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THIS IS SERIOUS , WE COULD MAKE YOU DELIRIOUS
And an artist (Dalton Ghetti) who pays some fine attention to detail.
and lastly, alil something for the fellas in Norway.
I love my crew! SKILLMETHODZ the best crew on EARTH. Do your homework.....
Congrats fellas.
You read that correct, SKMZ Anniversary is in NYC this year. Sept 18th. Don't sleep.
Newburgh Skate Park aka The Avalon, mid 90's
This brings back so many memories....
Big ol' Yellow guy....
Keep up the good work, and was also good to see an old friend Allen Benedict out there as well. We're all gettin' them grayz on the chin! Its wisdom I keep telln'm! Wisdom!
And yo, steal my flicks all you want you REBLOGGING LEACHES, Im watermarking my shit now cuz' of you fagz.... Get a life and stop recycling mine...
Some good ol' readin'
READ IT BIG
Page1
page2
page3
page4
And a big thanks to my home girl Maru @ Married to the Mob for scanning these pages for me, seeing that the useless chicken head culture vulture at the magazine (which I refuse to promote) couldn't make it their better business practice to get me copies of the issue after already doing me dirty by offering the cover, getting their graffiti feature for their mag's street cred. then dodging me for 3 months until the ultimate release of some silly swapped in cover image. Then instead of being straight up and apologizing for their bad business antics,would you believe this bird had the nerve to try to get stupid in her responding emails instead of coming clean and offering solutions to make good, and as a result I was never sent any issues for offering my hard work, time, images and ultimately my name and reputation to some culture leaching magazine that in the long run made no efforts on the simplest task of shipping a few copies to make good on their scandalous actions.
As anyone who has been around the block in one niche culture or another, this type of behavior is nothing new. Every week I'm approached via email or through mutual connections about doing an interview on a site, or in press, or to do a panel discussion at this college or this event or that event.... and if they first surpass my strict background screening to see what their intensions lie, I then will only break my silence and offer images etc. if I am also given the cover. This has been my M.O. for I would say over 5 years now. I just don't believe in magazines coming into our culture and exploiting it without paying financially out the ass or offering priceless ad space to promote the feature artist on the cover as a sign of respect for the culture they want to showcase at their own benefit$. If you cannot offer this, then you should really get the fuck out of the scene and stop exploiting people for their years of blood sweat and tears and in graffiti, their financial hardships we have all encountered just by living the lifestyle we chose to live. I find it incredibly disrespectful for ANY publication to not justly make the effort to compensate myself or anyone else, then going on to dangle a carrot in the face of decades of history with an inside feature all by itself (that no one ever remembers anyway). So to wrap up my outburst, Im gnna' conclude with an ǝpısdn uʍop ʞɔnɟ noʎ puɐ ǝɥʇ ooɹɐƃuɐʞ noʎ pɐoɹ uı uo..... And to my viewers, please enjoy the interview as it was in my opinion one of the best interviews I've responded to to date, mostly due to another artist who also put his reputation( a legendary one all by itself) on the line, ask the questions, someone who actually knows what's up, the legendary SKEME RICHARDS . Check his blog also... He's a good dude I've known for years! If only people like SKEME ran these magazines, no one would be getting jacked for features. lol.....
Peace..
004 Connec.
And most of all, bookmark the blog on the site, with constant updates from the team writers and all kinds of exclusive pics that you won't see me post here.
004 has been doin' their thing, and now teamed up with us in the north east has proven over the last few months to be a solid step forward to locking down some of the countries most up and coming and already established writers in the peaks of their careers. Stay tuned and slide thru 004connec.com
004connec.com
And as the title says " A lifestyle, not an image" which is a huge problem these days. Where writers are portraying a lifestyle that isn't true to themselves. So I immediately embraced the cause behind the 004 mission statement.
DIABOLICAL FUNCTIONS 2010
In May the crew (for the most part) took planes, trains and automobiles into town and did a good sized reunion wall. This video is a result of those days following. For those that couldn't make it, would have only been THAT much iller. Till next time, enjoy this one, as it is VIDEO BLOG 21 .
Downtown Calling, Wednesday Night Screening.
In the mid-1970s the "greatest city in the world" was teetering on theedge of total chaos. A crumbling economy, rampant crime and massivehousing corruption gave way to a city in crisis. Yet out of theeconomic and social strife that held the Big Apple hostage, a newculture of musicians, artists and thinkers emerged downtown that wouldforever change the world. "Downtown Calling" not only documents, invibrant detail, the evolution of New York City's fertile music and artsubculture during this period, but shows how its collective outputcontinues to drive the international fashion, art and music scene today.
and a picture of a Hipster I drew in Chipotle' on 34th this week, with HIIGGGHHHHH riding WOOL shorts with big "butt flap" style buttons on the side, the cliche' American Apparel type tank top, braces ( in his 30's Im assuming), gigantic clown style Reebok sneakers and a Zebra striped work out bag held flamboyantly far far away from his person, almost appearing to be on center stage, or on display.
