Cover for the Utne Reader!

I'm happy to be able to share my first cover for the Utne Reader! I did this cover a month or so ago, and if you remember, I did another cover that week for The Weekly Standard. Two covers in one week. It was a crazy week for sure! I really enjoyed working on this piece for various reasons, but mostly because the art director was great to work with and as I've said before, that goes a long way. What's not to love? Obama eating a cheeseburger with a cigarette behind his ear . . . as well as an angry Michelle Obama scowling in the background holding veggies . . . Oh yeah . . . tons of fun!!!

This painting had its challenges, but mostly because I only had 3 and half days to paint it. I had a difficult time finding the exact expressions that I needed for this piece. So in the end, I resorted to taking pictures of myself making the type of expression that I needed. This enabled me to create whatever expression I needed. It's not easy, but it can be done . . . I actually do this quite a bit these days.

This issue is on the news stands, so go out and pick one up!




My first version had smoke, but in the end the smoke got the axe for one reason or another. I'm only sharing it here because I personally like the smoke . . . and it was fun to paint!




Detail of face and burger . . . this burger took a long time to paint . . .





Some of the sketches and thumbnails that I did in prep for the mock up cover. Because of my time crunch, I had to find reference and sketch even faster than usual.



Mock of cover, working out the idea . . .



These were taken as reference for folds in clothing and so on. The model wishes to remain anonymous. :)