11% of the people who find this blog are searching for "why people put animals in the pond"  and not only that, I get 974 people a month visiting because they searched for "chris brogan walmart"  haha!!!

Oh, and my new punk band is called Warcasm Awesomesauce! and our new CD is called why people put animals in the pond

I love being an artist, being able to inspire and be inspired is a direct connection to God for me. I have shown my work to thousands of people now thanks to the internet and art shows and while I’ve yet to sell an actual painting (I’m still winning Vincent!) I will make money selling my art this year. I plan to make 11×18 full bleed mini posters (that’s edge to edge color – no border) and sell them for 99 cents and also provide this service for my fellow artists. Riverfront Media is expanding and getting so many clients it is hard to predict anything but total success and the capital to really promote the arts in the way I feel is the best way.

Speaking of the arts, I had so many amazing gifts on my birthday, the most spectacular was this news story about Michelangelo’s first painting! 

The Torment of St. Anthony I have not seen this one before, which means it just wasn’t in the art books,  and so I am very thankful I can see it now! 

I remember when I was younger, how fascinating the power of creating monsters was and I do not subscribe to the theory that there are ‘phases’ in art even though it felt like I went through a monster/action/masculine/line stage and now pretty much work in a more feminine /organic/color style.

Michelangelo’s Saint Anthony with monsters is a perfect example of ‘line’ work,he literally used tiny lines of color to make a very clear sharp edged graphical painting. Compare that one with the one below with the same story being told, Saint Anthony being tormented by wiches who turn into beautiful tempting women. Fantin-Latour uses ‘color’ instead of line, meaning he makes the shapes from blobs of paint rather than from lines. I love Michelangelo but his picture is not as plesing to me as the one below. St. Anthony is not in the Bible he’s just in extra stories someone was inspired to write, and over the years it’s turned into a part of the Catholic religion. here’s the link to the story with more pics!  http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/may/13/art-michelangelo-torment-saint-anthony

collection.nmwa.go.jp/en/P.1959-0099.html  

Henri Fantin-Latour [Grenoble, 1836 - Buré, 1904]

The Temptation of St. Anthony

and I almost forgot! Salvador Dali did an awesome Temptation of Saint Anthony too!!

 

and how could I forget another of my favorite surrealist artists, Felicien Rops, did a Temptation of Saint Anthony as well!

I, Darren Daz Cox am an artist too but I make up my own stories. Here’s some of my recent sketches! I don’t use my art models the way the old masters did, they are not just bodies with light on them, but rather their actions and thoughts help inspire my art in the way I want it to be.

Beff in her holocaust cloak (from The Princess Bride) stormed the castle of bad weather and brought us some sunbeams!

Beff is a romantic who inspires these type of pictures!

My art model Beff as a little old lady reading to her grandkids and pets… pencil on paper then the liquify filter by famous artist Darren Daz Cox. I asked Beff what book her future self I drew here might be reading and she said the classic The Monster at the end of the book featuring Grover. I love that book too!

Oh, and here is the monster at the end of the post! (painted by Michelangelo)

Monster by Michelangelo!!!!

 

According to David Wilcock we are moving into the 4th density, which is one of love and compassion.

There’s a really great interview on Myth or Logic radio with David Wilcock  (scroll down to March 24 2008) that goes through many topics including notes on the current political scene from a psychic’s perspective, chakras and how to understand yourself through them, David evolving from a teenage pot-head to having experiences through meditation that were far more powerful than drugs and what he expects to happen in the near future when the Earth moves into a new energy feild in 2012.

It’s not a gloom and doom future at all, forget the illuminati, they can’t hurt you, only you can hurt you by hurting others.

Love your neighbor, be kind to strangers, have self-respect and think positive, that’s basicly the way to prepare for the coming changes.

You are probably already doing those things if you are here!

~* with love, Daz *~