"The Devil's Backbone" Movie Posters by Aaron Horkey and Vania Zouravliov

UPDATE: All sold out! I hope everyone was able to get one.

I'm finding it a little hard to contain my excitement right now. For those not following @MondoNews, Mondo announced two very incredible posters from three very talented artists earlier today. I'm only going to focus on the first poster, since it'll be available tomorrow, but rest assured (I'm sure you were at the edge of your seat), I'll do a write up of Ansin's Cronos poster as the release date approaches.

The Devil's Backbone - Regular

The Devil's Backbone - First Variant

The Devil's Backbone - Second Variant

First things first, I'd like to address the film. The Devil's Backbone has all the trademarks of an amazing Del Toro film. By that I mean, it's in Spanish (I love pretty much every film the man has ever made, but his Spanish films, in my opinion, represent the best of his work), it's a period piece (these types of films just seem to exude timelessness), and finally it feels like an incredibly personal work of art from a master storyteller. I'm trying my best not to turn this into a review of the film, so I'll just sum up my thoughts on The Devil's Backbone by saying this: go watch this movie right now - it's a cinematic delight in every conceivable way. On to the posters. What to say, um, Vania's and Aaron's poster is pretty much perfect. Seeing work like this, and their previous collaboration on Mondo's Dracula poster, makes me kind of wish Horkey and Zouravliov did every print together. Both artists bring something different (but equally important) to the table. Aaron Horkey is able to create elaborate frameworks and typographic treasures that seem to be from a different universe altogether, with sharp but eerily organic line-work, while Vania Zouravliov has an uncanny knack for crafting nightmarish visions, in this case a fetus with spina bifida, that appears to have leapt out of a Victorian era tale of terror (i.e., it fits Del Toro's sensibilities perfectly). When these two artists come together, as talented as they are, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. If there was one thing I could change, I would have made the second variant's sinister crimson colorway the main edition, if only so more people could get their hands on the gorgeous red version.

The Devil's Backbone posters will be available tomorrow (6/17) through Mondo's site at a random time. The regular version comes in an edition of 350 and will cost $60, while the first and second variants will both come in an edition of 90 and will cost $90. All of the posters will measure 24" x 36" and were printed by D&L Screen Printing. For the exact drop time be sure to follow @MondoNews, but most importantly pray to the gods of F5 for the gift of dextrous typing and a fast Internet connection. To check out Vania Zouravliov's other work you can visit his portfolio or his online store. Good luck!

Phantom City Creative's "Scarface" Movie Posters

UPDATE 2 (6/22): These posters are officially sold out.

UPDATE 1 (6/20): The Phantom City Creative Scarface posters will be available through Tommy Good on Wednesday (6/22) after 4 PM PST according to Inside the Rock Poster Frame. Happy hunting!

Posterocalypse favorite, Phantom City Creative, has crafted yet another wonderful movie poster. This time for the Astor Theatre’s art partner (artner?) Tommy Good. The film in question? The Pacino starring, mountain of cocaine friendly Scarface. Yeah, this one's going to be popular.

Scarface - Regular Edition

Scarface - Variant Edition

I’m really excited to see that Phantom City Creative has started having their work screen printed, and I can't even imagine how insanely gorgeous these posters are going to look up close. What I really love about these images is that the artwork can be enjoyed on two distinct levels, the first being the indignant and fatigued expression on the face of everyone’s favorite drug kingpin Tony Montana, and the second being the supporting cast of seedy characters that make up Tony’s facial scar (I tried to think of some sort of Scarface pun, but I got nothing). To repeat myself ad nauseam, this print is going to look amazing in person! And if one bloody Scarface poster wasn’t enough, how about two? Phantom City Creative has made both a regular (light) version and a dark variant of their already viral Scarface design.

These posters will be available through Tommy Good sometime next week, so as usual, if you want to get the exact drop time I'd recommend subscribing to their mailing list and following @ThisIsTommyGood. Although both posters will measure 18" x 24", the regular version is limited to an edition of 200 and is going to cost $33, while the variant is limited to an edition of 60 and will cost $53. If you at all dig this artwork, be sure to head over to the Phantom City Creative's website and store to see what other goodness they've cooked up. If you happen to miss the release at Tommy Good, there's still a chance that the artist may have a few APs for sale, so be sure to follow @PhantomCityCrtv and sign up for their mailing list to get the scoop on future Phantom City Creative releases.