A "COMPLEX" Irony....
Well, ironically yes, I seen it, 10 years ago when I was working at ECKO UNLTD. So do you see the irony in all of this? i.e. the roots of Complex being an Echo Unltd. publication? I did the exact same ideas for about 5 different magazine ad layouts for their various sponsors and modeled rappers etc etc. then the same idea was passed off to another artist after me by the name JEN1 if my memory serves me correctly. Below are image of at least 2 of mine that I could find at an arms reach to prove a point. The rest are buried in magazines I have in milk crates and don't care enough to waste more time on.
So fast forward back to today, the more and more this concept of ripping off others who birthed an idea first, keeps coming up the more I hear clueless responders jump to save the day wit things like "nothing is original, everyone bites get over yourself yata yata yata" - no, not everyone bites, people who lack ideas and are pressed to keep up a public image greater then their self worth resort to stealing ideas from people with the notion of getting away with no one noticing. There's an underlying intension of getting away with something shady.
So we're on the same page, this is in no way to be confused with someone paying homage , which is 100% up front and showing respect for someone you admire and may not be relevant anymore. Doing something in homage, sometimes can be to bring something back to the forefront that has been lost with a direct lineage back to it's origin.Basically holding up an arrow pointing to the root. Unlike the latter motives of taking credit for a groundbreaking idea where there is no arrow pointing, just the subject sitting center stage smiling for approval to the audience.
Bicker on amongst yourselves as you wish. I will continue to be an anchored rock in the tides of trendyness refusing to just go wherever the wind blows. And in the end my integrity will reflect that. Thinking long term, while most think about the fast turnover payoff. And I will continue to blow up spots when necessary, if I haven't touched on it, then it hasn't made enough of an impact for me( or anyone) to even take notice.
And in case you're looking for an avenue to confuse the argument, I'm referring to customized graphics drawn within and over photo layouts that interact identifiably or subjectively to the showcased subject.
And for those who are completely clueless and have no idea what Im talkin about Im sure you can find what I mean over here http://www.complex.com/
"Bite me"
Some things from my everyday...
A first visit attempt at a tattoo design for someone...
New Lettering options for the SKILLMETHODZ (SKMZ) 2010 NEW YORK CITY Anniversary in September....
and a Horse on a Mic....
New Truck rollin' in.
There's a PRE ORDER set up for this jsut like there was for mine, and mine sold out in like 2 days of being on the "open market" so if you have any inkling that you would wanna grab this I'd jump on the pre order asap. Also these trucks are turning into something special, just wait till you see who's truck is rollin' in next! This is anothe rone of those "damn I shoulda' got on board when I first heard about it"
PRE ORDER <-- check it out.
Strange issues with a free mural for the people?
Semi recent..
This was I think 2004? 2005? In the Bronx, a friend of the KD family was in town from France NOE2. We gave him center stage to do his thing, and he did a wizard type of a character, so we tried to match the scenery with some misty backgrounds with these rocky cliff type chunks or Earth in the backgrounds, and I did the tree trunk in the foreground on the top right with my piece in the vein of a tree grown on a limb... Cern did if my memory serves me correctly, a nude woman on the left of the wall... So it's just odd to me, that at some point over the past few years someone from the area went to the wall illegally with a bucket of white paint, and Im assuming a roller and stick and buffed specifically only the faces of the characters... I don't want to throw any stones or come off as an ignorant American but I once saw a Flickr account of a Muslim who was a graffiti writer in the 90's, and in ALL of the photos he uploaded he scratched the faces out of all the characters and peoples faces. And when I spoke to him, I asked why he did this, and his response was something on the lines of "By putting a picture up somewhere with someone's face makes that person a deity, or allows that person to be worshipped in a God like manner" this was super odd to me, but what was I to say, it was his photo account, but overall I noticed that it made more of a "scene" with all these faces scratched off then it would have if he just left them in there. Especially to walls painted in his collection from the 90's. It seemed odd that he would go into his history and erase things that where once there. So when I saw this picture of the characters erased from history yet the rest of the walls where left alone, aside from the natural hater mentality that goes along with the aging of a wall, I found it odd that they would be content with mutilating an enormous mural that reached about 3 stories high, and obviously done in a professional manner....
