A Slice of Fried Gold

Food One in Anchorage

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Popular comic creator and live art impresario/performer Jim Mahfood is in Anchorage for a signing, lecture, and live mural art demo. I've always liked the guys work, not my favorite style but it's definitely unique and he stands out amongst a crowd of other creators, and there is something to be said about that. I was at Bosco's getting books for the week and completely spaced that he was going to be there and forgot my Clerks books (amongst other Mahfood creations I own), but I got to chat with him for a bit and he seemed like a really good guy.

Today I caught his live mural art demo, and it was really cool. Essentially it's Mahfood making pieces of art live set to music, and you can see pictures from it below. The guys art is heavily influenced by music and grafitti, and you can definitely tell from what he was producing today at UAA. Thanks to UAA for bringing up a interesting and non-traditional guest to the state. Solid work there all!


Jim Mahfood working on his murals

Middle left mural

Far left mural

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can't imagine being so talented at art that I could come up with murals like that off the top of my head. So he just does all of that live without planning or anything? Looks awesome.

David Harper said...

It was really awesome...he'd grab one of his paint markers and he'd stare at a spot for a bit and then he'd start grinning like he was seeing something no one else was seeing.

For example, on the middle left mural where there is the bold red on the left side with the streaks of red coming down? It's like he suddenly figured out how to use those markers in a new way, and he just pushed it in to see what it would do (it poured out extra paint and made the streaks, it was cool).

He tours around the country, check it out if you get a chance. He's really talented. The whole thing is on the spot, he even painted the backgrounds himself just off his mood and what he was listening to (it was this weird techno/jazz/hip hop fusion - it was like jazz if Danger Mouse was producing).

By the way, when I come down there I'm going to try and make time to check out Dark Horse Comics. Great publisher that's based in Portland. So envious!

David Harper said...

Oh yeah, and as I was leaving a local DJ was setting up and he was going to do a live set to inspire the next two murals. Kinda wish I caught it, but Colver and I had sports trivia tonight.

Post a Comment