Thursday, April 19, 2012

NEIL GAIMAN/DAVID MACK "I will write in words of fire"..



It started when a gentleman named Burton Olivier requested a poem from Neil. A poem that he might illustrate with the help of a willing artist. Something that he may be able to have and call his and his alone. Written on his skin---

Anyone that knows me, knows I am a fan of the tattoo. I have always said, it is only for those that can truly commit.  I have lost count of mine, truth is I never counted them to begin with. However, that is the question that i get asked the most. Why, i will probably never know...

Anyway, commit he did, our Burton. There he is, being tattooed by Farsyde Kauai, a very handsome fellow. I know that  backpiece didn't tickle, but he got the first sitting under his belt. We will wait patiently for the next batch of photos.

Meanwhile, Neil introduced me electronically to DAVID MACK, he of the Kabuki comic and the simple beautiful lines. David said he would try his hand at an illustration. What he produced, both haunting and delicate. David came out to LA, we had sushi w/ Drew and Amatosan and Kent Williams, we all went to a stellar art opening, and I even introduced him to that gorgeous pinup doll OLIVIA that same night. 
art worlds colliding...dynamic duo, Olivia and David Mack.  on Twitpic

Then I went out on tour and turns out, David was a fan of Puscifer--He drove more than a couple hours to come see the show. He brought some of his beautiful books and signed some to me and some to Maynard. 
This is how prints are born.
I thought a small personal run of this piece, priced moderately, would be the best approach.  
this means.....PRESALE! I will have these posted up at $25.00 for the next 48 hours, until Saturday night at midnight west coast time, when they will go up to $38.00 and stay there, until we dwindle in stock.  ORDER THEM HERE and a 50% chunk will go to the CBLDF. We expect to have these in hand to ship these in about 10 days or so.

These 3 color seriographs (8.5" x 11") are hand silk-screened by artist Brian Rise in Austin, Texas. He chose a thick creamy 70 weight recycled French paper, these prints will ship flat, in their own little recycled kraft vessels, from me to you. I will be interviewing Brian, a friend of mine from the dark ages in Baltimore, my old Charm City buddy.

Here are some photos Brian took during his printing process. These 100 blue variants will be split up and sent out to David, Neil, Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and to Burton to do what they please, the grey version (seen at the very bottom) will be the ones available here at Neverwear.






here is the entire text of the beautiful poem Neil composed:


I will write in words of fire.
I will write them on your skin.
I will write about desire.
Write beginnings, write of sin.
You're the book I love the best,
your skin only holds my truth,
you will be a palimpsest
lines of age rewriting youth.
You will not burn upon the pyre.
Or be buried on the shelf.
You're my letter to desire:
And you'll never read yourself.
I will trace each word and comma
As the final dusk descends,
You're my tale of dreams and drama,
Let us find out how it ends.






6 comments:

Dragonsally said...

That is gorgeous.

spacedlaw said...

Astounding poem!

minky said...

so can we all steal it for a tattoo now? ive been searching for the right words for a while now...

Kitty Cat said...

I don't think there is a copyright upon tattoo work.
It would be courteous to credit the artists, though.

If you do get this GIANT project put on you, please send us photos--

minky said...

im thinking more the poem itself, not necessarily the artwork...though that would be pretty epic in itself.

Ellamir said...

Would that be allowed? To use this same poem in a new tattoo? Wont the original tattooee be upset about that? I don't think I'd be able to add copyright in my body, though...
I am looking for a Gaiman quote to get a tattoo but of course him being who he is, Neil already WROTE one specific poem for the ink-n-skin medium. Would Neil agree on more versions of this in more of us? =)