Unfortunately the type on the cover design ended up blocking a nice glowing effect I got in the wave. You can see the final cover here.

Here is the cover illustration for the second Cox & Forkum book.

A cover illustration for the monthly magazine The Intellectual Activist.

A cover Illustration for the monthly magazine AutoGraphic Automotive Report.

A cover illustration for the monthly magazine The Intellectual Activist.

A cover Illustration for the monthly magazine AutoGraphic Automotive Report.

A cover illustration for the monthly magazine The Intellectual Activist.

I illustrated the cover for the book Caucus of Corruption by Matt Margolis and Mark Noonan -- which is now on the market.

A cover Illustration for the monthly magazine AutoGraphic Automotive Report.

A cover illustration for the monthly magazine The Intellectual Activist.

A cover Illustration for the monthly magazine AutoGraphic Automotive Report.

I'm a BIG Calvin and Hobbes fan. I have the book Calvin and Hobbes: Sunday Pages 1985 to 1995 by Bill Watterson, and on a whim I decided to have some fun mimicking the cover with caricatures of me and Allen (that's me up front). It gave me a chance to study Watterson's wonderful water color work. And my efforts didn't go to waste; we used it to announce our hiatus from editorial cartooning today.

I'm in the planning stages of doing a collection of sketches based on the wacky left. This is the cover idea.

I throw darts in a Decatur league when I'm not chained to my drafting table. So here's an idea for our team shirt.

Every once in a while, I like to play with a book cover idea just to get a good workout.

Goofing around in Photoshop with an alternative version of Glenn Reynolds' Army of Davids.

Allen Forkum art directed this piece for his newspaper, Automotive Report. My favorite part is the irate cave dude's sun dial watch. Yabba Dabba Doo.

I thought this could be a book cover for a southern gothic tale. Any titles?

"I'm honored to be here with the eternal general of the United States, mi amigo Alberto Gonzales." --George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., May 4, 2007

Any favorites?

A friend of mine hired me to do a cover idea he could present to a publisher. The story has a kind of Snow White-via-Prince and the Pauper theme.

A tiny job I did for Kimberly J. at Atlanta Classic Theater some years ago.

PUT SOMETHING IN
by Shel Silverstein

Draw a crazy picture,
Write a nutty poem,
Sing a mumble-jumble song,
Whistle through a comb.
Do a loony-goony dance
'Cross the kitchen floor,
Put something silly in the world
That ain't been there before.

Thought I'd try to illustrate to one of my favorite poets. Expect a few more of these.

"Let's hear from Vincent in Brooklyn...."

"Hey Maury. Long time (BLEEP) listener, first-time (BLEEP) caller. Love your (BLEEP) show. I'm sittin' down to a (BLEEP) danish and an awesome (BLEEP) espresso."

"Glad to hear it. Breakfast is just so great, isn' it?"

(BLEEP) A, Maury. It's like the (BLEEP) best"

"Thanks, Vincent. Now let's hear from Jack in Iowa...."

Goofing with photoshop....

Hope he has his green card.

PRAYER OF THE SELFISH CHILD
by Shel Silverstein

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
And if I die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my toys to break.
So none of the other kids can use 'em....
Amen

If Stipe ever does a memoir....

THE SITTER
by Shel Silverstein

Mrs. McTwitter the baby sitter,
I thinks she's a little bit crazy.
She thinks a baby-sitter's supposed
To sit upon the baby.

I'd love to read a revisionist "Alice in Wonderland" where the Madhatter was totally misunderstood and "sweet" Alice turns out to be a twisted vanity-monger.

HOW NOT TO HAVE TO DRY THE DISHES
by Shel Silverstein

If you have to dry the dishes
(Such an awful, boring chore)
If you have to dry he dishes
('Stead of going to the store)
If you have to dry the dishes
And you drop one on the floor-
Maybe they won't let you
Dry the dishes any more.

Caricatures of a few of my favorite historical Americans:George Washington, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton and Robert E. Lee.

I hope you get a chance to sit down and consider what a miraculous country we are privileged to call home. Happy birthday, America.

I've always thought Bruce Wayne's alter-ego was a bit goofier than originally intended...

CONRAD THRASH, INTER-GALACTIC BOUNTY HUNTER...