ARTicles - Volume 1

I'd like to introduce a new feature called ARTicles tonight. I'm hoping to do an entry like this maybe once a month where I can highlight interesting articles and blog posts that I've happened upon about, you guessed it, art. They may not all be about cool movie posters, but you can rest assured that the vast majority of this column will be either dedicated to art, film, or film art. Please let me know if you like this feature, and of course, if you know of some great ARTicles (yeah, it's cheesy) feel free to email them to me at posterocalypse@gmail.com. Enjoy!

"Tons of Hand Painted Movie Posters from Ghana" (Nerdcore)

Conan the Destroyer

I think the best way to prepare yourself for the images you're about to see is to read the summary of what the posters represent (stolen from the Nerdcore): "During the late 1980s, a cottage industry developed in Ghana, West Africa, called the 'mobile cinema.' It was composed of young entrepreneurs who possessed three pieces of property — a TV, a videocassette recorder (known then as a VCR), and a portable, gas powered generator. Armed with these tools plus desire and ambition, they traveled from village to village showing movies on the VCR and selling tickets to the event...Most cinema operators found the only way to thrive was to increase sales, the only way to increase sales was to advertise, and the only effective way to advertise was to put up posters." What we have here are hand crafted African (Ghana to be exact) movie posters executed with varying levels of success. Any way you look at it, it's a blast to see these one of a kind works of movie art. If you want to check out even more poster goodness head over to Primative Explorer's African Movie Posters Gallery. Note: Much of Nerdcore is in German, so unless you sprechen die Deutsch you might have some difficulty wandering the site.

"Process: SOLARIS" (Sam's Myth)

Solaris

Yeah, I go a little nuts over the Criterion stuff (I know, I know), but I'm always excited to read (and then immediately talk about) a Sam Smith process post. It's amazing how thorough he is in discussing and illustrating the creative process. There are some artists who are fantastic at putting together a process post (Kevin Tong's process videos immediately come to mind), but I think Sam may have the most impressively in-depth and analytical write ups on the web. In this post, Sam walks us through the creation of his Solaris Criterion cover artwork. I haven't seen the film yet, but reading through his creative journey while making the cover has definitely piqued my interest. Be sure to check out Sam's blog, Sam's Myth, for additional required reading. And if you're at all interested in  Solaris after reading his post, you can pick it up for a pretty decent price on Amazon.

"Movie Poster of the Week: Rainer Werner Fassbinder's World on a Wire" (MUBI)

World on a Wire

This is another Sam Smith-related link, but I think anyone who's a fan of good design will appreciate what he's done here. MUBI, an online community for fans of moving pictures, has a weekly feature called "Movie Poster of the Week." Unsurprisingly, the feature is meant to highlight some of the cool film artwork that has recently been released or announced. It turns out that Sam Smith just so happened to create a very slick poster for a re-release of the 70s German sci-fi masterpiece from R.W. Fassbinder, World on a Wire. I'll let you click the link if you're interested in more information, but that's not going to stop me from teasing the film with a quick synopsis: "Made in 1973 for German television and rarely seen until it resurfaced at MoMA last year, World on a Wire is a three-and-a-half-hour, two-part, sci-fi head-trip of a movie about government conspiracies and parallel realities set in a world of gleaming ’70s corporate minimalism." Interested? I thought so. And as of yesterday, World on a Wire is now available for viewing on Hulu Plus through their deal with Criterion and Janus.

