Society of Illustrators - Stevan Dohanos Award - Part 1

I got a call on a friday that I had won the Stevan Dohanos Award this year at the Society of Illustrators in NY. I decided to fly from London to NY for a week to accept the award. This would be my first time back in the US in a year.



Asian Americans for equality. What do they do in there?



B and H photo is a crazy place. orders zip around the ceiling on these conveyer belt things. I need to buy a lens filter for my new 24mm f/1.4 L lens which i'll show later. It's amazing so lots of pics on this blog from here on out will be with that lens.



Salih showing me how to use Final Cut Pro. I'm trying to make a travel video out of all the clips i've taken. It's doable but will take a while to learn the program and learn about video, timing, music, cuts, pace and that whole universe



at the opening of the Society of Illustrators Member's Open show. My piece in the back with the red bridge won top prize, the Stevan Dohanos Award. The Society of Illustrators is the top place probably in the world to be recognized for your work in the illustration field so I was dumbfounded. I was even more dumbfounded when they gave me one of the Society's medals!



had to give a little speech. The Society owns this awesome old New York building on 63rd and Lex. Upstairs is the members bar where all the old school founding fathers and so on have hung out and jammed.



after a bunch of drinks at the Society it was off for celebratory champagne.



after celebratory champagne we were very inebriated and any old $2 PBRs would do. Many were consumed and you know the rest of the story.



Max Fish



the twighlight series owned by Mel's sister.



here's the medal! it's heavy. I never thought I would own one of these and now i have one. It's amazing.







djembe drummers on the subway



churros lady didn't want her photo taken



bedford ave station on the L



I never noticed this before in NY but it seems like there are tons of "perro flautas" now. perro flauta meaning dog flute, like what they call these guys in Spain. I mean they are the same down to the dread locks and owning dogs. what gives.



a lot of this in NY



williamsburg



the view of manhattan from williamsburg. somewhere near north 7th or 8th. Sophie has moved back to NY and Steven (we went to Oxford together the week before) came from London to visit her.



Kenka used to be my favorite place to drink. its a funky Japanese drinking hall on st. marks place. I don't know how it is now though. I will have to give it another try and see.



the cotton candy machine is inside now.



the Chinatown Dragon Fighters. The firehouse is near Mel's house.





Mel had a party for me at her house on East Broadway. Thanks Mel!



Sandra's dog pudge is sooooooo cute. he's like an Ewok/Koala Bear mix.



Van Der Doodle got noodled before he even got to the party.



which is why you see him here drinking out of a pot.



pickleback shots at 169 bar on east broadway. Its this new craze where you take a shot of whiskey and then chase it with a shot of pickle juice. its not that bad. how do they produce huge jars upon jars of pickle juice to fill the demand? are they making synthetic pickle juice now? No one else seems to think its gross.



go go dancer at 169 bar.

cheetah pool table

Oxford

Oxford is the home of many universities, the most famous and prestigious being Oxford University. It has a population of just under 165,000. It lies about 50 miles (80 km) north-west of London.

what's up with this one teated cow



Steven is upset that this is a mobile phone store







awesome places by the river



this wolf/dog was just wandering the streets.



cigarette ends?



forget the name of this museum but there was some cool stuff life this chinese chair and the samurai kabuto below





i'm really into this indian art





I asked the woman what's up and she said they have a collection of rings, some of which inspired the lord of the ring's ring. when the light hits it just right it lights up inside.



side street next to the flag and lamb or eagle and child pub, can't remember which.



this says "hands off vietnam" could this still be there from the 70's?



one of the coolest museums i've ever been to, the Pitts Rivers museum. it's an accessible museum that knows what it is. It's for the everyman and his kids and not the museum snob. It is jammed to the brim with cool stuff. I highly recommend this museum if you go to oxford. I wish i had more time in oxford because i could have spent a few more hours in here. the displays literally are jam packed.





they're called buggies in the England.



what's happening here? this door seems really small.



the building was quaint and awesome.



one of the famous buildings of Oxford. i think it's a library.



tiny alley that is easy to miss. down this alley is the Turf Tavern, one of the famous ones in Oxford. the smaller sign says "an education in intoxication".





court yard of one of the other universities. it seems to be the dorms.







salmon something or other. good stuff. at this point me and steven had been to 3 pubs including the "flag and lamb" and the "eagle and child" both of which JRR Tolkien and C.S. Lewis used to frequent. We had quite a few pints and i forgot to take photos of that.



we missed our train, went to drink another pint, found this pub with 5 british rednecks, one of whom upon hearing i was from america asked if i liked toby keith. he said he went to a toby keith concert and thought he would be the only one there but to his surprise there were 40,000 other british fans. upon getting back to london we were still filled with pints and had no reason and proceeded to go to the Sun on bethnal green road for more pints. that was dumb. Oxford was a charming city



thanksgiving in foreign countries has been interesting. this year it was a KFC box



what is wrong with KFC in foreign countries? in London they don't have mashed potatoes or biscuits. one of the options for sides is gravy. since when is a cup of gravy a side!



Satoko from Tokyo came to London. she got drunk and really let loose for once.



loft party somewhere. Satoko was bouncing around like she was drunk on gummy bear juice.



phones i have used in the last 3.5 years. from left to right. USA Verizon phone i've had since 2002. 2 identical chinese Motorola phones. purple samsung softbank phone from japan. red spanish sony erickson phone. British unlocked HTC smart phone. and lastly my landline phone through vonage (VOIP, internet phone that has remained my 917 new york number).



i was in this Neo Folk mini book that they gave out at some big show in Paris. it was put together by Kult, an agency in Singapore.





Betty



Wilf

A paper model i put together so i could get the shadows right for this painting i'm working on. You'll see that later