None of the townspeople could quite remember when they last saw a crow....

When she's not bitch-slapping some security guard in D.C., Georgia's Cynthia McKinney enjoys rollerblading, horseback riding and scouring the streets of Atlanta for the next juicy conspiracy theory.

A little fun with my Cheney caricature....

PS...Any ideas out there for any of my past caricatures paired with a well-known book title?

I'm looking to start a dart team.

This was a proposed August 2006 schedule cover for a local dance company.

ROCKABYE
by Shel Silverstein

Rockabye baby in the treetop
Don't you know a treetop
Is no safe place to rock?

And who put you up there,
And your cradle, too?
Baby, I think someone down here's
Got it in for you.

This was a cover proposal for a local band called Das BoomHair. Featuring Les Thanaverage on pan flute.

A while back, Allen and I were asked to do an illustration celebrating Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" for The Intellectual Activist. After we batted around a few ideas, we decided this was a good way to go. I'm a huge fan of Rand's literary work (though NOT a devout Objectivist) and this project turned out to be quite a challenge. We got a kick out of trying to re-intrepet a fascinating metaphor for individualistic freedom

This is an example of a drawing style I was goofing around with a few years ago.

Thought this was a decent web illustration for a local radio blowhard here in Atlanta.

Daniel Howell runs BigRedKitty for gamers with a medieval bent. Luckily, Daniel does it all with a dwarf hunter's portion of humor.

Beyond the Octoroon Splinter, the Nefarini cast a formidable shadow of eternal hatred over human space. Were it not for the Galathan Ultimatum, Second Incinerator Stark would have passed on negotiating with these vile creatures and spent a long SolSpan in Sector Azurine.

FANCY DIVE
by Shell Silverstein

The fanciest dive that ever was dove
Was done by Melissa of Coconut Grove,
She bounced on the board and flew into the air
With a twist of her head and twirl of her hair
She did thirty-four jackknives, backflipped and spun,
Quadruple-gainered, and reached for the sun,
And then somersaulted nine times and a quarter-
And looked down and saw that the pool had no water.

I'm thinking this is a Crichton thriller where quantum physicists discover an ancient conspiracy that reveals the REAL reason why organic food costs more than canned food. Mayhem ensues.

I think this could be a Wes Craven flick about Scientology and its strangle-hold on the shoe industry.

Now that it's been a few months since Rumsfeld has been out of the D.C. Shuck 'N' Jive Show, I"m having a hard time imagining him spending his days doing sodoku puzzles, finishing off a pot of Badger Breath herbal tea.

Part-time A/C repairman, Nick Webb rolls through the city's underbelly, scratching it and making it belch.

Been reading up on Rene Magritte lately....

This would be the first CD release by a North Carolina acoustic country trio that melded the raw heartache of Patsy Cline with the melodic soulfulness of Otis Redding.

This is a little thing I did for a local tavern that's celebrating 25 years of business here in Decatur. You can bet they'll get the fee I received right back.

This could be a story (taking place during Napoleon's campaign in Spain) about an old warhorse gone AWOL who disovers what life is like on the farm where he was born.

HERE WE GO: It's happening. I've stuck my toe into the comic book world along with two writers from Philadelphia and this is just a sample. It's a tale of GOOD vs EVIL and how a U.S. soldier makes his way through it. I'm in the midst of creating this 30 page story and a publishing date is imminant. STAY TUNED for all the glorious tidbits forthcoming. If you were ever curious about what a John Cox book would look like....here ya go.

Learn a little more about this project here.

I actually wrote a clean limerick. Why do limericks readily lend themselves to deviant verse?

Any angry, ill-informed white guys out there with blog aspirations? Here ya go, compliments of the house.

UPDATE: Congratulations Snowdog! Glad to see it out there. Hope you have fun with it.

My good friend and fellow darter, Bob Tuchow, asked me to try my hand at creating a logo for a prospective new team we've been talking about. What is a "mook"? Catch us throwing darts some night at Trackside and all your questions will be answered.

Played with an original drawing in PhotoShop. This feels like a Richard Ford story of a entomologist's epic fall from grace.

