inspired by foolishpeople’s new production ‘terra: extremitas’ whose promotional material i’ve been asked to design again this rather mad image emerged. a few things i’ve come across during the past couple of months (conspiracy, alien seeding, blabla) are put together in a humorous way …
(invited pitch for atlantic records to promote the new album by LUPE FIASCO as a graphic novel / game ‘sitelette’).
CONCEPT:
From amongst all the characters, features and scenes within the world of THE COOL, there is one detail, one element of the story, which I felt has an extraordinarily powerful potential, conceptually and emotionally. I thought it could serve as the red thread, ‘the key’ if you will, on which we can build the whole purpose and incentive of our game:
It is THE LETTER, written by MICHAEL YOUNG HISTORY’s eight-year-old sister.
By arranging three different episodes, on two pages of graphic novel narrative each, we have THE LETTER prominently featured as the pivotal mystery of the underlying story. Both LUPE FIASCO and THE STREETS are continuously trying to get hold of it (although for obviously completely different reasons). Its content, the innocent writings of merely a little girl, wield a power none of the evil forces will ever be able to content with. It is brimming of genuine, unconditional LOVE.
this is an art show i’m doing with two friends of mine (the first of its kind) and i thought i’ll just post the press pack / mini-catalogue as jpegs to be remembered for ‘eternity’ …
i’m putting this online because i feel this is somehow a key piece in my illustration work. the coincidence is quite mad, as i’ve just the other day joked with a friend about staging my own death (whilst having my website miraculously updating itself, hahaha). and two weeks later i’m getting this commission from australia asking me to come up with an editorial piece for an article exactly looking into both the ridiculousness as well sincerity of doing something as crazy as this.
these five pictures are a definite milestone for me as they officially introduce another STYLE to my portfolio. i’ve found that i quite like the raw, spontaneous feel of the original pencil drawings and therefore decided to cut the ink and get them straight into photoshop. i’ve started to work like this much earlier already (with my POLITICAL CARTOONS from 2003) but for some reason only now, about four years later, it all of a sudden makes sense for my actual illustration work as well. the new style allows me to loosen up the sometimes too perfect ligne claire artwork (a lot of people repeatedly ask me whether it’s been done on a computer) and it subtly moves me away from the semi-annoying graphic novel connotations i’m often getting.
© 2007, all rights reserved
this is the first sample of ASTROLOGY writing which i’m putting herewith online. it is an excerpt from the preface of THE LANGUAGE OF GROWTH, a book i’m currently working on. the text has been used as the intellectual backbone for a ‘micro lesson’ i held at city & islington college in london, yesterday morning.
“we astrologers feel that there is a ‘meaningful logic’ behind the movement of the PLANETS in our solar system which deeply affects us as human beings. by somehow ‘relating’ to our endocrine and nervous systems, the planetary CYCLES thereby establish a framework which we have come to refer to as FATE. behind FATE, we feel, lies a certain programme, and the goal of this programme – the game plan, or MEANING of it, if you will – is to reach a genuine state of HAPPINESS – brought upon through a healthy and mature dedication to the individual and collective GROWTH of HUMAN POTENTIAL.
five images created on the suggestion of my agency – SYNERGY – to strengthen and ‘tone down’ my portfolio, making it ‘more commercial’.
© 2007, all rights reserved
the second commission by THE NEW YORKER magazine. still not printed but at least this time finished and loved.
this text has been created to accompany the publication of my MUSIC triptych in issue #4 of CREATURE magazine:
with the chord a boy strikes on his PIANO women are lifted off the ground and join in to a journey of collective human surrender to the random magic of LIFE. happily transiting through the skies above the cities we’ve created and whose structures beautifully mirror the FRACTAL of our own genetic diversity we ultimately enter a state of consciousness seen under the shamanic microscope of SALVIA divinorum.
reinhard schleining
london, 5th december 2006
another series of illustration assignments.
TIME OUT magazine, london
INSPIRED ART FAIR / APRILIA, london
RADIO FM4, vienna
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, oxford
other PROMOTIONAL PIECES, london
© 2006, all rights reserved
***UPDATE spring 2024:
these are the original pieces of work i did when starting off to write and draw again. it is a strip series featuring surreal, psychologically ‘rich’ dialogues in front of an alienating urban backdrop.
this is my first published multiple page comic entitled MY BIGGEST MISTAKE. it has appeared in PANIK ELEKTRO NO 4, an independent german comic anthology.
© 2006, all rights reserved