"64 Years of Cannes Film Festival Posters" (L'Express)

Cannes 1960

I found this link by way of Sound on Sight's wonderful "The Art of the Cannes Poster" article and was entranced by the range of artistic styles on display. This collection of Cannes posters goes from 1946 to 2011 and fluctuates from bleak minimalism to indulgent absurdity to just plain weird. I think my favorite may be the 1960 poster (pictured to the left). Yeah, it's kind of busy, but I love the silhouettes against the black background. I can't help but think that by peeking at these posters I'm seeing a snapshot of what cool looked like in years past. For those of us who will probably never make it to the Cannes Film Festival this is as close as we'll get to experiencing the chic avant-garde nonchalance that I imagine everyone walks around with. What's your favorite poster? Note: This website is in French, although you shouldn't have any trouble navigating it.

"Critique Commentary: Rick Poynor Selects DVD Covers from the Criterion Collection’s Film List" (Eye Magazine Blog)

Sweet Smell of Success

I promise this is my last Criterion related link (at least for today). The Eye Magazine blog wrote up a great post about some of their favorite Criterion covers. The post is especially fun to read, because not only do you get to find out who the art directors and designers were, but in some cases a little bit about the inspiration for each design. My favorite cover is probably Sean Phillips and Eric Skillman's Sweet Smell of Success cover (pictured to the left), but I also love Skillman's Blow Out and Kellerhouse's Gomorrah covers. And as an FYI to everyone who was wowed by the Sweet Smell of Success cover, I highly suggest you immediately pick up all of Sean Phillips' and Ed Brubaker's amazing Criminal comic book series. I know I mentioned Sam Smith's blog earlier in this entry of ARTicles, but if you're in the mood for some more amazing process posts from another artist I'd recommend visiting Cozy Lummox, the digital home of artist Eric Skillman.

"Mind Blowing Examples of Experimental Typography" (Webdesigner Depot)

Typographic Example

This post really has nothing to do with film, I just thought this was a great collection of typographic experiments. Looking at something like this just makes you want to create, or at least, makes me want to create. I wish these were all available as fonts that I could freely and indiscriminately abuse. It's fascinating when a letter in the alphabet goes from being a small, but important, piece of something larger to a beautiful work of art all on its own. As my own typographic experiment, I googled "typographic experiment" and it turns out there's a book titled Typographic Experiment - that is all. Note: Give yourself about thirty minutes to go through all of these abecedarian masterpieces. I studied three or four of the images for at least a good five minutes, completely lost in the detail, until I realized the faucet had been running for the better part of ten minutes with nary a dish, pot or utensil cleaned.

"Saul Bass' Movie Posters: Then and Now" (Christian Annyas)

Saint Joan

This post from Christian Annyas' blog was at once incredibly interesting and also kind of sad. In it Christian compared many films' original Saul Bass posters against the films' more recent (and by "more recent" I mean in the last ten years) DVD covers. To be fair, a few of the DVD covers aren't necessarily bad, not at all, but when you've already got such great artwork waiting in the wing, why oh why, would they opt for the floating disembodied head? One of the things I found most interesting when reading Annyas' post, was that whenever Saul Bass worked on a film "he created a complete and consistent identity for films (main and credit titles, a symbol or trademark, trailers, posters, ads, album cover)." That cohesiveness is sorely lacking in today's films. In fact, the only filmmaker that immediately comes to mind that still seems to exercise that level of control over the entire package (the film and the marketing) is David Fincher. Tangent aside, be sure to check out this post.

Well I guess that's it. Hope you enjoyed everything and again, please send me an email if you've got an ARTicle that you'd like to see here, or if you find a dead link.

Shepard Fairey's "They Live" Movie Poster

I was planning on introducing a new feature tonight, but this release is just a little too big to ignore. Shepard Fairey, the well known artist behind the "Obama Hope" image and a key player in Banksy's Exit Through the Gift Shop, and Mondo, curator and seller of some of the finest film artwork in existance, have finally joined forces in some sort of unholy union to honor a little John Carpenter film with a very, very long fight scene called They Live.

They Live

I'll be honest, I respect Shepard Fairey a lot more for what he did in helping street art gain respect and his passion for mingling the political and the artistic, than for the look of his work, which I've never been a huge fan of, but even I'm in awe of this print. I think the reason this poster works so well is because he's still doing his Shepard Fairey thing, and spouting his Shepard Fairy message, but it turns out everything that makes Shepard Fairy, Shepard Fairy, completely meshes with the plot and message of Carpenter's film. Fairey's interest in using art as a way to make a statement about symbols and their (sometimes meaningless) meaning speaks perfectly to the film's conspiratorial tale of alien invasion and subliminal brainwashing. It's a wonderful work of art, promotes an awesome 80s film, and has a message. In other words, I'm predicting Mondo will slow to a crawl tomorrow morning.

