Cephalopods...

...of the Octopus variety.

Hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving!

Still life with juggernaut and cats.

Two things: Thanks to everyone who came out at NYCC; it was a blast! I'll be posting some of the commissions I did here (and on my tumblr) over the next few days.

And also, thanks to everyone who donated to The Apocalypse Calendar!! We reached the kickstarter goal, and you can purchase said calendar RIGHT NOW! You can also just buy a print of the underwater illustration I did for the calendar here.

NEW YORK COMIC CON!!

NYC here we come!
(no, we will not be arriving via tractor)

Joe and I will be sharing the magnificent S-2 table, right next to Mr. Paolo Rivera. Saturday we will be in COSTUME...you heard me. IN COSTUME. The identity of my costume will remain a surprise for now.

I will being selling lots of prints, including this one:



Each of those dudes will be available as individual prints too! Also, there will be mini-comics and original art. AND I'll be doing commission sketches. woot! It'll be a fun time!

APOCALYPSE CALENDAR!!!!!

Now you can see in EPIC DETAIL all of the marine critters I jammed into this piece for the APOCALYPSE CALENDAR! Can you find:
2 hagfish
1 goliath grouper
6 marine snails
1 cownose ray
2 sea roaches
3 angel fish
1 giant pacific octopus
7 moon jellies
4 seastars
1 scallop
1 clam
2 horseshoe crabs
1 rock crab
7 royal grammas
6 cleaning wrasse
4 redfish
2 flounders
1 longhorn cowfish
4 porcupine fish
4 anemones
4 grass eels
4 moray eels
2 cuttlefish
3 rainbow parrotfish
1 southern stingray
1 green sea turtle
1 harbor seal
1 american lobster
1 whale shark
5 human skeletons
and a whole bunch of barnacles

You can see a bunch of other apocalyptic images, as well as support this project (previously mentioned here), at it's kickstarter site!

MODOK!

Teeny tiny MODOK, from Emerald City Comic Con.

APOCALYPSE CALENDAR!!!!!

That's right! With the end of the world just around the corner, wouldn't you like to spend your final days looking at THIS? I was lucky enough to be part of this awesome project, put together by RISD buddy Thomas Quinn, featuring a whole bunch of rad artists! This calendar has a Kickstarter to help it see the light of day (before the light of day is extinguished, that is):
APOCALYPSE CALENDAR KICKSTARTER!

You can even watch a video about it! Can you guess which piece I did?

Thanks to everyone who came out for M.I.C.E. this past Saturday; it was so nice to see all that support for a local indie con! The next con that I will be at is New York Comic Con. Joe and I will be sharing a table in Artist's Alley; I'll be posting more about those details later.

Also, I am starting a tumblr: mariswicks.tumblr.com (click to see some more superhero silliness) I am going to use this as a motivation to post more often, as well as to get less precious about my posts (less words, more DRAWINGS).

I will still post here, but there will be doodle-y goodness going on in the tumblr. Mmmmmm...doodles.

COOOOOOOOMICS

Hey everybody! It's the internet! But let's talk about REAL LIFE:

Joe and I will be at our local, down-the-street comics fest this coming SATURDAY!! If you live in the Boston-area, come out and say "hey" at M.I.C.E. (Massachusetts Independent Comics Expo). IT IS FREEEEE!!!! I will be drawing things and chatting and maybe if you want to hear about ocean animals I will totally TELL YOU ABOUT THEM. They even let me do one of the posters for the show (available as a limited edition print AT the show:

MICE, The Massachusetts Independent Comics Expo

September 24, 2011 10am - 6pm

1815 Mass Ave., Cambridge MA (Porter Square)
Illustration by Maris Wicks

That's me: always working intestines into an illustration. AND...I got to help draw the cover of this week's dig boston, along side the talented Ming Doyle and Patt Kelley:

The DIG is a free weekly local paper that you can get on many classy corners around the Boston-area! Pick it up!

Stay tuned for more comics-related news...

MOOSE!!