Rammellzee -Rest in Peace
Rammellzee on the Mic, Rock Steady on the floor and LEE on the walls...at the old Amphitheatre. I wish I was a few years later to have witnessed this kind of thing, the crowd, the vibe, the people. Im honored to know a few people in the clip, and I swear every time I see these guys in person, I get a bit star struck to know that they where actually there, and that most of them today are still the same cool dudes from back then( Legs, Daze, Lee, Kenny). Too many people from yesteryear are passing away now, I hate making these posts but I feel it's important that the name echos throughout my network to help keep continue to spread awareness and to keep a name alive. And if you don't know about Rammelzee, do your homework. This was an artist that I once heard Futura, hands down show respect to. That holds weight in the scheme of things. Rammellzee was way ahead of the curve. Sad to say but people still probably won't understand this mans wave length, even now that his work output has stopped. I hope I can lend my network and raise more awareness for such an inspiring entity of New York City's history. Rest Easy Rammellzee. Your presence and creative juices will be greatly missed.
Gotta love it....
"A design I came up with....."
LOL, NO.... How about a character I came up with in 2006 while on a trip to Veracruz Mexico with another friend of mine. Hilarious though it may seem, this shit has to stop, this kind of material on my blog is becoming all to frequent lately... Man up and do your own work, and get your own ideas, for Christ sake, STOP BITING!
But Im the bad guy for callin this stuff out right?
www.mr-ewokone.com/letter/images/84.jpg
GO RIGHT NOW!
Enough talk, here's the images of these great prints of an original piece that had already sold last month on the DIRTY PILOT site, the piece was sold within 25 minutes of the show goin live, so we decided it was a smooth idea to make prints of it before that piece was shipped off to it's new owner. The good thing about these aside from the quality is that they are larger then the original, which is super cool for me to see in person. I left the signing pencil in a few shots to try to show reference to size. If any finatics out there are interested in the actual signing pencil ( black pencil I draw with that I call my "Ninja Pencil") they can email me privately to acquire it, first person who drops me that email get's it for free, and I'll toss in a few stickers and such. so there's a funny story to go with your print.
ORDER HERE
p.s. a run of 15 is a pretty fuckin' small run. Don't sleep.
Vision Street Wear comeback????
It’s been a while since we’ve heard from Vision Street Wear,
but now the legendary skate company is back, and bigger than ever, as
seen in the two gender specific remakes of the ‘1400 Vision Classic.’
The guys shoes are available in three colorways (gray/green/white,
black/red/white and white/red/gray), and are perfect for skateboarding,
and general every day wear. Features include a ribbed outsole, padded
ankle strap and toe-box perforations.
I grew up wearing these in the 80's. And have gotten 3 or 4 pairs vintage and retro released over the past 8 or so years. Once was in a Paquito Mas in Studio City wearing a pair of the O.G's and Jason Lee known for his acting looked at my kicks and gave a point and a smile. Not many people know of his professional skateboarding career he had prior to his acting.
Anyways, it's cool to see VSW embrace their early designs and try to revamp them, I wouldn't mind designing a couple Tshirts or board graphics for these guys, I have a few nice O.G. boards still to this day and some other goodies..... So Vision, reach out and lets get this retro feel remake shit poppin.
Split Croatia. May 2010
Just getting warmed up...
There's an Ebay item if I've ever seen it....
Sub hard at work....
"Im always last" - emit.
Stay tuned....
Vegas Magazine
Thanks Mast...
Dirty Pilot Archival Print.
TRAINS OF THOUGHT, 2moro on DP.
So there's an online show opening 2moro on DIRTYPILOT.COM I've been fortunate to see some of these in person and they're beautiful! I would suggest picking one up if you have the $$$$$. And if you can't, not to fret! They will be releasing limited print runs of I believe only 15 of a few chosen trains. I know for a fact mine will be made into a print, signed and numbered in edition of 15 only I beleive for a $100 a pop which isn't too shabby....
Finally something new and fresh to the table... be sure to check the items early if you plan on acquiring...
DIRTYPILOT.COM
The Legendary Frank Frazetta
Here's a link to a beautiful documentary about the life and art of this incredibly talented man "Painting With Fire"
Rest in Peace Master Frank Frazetta.
What happens when your own government ignores information?
Usama Bin Laden Is Living Comfortably in Iran, Documentary Asserts
An Iranian who supplied falcon camps says he saw and met with Usama Bin Laden six times since 2003. His eyewitness accounts adds to a growing body of evidence that the world’s most wanted is living comfortably in Iran.