Fairey's They Live movie poster will be available tomorrow (6/10) at a random time through Mondo. I'd highly recommend following @MondoNews if you want an exact drop time, because I have a feeling that even with an edition of 500, this is going to sell out instantly. The poster measures 18" x 24" and will cost $50. If you aren't able to grab one tomorrow, it sounds like an alternate colorway will be released by Obey at a future date. If you'd like to know more about Shepard Fairey be sure to check out his website at obeygiant.com. Best of luck to everyone tomorrow and let's do our best not to break the Internet, yeah?

Joshua Budich's Coen Brothers Inspired Artwork

UPDATE 2 (6/20): In addition to Budich's already on sale "O Brother" print, his Big Lebowski prints, "Dude, Donny & Maude" and "The Stranger, The Jesus & Walter," will be available on Wednesday (6/22) at 12-noon PST through his store. Nobody calls me Lebowski. You got the wrong guy. I'm the Dude, man.

UPDATE 1 (6/14): Joshua Budich's "O Brother" print will be available tomorrow (6/15) at 12-noon PST through his store. He's got about 50 copies to sell and each prints will cost $65 plus shipping. These are likely to go fast, so be ready. Good luck!

The "Quentin vs. Coen" madness continues, although today's post is decidedly much more Coen-centric. In addition to his insanely beautiful Pulp Fiction print, which I wrote about last week, Joshua Budich has also created three fantastic prints inspired by the works of Joel and Ethan Coen. If you're a fan of either O Brother, Where Art Thou or the pro-White Russian Big Lebowski then you'll definitely want to have these hanging on your wall.

O Brother

Let's start this off with Joshua's brilliant "O Brother" poster. You can immediately see why Budich is quickly becoming a go-to-guy for inspired film art. I want this, nay, need this poster hanging in opposition to his Pulp Fiction print. First things first, I've just got to say how impressive it is that he managed to fit practically every character from the film in the 24" x 36" dimensions (sorry Mark Munson, also known as uncredited KKK member, you didn't make the cut). For those with an eye for detail you'll notice he even managed to get a case of Dapper Dan Pomade and everyone's favorite cow (yep, the one that survived the flood) in the artwork - it's like a depression era Where's Waldo? I think the only way this poster could get any better is, if in addition to the fantastic art, you could also put it in your CD player and have it play the film's soundtrack (easily one of my favorite albums in the last two decades). The "O Brother" print is limited to an edition of 100 and was printed by D&L Screenprinters. The poster isn't available yet, but be sure to subscribe to Joshua's mailing list and visit his store vigorously and often (not necessarily in that order) if you want to grab one before they run out. And if you haven't seen one of my favorite Coen Brothers films, what are you doing reading this?! Watch O Brother, Where Art Thou right now and enjoy every second of it.

Dude, Donny & Maude

The Stranger, The Jesus & Walter

I wanted to group these last two together, because I honestly can't imagine them apart from one another - it's like vodka, coffee liqueur and cream, they all belong in the same glass (that was another White Russian reference if you're keeping track). No matter who your favorite character is, and everyone's got a favorite character from The Big Lebowski, chances are pretty good that he or she is on display in one of these prints. Budich's triptychs manage to capture each character in their most honest moment and expression: Jesus - creepy pedophiliac confidence, Walter - anger, and The Dude - confusion and disbelief with a generous helping of amusement. If you are a lover of The Big Lebowski, and who isn't, then this is a must own. Like the "O Brother" print above, "Dude, Donny & Maude" and "The Stranger, The Jesus & Walter" were created by Joshua Budich for Spoke Art's second round of the "Quentin vs. Coen" art show and will be available through Joshua's website soon. Both posters measure 18" x 24" and are limited to an edition of 100. I don't have any price information yet, but if you subscribe to his mailing list I'm sure that will be announced shortly. Well that's it for tonight, to learn more about Mr. Budich be sure to visit website at joshuabudich.com.