Biggs riding a skateboard, done for Paul Maybury Heroes Con 2011

Hey everybody. It's been a crazy summer; I will have updates on work and upcoming conventions soon. I recently did a pin-up for my friend Max de Radiguès' mini-comic MOOSE #3. His comics are ultra-awesome and have been a great inspiration to my own work. You can buy MOOSE #3 (and many of Max's other comics) HERE.

Sketches!

I did a BUNCH of sketches at Heroes Con...it was a lot of fun. I'm going to try and pace these out, though it is very tempting to post them all at once. I'll start with the more summer-y ones:


Octopuses and put-put golf are summer-y, right?

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Along side the fabulous DJ Spider!

Wormie McWormiton

I finally got jealous of all of Joe's gifs and created my own:

It's a worm who is worming around (actually, it's more of an inch worm, which is really more of a caterpillar...)

Thanks to everyone who came out and said "hi!" at Heroes Con; Joe and I had a great time. We got to sit right next to the magnificent Stéphane Roux, and spent a lot of time bumming around Charlotte with the ridiculously talented Ming Doyle. I met so many new comics peeps...that con is SO CRAZY I LOVE IT. Oh yeah...I totally cosplayed. WTF?

Super-sports: BLACK CANARY

Ah, Badminton...

Super-sports: HULK

Me HULK! Me STRETCH! Me BREATHE! Me ONE WITH ONE'S SELF!

Girly McGirly-pants!

Here's a little peek at a freelance piece I did a few weeks back for RISD (my alma mater):
It's a paper doll to go with their current exhibit Cocktail Culture, which highlights cocktail apparel, accessories, textiles and furniture from 1920 to 1980. I got to illustrate 5 dresses (and 4 pairs of shoes and some accessories) from the collection. It was AWESOME (and possibly the most girly project I've ever worked on). Thanks to Evan for sending that one my way!

If you'd like a Party Paper Doll of your own, you can order one here, or if you're in the Providence area, swing the RISD Museum (they're available in risdworks, located within the museum).

Oh, and Joe and I will be guests at MECAF this weekend (the show is Sunday only). I will have super-sports prints and comics!

Boston Comic Con!

What a crazy weekend! (I know it's Thursday already...). Joe, Liz and I had a nice hometown con. I got to draw some super-fun sketches, such as:
(Gandalf as a crossing guard, helping some hobbits across the street)

and

(the Incredible Hulk riding a bicycle)

Thanks to everyone who came out to support the Boston-area comics scene!!

I should mention that Joe and I will be at MECAF (in Portland, ME) on May 22nd. We will also be guests at Heroes Con this year (June 3-5 in Charlotte, NC). I'll be posting more about those events later, and also about items I will have for sale.

Okeedokee...back to coloring!

Super-sports: DAZZLER!

AW YEAH THAT'S RIGHT!!

Liz and I will be sharing a table at Boston Comic Con this weekend - Artist's Alley #503. We'll be right next door to none other than Mr. Joe Quinones - Artist's Alley #502. This way, one of us can get us tasty sammiches during the con.

I will have prints of the Super-sports Superheroes (there's 9 altogether; I haven't posted them all on-line yet), minicomics and other stuff. I'll also be doing sketches. Stop by and say "hi" if you're at the con! TONS of peeps - both local and from afar - are going to be there; nerd-ery will be had by all! I love that we have a big home-town con; I hope this tradition continues!

Super-sports: Spider-man

Super-sports: Wonder Woman (part one)

Jumpin' some rope (which is kind of lame, but she's warming up for her main event...hence the "part one").

Super-sports: Captain America

Playin' some frisbee.

Super-sports: Batman

I've been doing these little (6.5" x 9") drawings as a warm up for inking/coloring lately. I've drawn supers playing sports before, but I thought it'd be a nice little challenge to add some more folks in tights to the mix. This one is actually a re-do:


Despite the fact that I just finished inking 133 pages of comics (with Faber-Castell Pitt pens), I've decided that I'm making the switch to...NIBS! I like to be green, and I always feel bad about how fast I blow through the pens (you can't refill them, and I'm not sure they can be recycled). I've also been missing a more organic line (although Joe has already pointed out to me that I'm pretty tight about my nib-work as well). What ultimately turned me was our trip to Belgium back in November, where we were lucky enough to work in a studio with a bunch of AMAZING comics artists. My friend Max asked me what I inked with, and I showed him my fistful of Pitt pens, and he was like, "Whhhhaaaaatttt??????". And then he made a pretty strong case for nibs. I was also inspired by my friend Alec's recent post about the inking tools he uses. Needless to say, I've been inking with nibs a lot. I'm still using the Pitts when I travel (to avoid bag spills, which is a phenomena that I excel at), but all the stuff I'll be posting will most likely be inked with a G-nib. I must admit, it is super fun. Enjoy!