Usama bin Laden gets up each morning in his dark, damp cave in northern Pakistan, gripped by fear, listening carefully for the telltale sound of a drone that is searching for him. His isolation is almost complete.Only a few trusted associates know where he is, and they visit rarely-- bringing food and news, but careful not to fall into a routine.There is no radio or other electronic device whose signal might befollowed. He can’t go out in daytime for fear of satellites. It is a grim, lonely existence.
At least, that is the picture that has emerged of the life of the world’s most wanted man since he fled Tora Bora in 2001.
But a new and vastly different picture of the Al Qaeda leader's life has been emerging over the past few years. In this scenario, he wakes each morning in a comfortable bed inside a guarded compound north of Tehran. He is surrounded by his wife and a few children. He keeps a low profile, is allowed limited travel and, in exchange for silence, is given a comfortable life under the protection of Iran's Revolutionary Guard.
The idea that Bin Laden is in Iran got a strong boost recently with the premiere of a documentary called “Feathered Cocaine.” In it, Alan Parrot, the film’s subject and one of the world’s foremost falconers,makes a case that Bin Laden, an avid falcon hunter, has been living comfortably in Iran since at least 2003 and continues to pursue the sport relatively freely. He is relaxed, healthy and, according to the film, very comfortable.
To make his case, Parrot, president of the Union for the Conservation of Raptors, took two Icelandic filmmakers, Om Marino Arnarson and Thorkell S. Hardarson, into the secretive world off alconers. It's a world in which some birds can sell for over $1million, and in which the elite of the Middle East conduct business inl uxurious desert camps where money, politics and terror intermingle.
Parrot, who was once the chief falconer for the Shah of Iran and who has worked for the royal families of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, still has extensive contacts in Iran and the falcon world.One of those contacts, described as a warlord from the north of Iran and disguised in a balaclava, reveals in the film that he has met Bin Laden six times on hunting trips inside Iran since March 2003. He says the Al Qaeda leader is relaxed and healthy and so comfortable that “he travels with only four bodyguards.”
Their last confirmed meeting was in 2008, Parrot says. “There may have been more since then, but I haven’t talked to my source since we left Iran,” he said.
Parrot told FOX news.com that the extraordinary disclosure by the warlord, who supplies the falcon camps Bin Laden visits on hunting forays, was not done out of altruism. “One of my men saved his life and this was the repayment," he said. "He was asked to talk. He wasn’t happy about it.”
To prove his case, Parrot said he managed to get the telemetry setting for the falcons Bin Laden was flying, and he provided them to the U.S. Government. “They could locate him to a one-square-mile area using those unique signals”’ he said. He says the government never contacted him to follow up.
Maj. Sean Turner, a Pentagon spokesman, said the U.S. Military would not comment on the whereabouts of Bin Laden.
Parrot's story is supported in the documentary by former CIA agent Robert Baer, an outspoken critic of U.S. policy in the Middle East andof how the CIA is managed. Baer, the onetime Middle East operative on whom the movie Syriana is based, explains that while he was in the CIA, he used satellites to watch the camps and they proved to be one of the key ways Al Qaeda was funded. He underscored how important falconry is to the vastly wealthy, and how Parrot’s position gave him a unique lens on that world.
Parrot's disclosures add another piece to a jigsaw puzzle that for years has fed suspicion that Bin Laden is living in Iran. Among the other clues are:
-- Iran accepted 35 Al Qaeda leaders after the fall of the Taliban,despite the schism between Al Qaeda’s Sunni roots and the Shiite regime in Iran.
-- In February 2009 the U.S. Treasury placed sanctions on severalhigh-ranking Al Qaeda operatives working out of Iran and helping run the terror network.
-- In 2004 author Richard Miniter, in his book “Shadow War,” wrote that two former Iranian Intelligence agents told him they had seen Bin Laden in Iran in 2003.
-- In June 2003 the respected Italian newspaper Corre de la Sierra, http://www.corriere.it/,quoting intelligence reports, reported that Bin Laden was in Iran and preparing new terror attacks.
-- Some analysts believe the reason Bin Laden switched from video toaudiocassettes for his announcements was that he couldn’t find a placein Iran that matched the terrain of northern Pakistan.
-- In December 2009 it was widely reported that one of Bin Laden's wives, six of his children and 11 grandchildren were living in a compound in Tehran. The living situation was made public after one of the daughters escaped the compound and sought asylum in the Saudi Embassy. It is in this compound, Parrot says, that Bin Laden has found sanctuary.