UPDATE: Took a hint from Terwiliger for a new take on the idea. Thanks, T

A little project i did for Keith Rose and his new site. Looks like fun.

Kate Bush
Hounds of Love
1985

One of my favorite albums. Sexy, heartbreaking, slightly dark,very moving. I'd love to get hold of a digital re-mastering of this.

This is the kind of work I do for Allen Forkum's newspaper, Automotive Report. If I can make this car stuff look interesting, my job is done.

This would be a collection of personal anecdotes revolving around what people were into during the summer of '74.

As for me, I was ten. I was into little league baseball, Cosby albums and listening to Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon".

I don't think radical Islam has enough leverage in western media....

This is an early attempt at telling a science fiction tale about an intergalactic census taker. A protege discovers his mentor is utterly lost among the vast star systems and the only clues to his whereabouts are these sketches and notations from a book found at his last known location.

The tiny scraps of writing are his personal notes on the flora and fauna of his last assignment.

The whole book is a compendium of the census taker's interplanetary missions.

Lifting an eggnog and Jack to all the gang....May the Holidays find you healthy and inspired!

General Khorxak couldn't stand having to take out The Frontier, but there he was, having to face the brutal Colorado National Guard....AGAIN!

Just finished this for Latino, a brand new magazine that will emphasize social and cultural news for the U.S.-Latino audience. They bought this for their piece on the future of Cuba.

Martin Lindeskog hired me to do his blog banner for his site,http://egoist.blogspot.com/. I thought it might be interesting to show the steps in its production.

This is the sketch I came up with after having read his suggestions.

I establish where the black tones (cityscape and other details) are in relation to the "finished" color pencil outline of the figures.

SAYS MIKE HUCKABEE.....
"There's only one explanation for it, and it's not a human one. It's the same power that helped a little boy with two fish and five loaves feed a crowd of five thousand people. And that's the only way that our campaign could be doing what it's doing".

There you have it, ladies and gentiles. This shmuck has the audacity to compare a Jesus miracle with a pointless vanity project in Iowa.

If he wins in New Hampshire, atheism here I come.

This is the 8" x 8" color rough for a cover of a book about Esther, the Old Testament queen who saved the Jews from extermination in ancient Persia. I'll show the finished piece later on.

NOTE: You may recognize the "Esther" from an earliler piece.

This blog would feature three sorority sisters with contrasting view points on campus life. There's Yvette, the darkly-clad pessimist in her third year of Icelandic poetry studies. There's Claire, the dance major who wants to treat the sick in Rowanda. And there's Jane, the 5-year arts grad student who is world-weary, yet passionate.

Each Thursday they tackle a local issue that MUST BE ADDRESSED. Or maybe they swap cookie recipes.....

1. A bowl of glass shards in the morning is a real eye-opener,
2. Jack Bauer can kiss my ass.
3. It's better to pull your own wisdom teeth. And your tonsils....as long as
you're back there.
4. Women love it when use cologne in your jockeys.

I was alerted by my Florida friend and fellow artist, Steve Mcafee, that he MAY have seen a snatch of my work on......wait for it.....the COLBERT REPORT. I was told I could catch the re-run and try to verify what he saw.

I was unable to be near a t.v at the Jan. 11 8:30 showing, so I called Allen Forkum to see if he could either watch the re-run and tell me what he saw (he could recognize the work) or maybe tape it and send me an image.

Well, here it is. Neat, huh?

Three questions....
1. Which Mid-Eastern paper ripped me off and (2) does Comedy Central know THEY didn't do the art?

3. Am I disturbed that the drawing possibly helped the enemy?

Kinda of weird....

Check the Cox and Forkum "Newsmaker Caricatures" archive and you can see the Clinton and Obama caricatures the newspaper stole.

This is a cover I did for Allen Forkum's Automotive Report newspaper in Nashville. The news item was about how mechanics must deal with future technological developments in the automotive industry.

This could a compilation of cutting-edge ring tones.

I thought it would be fun to illustrate a King cover. This story would be about a mute Holiday Inn housekeeper whose psychic abilities help the local police track down a demon-possessed '78 AMC Pacer.

This is my second shot at trying to nail our team logo.

This is artwork for Mitchell Halvorsen's boat and his crew. It happens to be based on another design of mine.