In the immortal words of Ulysses Everett McGill, "I don't want FOP damn it, I'm a Dapper Dan Man!"

Spoke Art's "Quentin vs. Coen" Art Exhibit Round 2

UPDATE (11/26): Darin Shock's Natural Born Killers poster is now available through Darin's site at stateofshockstudios.com for only $30. Grab one while they're still available!

UPDATE (6/24): The majority of the remaining "Quentin vs. Coen" prints will be released tomorrow (6/25) around 2:00 PM PST through Spoke Art's online storefront. The released prints will include: "Dead as Dillinger," "Dude, Donny & Maude," "Natural Born Killers," "Quentin vs. Coen Round Two," "Soggy Bottom Boys," "The Stranger, The Jesus & Walter," "O Brother, Where Art Thou?," "DeathProof," "The Dude," "Gulp Fiction," "Mia Wallace," "O Ren Ishii," "Zoe Bell" and "Margie." Yep, that's a lot of stuff! And from what I hear, all of these items are pretty low in stock. Good luck!

I've already written a post about the amazing Spoke Art "Quentin vs. Coen" show in April, but for those of us who are stuck on the beautiful West Coast (yep, life's hard) there's still a chance to see some awesome QvC artwork (hmm...not sure how effective that abbreviation was). Spoke Art will be opening round 2 of their "Quentin vs. Coen" exhibit tomorrow (6/2) at the brand new Spoke Art Gallery, located at 816 Sutter Street in San Francisco. The show will feature some of your favorite pieces from the recent New York showing, along with all new works. In honor of the second round I've decided to preview a few of my favorite pieces. Enjoy!

The Big Lebowski - Oliver Barrett

I loved Oliver Barrett's Pulp Fiction print, so it should come as no surprise that I'm head over heels for his new Big Lebowski print as well. There's something so awesome about his precise line work and choice of background color. Sure, the lines come together to form the Dude's face, but on closer inspection it almost looks like a fingerprint made up of concentric circles (I think The Dude would find that interesting). And Barrett has definitely shown himself to be a man that can pick a good quote, I hope he continues doing more movie artwork in this manner. This poster will be available at the show, but if you can't make it there's a pretty decent chance it'll also show up on Spoke Art's online store. If you've got some extra time on your hands I'd head over to Oliver Barrett's site, where you can check out his artwork and even purchase his prints.

Natural Born Killers - State of Shock Studios (Darin Shock)

I'm very fond of State of Shock Studio's Natural Born Killers print. I really like the fact that the artist didn't choose a super obvious QT film, instead they went with an Oliver Stone film based on a story written by Tarantino - very clever! I love the character design on display here. You've got Harrelson's Mickey Knox and Lewis' Mallory Knox both gleefully pointing shotguns at the viewer. And my god, State of Shock included basically everyone in the picture - an impressive feat. I don't know much about the artist Darin Shock, but I know I'm really digging his "Quentin vs. Coen" artwork. If you at all like this great Natural Born Killers poster be sure to check out the State of Shock website by visiting stateofstockstudios.com. These posters will also be available during tomorrow's show and through Spoke Art's store shortly after.

Pulp Fiction - Joshua Budich

It's kind of crazy how amazing Joshua Budich is now. Not that he wasn't insanely talented before, but he's reached a whole new level this year in my opinion. This Pulp Fiction poster is absolutely gorgeous. Hopefully this isn't coming off as an insult as I've always really enjoyed his work, but I just can't explain how impressed I am with this artwork. The initial stock has already sold out (yeah, they sold out quick), but according to Spoke Art's online store, a few more will be available at the show and some additional variants will be released by Spoke Art, so be on the look out and you should probably join their mailing list. There's sure to be some artist prints available at some point on Budich's website too, so be sure to also join his mailing list.

Well that's it for now, hope everyone is as excited about this show as I am. And if you're actually close enough to the Spoke Art Gallery to be there on opening night...I hate you. Good night!