Parrot said Bin Laden was renowned as an avid falconer who captured most of the falcons around Kandahar to raise funds to support his terror efforts. Each spring wealthy Arabs from the Gulf would fill military cargo planes full of specially equipped Toyota Land Cruisers and other equipment and fly to the falcon camps in Afghanistan. "Usama would arrive and presented the falcons as gifts," Parrot said. "In return, the wealthy princes would leave the cars and equipment with him when they left, giving Al Qaeda a considerable material advantage over others, including the Taliban.”
Richard Clarke, the former counter terrorism expert at the White House through two administrations, has admitted in interviews and before the 9/11 Commission that on one of the three occasions the United States was able to place Bin Laden, he was in a falcon camp setup by falcon hunters from Dubai. The CIA requested a cruise missile strike against Bin Laden. Clarke said he stopped the government from firing at the camp because “it didn’t look like an Al Qaeda camp.”
“I am not political,” Parrot says, “But he is the most wanted terrorist in the world and it has been frustrating getting the government to listen. Perhaps now they will.”
One more wall at a time.
The whole wall following the COPE REVOK battle.
Enjoy the collaborative efforts from everyone in one place. Direct video link for better sizing HERE
Nothin like a freeby....
He even gave me a pretty nice print that I had earlier asked him about. Keep up all the success and let the haters crabbily pull each other down further and further into the depths of obscurity....
Rock on Shep....
Cope2, pointing to the freshly dropped stamps on the Bowery...
other panel....
The sun leaves, the night comith, but the names remain....
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD RUN!
Dunno if you guys are up on COMPANY FLOW, but
I did some album artwork for the group back in 1997, and the original painting is
still in El-P's crib today. I've seen it a few times over the years
passing by his pad in Brooklyn. Check this video
at 1:45 is a couple shots of my FIRST real deal large scale painting
I ever did. Kinda nice to see it after all these years still
appreciated. Big ups El Producto.... Enjoy the vid too, pretty dope track with a creative video... Im gnna' bug this dude to get me a cameo in one of these videos one of these days. Dude is still truckin' forward with quality music and good video drops...
Get on his FACEBOOK
Oh yea?
Report: SEC staffers watched porn as economy crashed
(CNN) -- As the country was sinking into its worst financial crisis in more than 70 years, Security and Exchange Commission employees and contractors cruised porn sites and viewed sexually explicit pictures using government computers, according to an agency report obtained by CNN.
"During the past five years, the SEC OIG (Office of Inspector General) substantiated that 33 SEC employees and or contractors violated Commission rules and policies, as well as the government-wide Standards of Ethical Conduct, by viewing pornographic, sexually explicit or sexually suggestive images using government computer resources and official time," said a summary of the investigation by the inspector general's office.
More than half of the workers made between $99,000 and $223,000. All the cases took place over the past five years.
"It is nothing short of disturbing that high-ranking officials within the SEC were spending more time looking at pornography than taking action to help stave off the events that brought our nation's economy to the brink of collapse," said Rep. Darrell Issa. The Republican is the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
"This stunning report should make everyone question the wisdom of moving forward with plans to give regulators like the SEC even more widespread authority," he said. "Inexplicably, rather than exercise its existing regulatory enforcement authority, SEC officials were preoccupied with other distractions."
SEC spokesman John Nester said the employees involved have been disciplined or are being disciplined. Some have been suspended or dismissed, he said, adding that the SEC has further increased penalties for misusing government resources in recent months.
"We will not tolerate the transgressions of the very few who bring discredit to their thousands of hardworking colleagues," he said.
The investigation came to light on the same day President Obama gave a speech in lower Manhattan, calling for reform in the finance industry.
On Capitol Hill, the Senate is working on a financial reform bill that would set up regulatory oversight of the financial industry's practices with the goal of preventing another Wall Street meltdown like the one in 2008 that launched the U.S. recession.
The bill includes an "early warning" system intended to spot signs of crisis, as well as a $50 billion liquidation fund created with money from banks and other finance industry corporations to ensure an orderly transition in closing down failing entities. It was recently approved by the Senate's Banking and Agricultural committees. The House passed its version of the bill in December.
The inspector general's report includes specific examples of misuse by employees.
A regional office staff accountant tried to access pornographic websites nearly 1,800 times, using her SEC laptop during a two-week period. She also had about 600 pornographic images saved on her laptop hard drive.
Separately, a senior attorney at SEC headquarters admitted to downloading pornography up to eight hours a day, according to the investigation.
"In fact, this attorney downloaded so much pornography to his government computer that he exhausted the available space on the computer hard drive and downloaded pornography to CDs or DVDs that he accumulated in boxes in his office," the inspector general's report said.
Closed minded?
I'm sure some people may be too stubborn to wanna watch this but I'm willing to take the risk of posting it anyways... I learned from it....