JOYENGINE: cause sharing is cool

Come out Thursday September 24th for Nixon’s first Denver Art Mosh at Lisa Kowalski Gallery.  In addition to the rippin’ roster of artists listed on the flyer, Markham “Shitty Kitten” Maes will be in attendance and painting live.  Sounds like the 24th is going to be quite a little get together.

Ojo Por Ojo (Eye For Eye) is the title of Shitty Kitten’s new show at Plastic Chapel which opens February 14th! Can you tell me a better way to spend Valentine’s Day?… suriously? Shitty Kitten aka Markham Maes always comes full force, his last show on East Colfax nearly sold out… I’d suggest rolling through early if you’d like to get your greasy little mits on a piece. The super block will be lit up that night… with shows also running at The Fabric Lab (Photogrpaher: Ryan Resch) as well as The Shoppe (Theo Knox).

Markham Maes, the shittiest of kittens, never ceases to amaes. Markham is a rare creature, and an artist in the purest sense.  In a time where computers and all things digital prevail, Markham sticks to pencils, pens, paints, paper, canvas and sometimes wood.  He’s been know to work on paintings in his car while stopped at traffic lights. Sure, we scan his work once in a while or digitally manipulate it for various commercial appliques, but when it comes to his real artwork – that shit is analog – all day long.  And yeah, lots of artists still work almost entirely old school with little to no reliance on the computer, but Markham takes it to the extreme.  Can you name the last person you know who hand-drew screen printed and hand-painted their announcements for their latest show, themselves?  I can, it’s Markham Maes and he’s a gem of creative talent.  But, blah, blah, blah, see for yourself – and be sure to check out his latest body of work entitled Letters and Ladies on December 12th at the D-Note.

glimpse of incomplete painting for Letters and Ladies

hand-drawn screen printed and hand-painted opening announcements

51 toys have been delivered for customization.  9 more ship tomorrow.   Then we hit up the homies and distribute locally.  100 handmade custom toys, fully customized at the Plastic Chapel on September 13th, 2008.  Gonna be hot… Damn, did that Shitty kill that logo!!!

Markham stopped by this afternoon.  In typical “Shitty” fashion, he rolled through with a wicked pen & ink illustration of DOO that he whipped up between pulling screens this afternoon.  Markham’s imagination is really the stuff of legend.  His ability to travel conceptually never ceases to aMAES me.   According to Mr. Maes this illustration is a bit of a warmup for a painting or 2 he’s gonna crank out for the S&F™ show at the  Plastic Chapel in September.  We can’t wait!!!

Markham “Shitty Kitten” Maes took week #8 (the FINAL week) of the S&F™ logo/identity design contest.  Week #8 was a tricky one, we (cypher13) received some pretty amazing identity concepts, but in the end decided that Markham’s characteristic over-the-top creative interpretation of what the S&F™ project dreams to be, seriously stole the show.  We’re in the midst of reviewing the eight winning logos a little closer to see who’s gonna get the gold.  We’ll be choosing the big winner soon!!!

As usual, Markham “Shitty Kitten” Maes crushed his latest show, this time at Josh & Tran’s, Shoppe (a first of its kind cereal & cupcake bar chock full of the most coveted art & design books available).  Markham pushed the Sculpey around a bit further than usual, painted a number of albums, album covers, panels, skate decks, and kept it rollin’ all night long live painting both a large panel and a handful of models for The Fabric Lab’s fashion show at the Super Fresh Block Party later that evening (pics and details soon).  Saturday night was a must see Denver evening.  Thanks go out to all those who made it happen.  It sorta… ruled.  Nice work team!!!

Yep.  We’re doin’ it.  SBD and I.  Ridin’ fixed gears to Lefavor’s to celebrate our independence – from oil, or something like that…  This may be my last blog post.  So, Happy 4th!!!  If we make it… we’ll be meetin’ up with Alex and Mr. Shaeffer and takin’ in 7 cities worth of fireworks from Scot’s roooftop deck, Hopefully… droppin’ in on DJ Z Trip, hittin’ up Shitty’s show at The Shoppe, poppin’ in on Andenken, kickin’ Saturday at the “Super Fresh Block Party” – and gettin’ all arty with Lefavor and friends. Independence Day… hmm…

Markham “Shitty Kitten” Maes will be showing a new body of work at The Shoppe during the Super Fresh Block Party!  We’ll try to get a sneak peak of some new paintings before the show!

Markham “Shitty Kitten” Maes is a great curator, but he’s a better artist. Regardless, Shitty both curated and participated in Night Owls this past Thursday at the D-Note. Both his work, and the show were super hot. The list of participating artists was long and included, Josh Wills (who crushed!), small-but-dangerous, Keith Jive, Mike Graves, teebee, Sean Gilbert, Alex Henry, John Fellows, Anthony Salazar, and of course, Mr. Maes. We gotta say thanks to Markham, for once again curating another wicked show. While it’s great to have Shitty hosting art shows, seems safe to say, we’d all prefer him in the studio with brush in hand. Word to that.

NOTE: There was about 6x as many pieces as there are photos. Photographer… what happened… uhhh…

I got all inspired after seeing the super sick owl stencils the guys did for Shitty’s show and couldn’t help but whip one up myself. It’s obviously not stencil safe but it’s a reflection of my longing for the missed collabos from days past. I’m waiting for the next time we all get to stay up until the wee hours of the night killin’ it for a sweet promo project or a show.

In preparation for a little arty cypher13 side project we whipped up a DIY blank owl template last night and then the three of us mixed it up. We have intentions of turning these owls into super-sized stencils and breakin’ out the Krylon (they’re reversed so… the black will comprise the positive stencil, and the white will be cut to take paint). After all, Shitty does have a show tomorrow night (Night Owls at the D-Note)… and… we really oughtta be done by now if we’re gonna participate. We’ll see… Night owls, right?