Thursday, September 09, 2004

Con Report

Dragon*Con was just great!

I was hoping to meet some people, do some networking, see some art... sort of get the lay of the land of the convention world. But I also ended up making a lot of friends, and learning everything I wanted to know about Convention art shows.

First, I got to meet a few fellow Epilogue staffers - Chad (the founder), Shawn, and Stephanie Law. It was the first real, flesh-and-blood meeting I'd had with anyone from Epi. I also got to see the legendary Epilogue booth, which was situated in a great spot in the Art Show room. It looked fantastic!

Next, I got to meet several of the artists I've enjoyed seeing (and corresponding with) on Epilogue - Patrick Keith, Vicky Morgan-Keith, Grant Fuhst, Tim Roman (with Amy!), J.P. Targete (and Regina!), Jason Engle, and others. Each night involved groups of artists hanging out and talking shop over copious food and drink. That was wild!

I especially have to mention that Patrick and Vicky (along with Stan Morrison's charming wife Nancy) took me under their collective wing and showed me around. They were great "hosts" to me, the newbie.

Top strange moment of the con: as a group of us hung out in the upstairs piano bar one night, we were entertained by none other than David Carradine (Kung Fu/Kill Bill/Death Race - yep, him), playing piano and (gulp!) singing. It was a surreal and unique experience.

As always, seeing original art is vastly more entertaining and educational than seeing prints or pictures online. The application of paint, the subtleties of color and texture, these things are worth more than all the art-instruction books in the world. There was some top, world-class art on display and I loved studying it!

On Sunday I gave a Digital Art demo at the Epilogue booth - that was a wonderful experience. I got to meet lots of people as they stopped by to look, and I enjoyed the chance to talk up Epilogue while I did it. I worked on a laptop computer, with a large monitor mirroring my work so passers-by could see it. I'd planned to do some rocks or something, but I ended up doing a whole picture in about 2-1/2 hours. After I finished, J.P. did another demo, and a great time was had by all. As soon as the pictures are posted somewhere, I'll put up a like so you can see them.

Next year, I absolutely plan to hang some art in the Show. I'll see you there!!

Here are links to some of the people I mentioned in this article...
Patrick and Vicky
J.P. Targete
Grant Fuhst
Tim Roman
Stanley Morrison
Stephanie Pui-Mun Law


2 comments:

cmalidore said...

Sounds like you had an absolutely amazing time Patrick! I am definately gonna have to hike my way on over there some time.
-Chris Malidore

Patrick McEvoy said...

Hey, Chris! I did have a great time, thanks, and everyone there was just absolutely cool. Even the ones who aren't ordinarily cool were, in fact, cool. Coolness abounded, you bet! I'm really looking forward to going next year, too, and putting stuff in the art show, too. Hope you can make it, too :)