It’s all about the art

This past Saturday I spent the day in The Big Apple. CAG (The Comicbook Artist Guild) — of which I am a member — held our annual NYC picnic get-together. This year the picnic was held in Morningside Park, and wonderfully arranged by our NY coordinator, Chris Buchner. We had members show up from not only NY, but CT, and our RI branches.

From there, I traveled with Chris Torres (who panted Springload & Renegade for me, which appeared in CAG #7) to a nearby pub to meet a friend of his for a couple of drinks. We were later joined by a couple more of Chris' friends, and then we traveled to an art party that was being held by some other friends at their studio in Astoria, Queens.

I wound up staying at the Art Party ‘til nearly Midnight, leaving only because I had to catch a 1:15 A.M. train back to CT. While I was at the party, one of the “events” there was a life model drawing party (with a couple of willing, and beautiful gals who posed for the artists). After the models were done with their posing sessions, many of the artists continued to sketch. One of these many talented artists was James Rodriguez, with whom I collaborated on a 2009 calendar project (More on that later, see below for the cover).



James did a wonderful sketch of Spider-Man which he handed to me (knowing my love of Spidey). I hung onto the sketch throughout the evening, but I did (unfortunately) spill some of my beer on it, causing it to run slightly (Sorry James — fortunately, I managed to photoshop the stain out for the post). Still. It is a wonderful sketch, and I have it hanging in my office, as well as posted at the top of this blog.