Old Friends + A New Face

I am slowly branching out... You can check out my illustrations in several magazines this month.

Ricepaper Magazine- For this issue I was assigned to create a full page comic/ illustration based upon the featured theme: aesthetics. It was much more challenging than the previous assignments since I was handed a blank page instead of following written words. I hope you will enjoy the result. (It is featured on the last page of the magazine, if you are impatient, but please do check out the rest of the contents; it is a great publication.)

Crow Toes Quarterly- I was very excited to hear Crow Toes is able to continue on, and it is now offering digital edition as well. I illustrated one of the stories for this issue.

Sub-Terrain Magazine- Something new this month! A Vancouver based magazine focusing on alternative poetry and fiction. I was contacted by the editor to illustrate one of the featured short fictions. Not the easiest story to stomach, but exceptionally written with an ending that is both inspiring and nauseating. (Quite a combination, I think.) I don't know about the availability outside of BC, but definitely give it a try when you have the chance. (sorry, no cover image for this one.)

That's all the update for now- talk later!

A Card of My Own

It has come to a point that, as my role as a freelance illustrator becoming more and more steady, (my works will appear in three magazines in the upcoming months!) it's finally time to have something physical representing this particular side of me. (Instead of the ex-architecture student side.)

Previously I had printed postcards which accomplished such task fantastically, but as the quantity of 100 gradually depleted, (I've never been to the post office as many times as in the past months.) I need to create something new... Besides, it's a bit cumbersome giving out postcard when you try to introduce yourself. (Anything that won't fit into a wallet won't be taken away... I am speaking from experience.)

So allow me to present my first official business card:

JUSTIN CHEN all rights reserved. 2009

I won! Business Card Design Contest (Taiwan)

click image to access Queen's blog. (Chinese heavy!)
JUSTIN CHEN all rights reserved. 2009

This is the best news ever! My first time ever won anything 1st place!

The business card is for Queen (a pseudonym, of course), an popular writer/personality in Taiwan. It was a contest started back in December of 2008. I'm so very happy, out of the 300+ entries, she selected mine to be the base of her future business card!

With pink and black as the starting point (her favorite colors), the front face of the card features a crown (her symbol), embedded within are her name in both English (Illy) and Chinese. If you follow the little thread along to the back of the card, you'll see once again the author's name on a tag, (Indicating that this is "the Queen's crown." Get it?... I hope the concept looks better than it sounds.) along with all the required information.

My first win and it is all the way in Taiwan! This is just way too cool!

Inspired by Grimm: The Little Red Riding Hood... and Save a Magazine

"The Little Red Riding Hood" (click image for Crow Toes Quarterly Magazine.)
JUSTIN CHEN all rights reserved. 2009

Probably one of the most well known fairy tale from the Grimm Brothers.

I did not derive too much from the original elements, but merely played around with the idea of things are not always what they seem (especially in a forest.).

This piece is actually done much earlier, chronologically it was finished right after the piece inspired by Hansel and Gretel. So that is almost 4 months ago. Comparing to what I have done recently, there actually is a significant difference in my composition- recently I'm obsessed with solid, dark mass and geometry. (Maybe my architectural side is showing?) But so far I've enjoyed the direction I'm heading, and can't wait to see what's coming up next.

This illustration is among one of my works that were fortunate to be published; it appeared in the 9th issue of Crow Toes Quarterly. Unfortunately I just received the news that the magazine has become the latest victim of our global financial crisis; unless 250 copies were sold by April 10th, the magazine will be no more.

So spread the word! Don't let such a charming little magazine die!

Inspired by Grimm: The Griffin

"The Griffin" (click image for larger view.)
JUSTIN CHEN all rights reserved. 2009

Inspired by Grimm's "The Griffin..." But no Griffin here! The connection between The Grimm Brothers' fairytale and this illustration might be a bit of a stretch, as I took a minute moment and regurgitated something else completely.

The scene that inspired me was the death of the King; (it happened right at the end of the story, more or less in a sentence.) yet I found his death compelling. On plain sight his death was the doing of others, but actually, it was his own greed that brought him into the wrong place, at the wrong time.

In the end, the illustrations portrays the sinking of a man, tied to both a stone and a crown. But what exactly is dragging him down? Is it the heavy boulder? Or his own pursue for fortune?