Hammer Time!

Break it down:
THOOOOOORRRRRRR!

Let me first start by saying that our trip to the Pacific Northwest was AWESOME. SO AWESOME.

Emerald City Comic Con = super rad. Got to meet Mr. Chris Samnee, who is the man responsible for one of my FAVORITE superhero comic stories, Thor: The Mighty Avenger (written by Roger Langridge to boot!). I had never read a Thor story before. I totally love Thor now, because of this comic (see above drawing). Thank you, gentlemen!

Joe and I got to hang with Mr. Greg from Tugboat Press (the man responsible for making Yes, Let's happen), see Mr. Chris Haley and his posse, get some bro-time with Mr. Scott Campbell and meet countless other comics folk (sorry if I left you out; you can heckle me in the comments).

BOWIE!! (for Mr. Haley)

Aside from the con, Joe and I had a blast during our short time in Seattle. We visited the Seattle Aquarium (gee, I wonder who wanted to do THAT), marveled at the wonders of Pike Place Market and ate copious amounts of delicious food. Short and sweet, and then we where on the road to Portland (and beyond).

Once in Oregon, we checked in to Chateau D' Ann (Ann and I were roomies back in college!). From there, Joe and I rented a car for our journey south to visit...the Allreds! Mike and Laura are SUPER DUPER!!! We had a blast doing everything from karaoke to dune-exploring to movie-watching, out in the middle of the beautiful Oregon woods. It was amazing to hang with such amazing artists; we can't thank them enough for their incredible hospitality!

Joe, Maris and Mike somewhere in the Shire.

THEN, back to Portland for some hang-time with Ann, some doughnut-eating, and more karaoke (with the Allreds again, but this time at Floating World...crazy!).

Now I'm back in Somerville, drawin' and computerin' and workin' at that place filled with fish and turtles and penguins...

I'll have a post about the cons I'll be at this year...just a few (I'm trying to be good). Oh, and I apologize for my silence in the comments; I've just been super-busy. I suck at staying on top of stuff like that!!

byebye for now!

Inks-cellent.

Done. With. Inks. I am so excited!!!

*note: the pages above are not really that big*


So here's a little update on the life of Maris (well, the life that is squeezed into the non-primates time):

ZOMG (part 1): I wrote a one-page Madman story with Mr. Joe Quinones (he did all that lovely art - more about that project here). Thanks to Mr. Mike Allred for the awesome opportunity!

ZOMG (part 2): I also wrote a script for a super-secret DC project; more about that soon. I kind of still can't believe it. Joe's also doing the arts on that. Yeah Joe!

ZOMG (part 3): Leaving for Seattle in...1 hour!! Joe's a guest at Emerald City Comic Con, and then we're heading down to Portland, OR for a little working vacation. I will be at the con, but I'll just be hanging around. If you want to buy something Maris-y, my friend Greg over at the Tugboat Press table (M-22 in Artist Alley) will be selling copies of "Yes, Let's". Actually, if anyone would like a sketch, I could definitely be persuaded to draw something of the super-hero variety for a tiny bit of moolah...just sayin'.

I have lots of art to post. And peeps that I want to shout out too. But that will have to wait. For now.

So yeah. Crazy-pants stuff going on. It is EXCITING!!!

Power Girl.

I'm pretty sure that this is what it's like to be Power Girl.

It is a New Year.

Yes, indeed. Hope you had a Happy one. Here is Kitty and Lockheed to ring it in...
Done at Boston Comic Con for fellow co-worker/comic nerd-friend Sam. (Thanks, Sam! I love ANY excuse to draw Miss Pryde, especially with this costume!)