Gorilla Artfare Group Artist's Blog

For about a year I've been a member of an on-line art collective. After a few months of debate, we settled on a name. And then a few days ago, thanks to the hard work of Federico Piatti and Victoria Maderna and Tom Scholes, Gorilla Artfare - The Blog was born.

The excitement surrounding the blog over the last few days has been overwhelming. New art is posted by members almost hourly.

And we even have press.

Charley Parker profiled us today on his must-read blog Lines & Colors. As well as the Little Chimp Society, an illustration news portal.
EDIT (01.31.2008): Drawn (another great Illustration blog) profiled Gorilla Artfare last night. w00t!
EDIT (02.01.2008): Another MUST READ blog, Irene Gallo's "The Art Department" has a write-up on Gorilla Artfare.

This is the piece i posted (a work in progress):


Hope to have more quality work to put on there, and on here, soon.

Last Man Standing 3 - Round 1 - Underneath It All

A few years ago a friend of mine, Cody Tilson, started a brutal art elimimnation contest over at ConceptArt.org. It was a modification on their yearly Thunderdome contest where artists would compete against one another for bragging rights. Cody's version, Last Man Standing, pits members of the site against one another in multi-round elimination art "fights". Amateurs are pitted against professionals and the soon-to-be-professionals. The only way to advance is to bring out your best art skills and tricks and then push them beyond their limits.


(I submitted this version to Spectrum 15)


In it's Third year Last Man Standing (LMS3) started with 360 contestants "fighting" in 72 six-man/woman battles. The battles were posted last week and we await the judges' results.
(LMS3 round 1 - Matches 1-24, 25-48, and 49-72)
The entries are judged by an all-star panel of Professionals in the field and Art Directors. This is a great way for young upstarts to get their work in front of the people who matter.


I had a tough match (#28). I'll consider myself very lucky if I advance to Round 2.
This was the state at which the piece was at when I submitted it:



Related Post: Process of "Underneath It All" Painting

Working out some kinks

working out some kinks that happened during the move to blogspot.

Technorati Profile

The Blog has Moved!!

I wanted to update the template of this blog and to avoid headaches and potential problems I've put the blog on the blogspot server (instead of hosting it myself).


The new URL is: http://arkadyroytman.blogspot.com. Please update your links.

Spectrum 14 - The Book

With the deadline for Spectrum 15 (January 25, 2008) fast approaching, I'd like to write about #14 (another post that is a long time overdue).

In late October 2007, Spectrum 14 (Amazon link), The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art came out. With every passing year, the annual has been getting progressively better.

Check out that awesome Andrew Jones cover:


After 5 years of trying, someone actually thought my work was worthy of the book.


And best of all I was put on the spread facing Alexi Briclot's piece that was used on the back cover of the Paperback version of the book.


Charlie Parker, wrote about #14 on his "Lines and Colors Blog" featuring Alexi's page. And Spectrum's website write-up about #14 has the foldout with my piece on it (even though the image quality is poor). Look Ma, I'm Famous.


For those looking to enter this year here is the Spectrum 15 entry info. Good luck to everyone!

Society of Illustrators - Jazz Sketch Group Show 2008

I have a piece up on the Members Wall at the Society of Illustrators (right across from the bar on the 3rd floor). It is part of the Jazz Sketch Group Show. This is the only time the Members Wall is opened up to non-members who participate at the life drawing sessions at the Society on Tuesday Nights. The Show will be up for the next 2-3 weeks so if you're in New York stop by the Society to check it out.

This is the piece that's up:


It is also featured on my Nude of the Day blog - 12.25.2007 post

Once I get a shot of the piece wall I'll post it in this blog post.

This is my 3rd year participating in the Jazz Sketch Group Show.

Here is the painting that was up May 2007

Nude of the Day blog post


And the first one from January 2006

Nude of the Day blog post

Happy New Year - 2008 Resolutions

Happy New Year!!!
WOW! it has been exactly 6 months since my last post!!!

I know I said I would not neglect this blog after starting my "Nude of the Day" blog, and then in my typical slacker fashion went on to neglect this poor thing for half of 2007! Hell, I'm even slow with the New Year's wishes. I'm so bad, I waited until the new year started to begin thinking about my New Year Resolutions (I'm still formulating them). My generic Resolution every year is to create more art, particularly Portfolio-quality Illustrations. I failed miserably, in 2007 even after promising myself not to repeat the failures of 2006. Well my first New Year's Resolution is to post new work in this blog at least once every week of 2008. I may not post finished work every week (or every month), but Works-In-Progress and Sketchbooks are fair game.

And to start of this New Year here's a detail of something that's currently on the easel: