Puppets and Post-Its!!! Oh My!!!

Two of my favorite stores in Los Angeles have always been Giant Robot and Giant Robot 2. I remember after finishing classes every Friday afternoon at UCLA, I would race down to Giant Robot to see what cool new product they had just gotten in. Or the numerous times when I'd line up early for an art opening at Giant Robot 2 just to ensure that I would get my first pick of an artist's work.

So I was truly grateful and honored when Eric (Big Boss Robot) asked if I would like to do an event at Giant Robot 2. I thought a live book reading with simultaneous puppet show would be a really fun idea. So we set up on one Sunday afternoon with books, puppets and monkey cookies.

Plenty of kids of all ages showed up. Stories were told. Cookies were eaten. We even had our own coloring contest.

We were truly touched to see so many smiling faces and friends. The following week I was also invited to submit art into Giant Robot's Post-It Show 8. There were so many talented artists in the show. I was so honored to partake. Here's a photo of the 9 Post-It's I made!
 

Unfortunately I could not make it to the opening night, but look at all those people.

December has been amazing month for us much due to the support of Giant Robot. 

Thanks Giant Robot and crew for everything!!!

Doing It DCon Hyperactive Monkey Style!

YAY! We just got back and are fully recovered from a few weeks ago where exhibited at Pasadena's Designer Con. It is our 4th year exhibiting here and it definitely was our best show yet. It took us awhile to set up as this year we were given a corner booth. It was an awesome location as we were pretty much by the entrance.

The cool thing about DCon is all the cool toys all the vendors showcase. I didn't have too much time to look around. But I did have a chance to swing by the Dynamite Rex booth and see our Shaolin Raar on display. Look for this guy early next year. Kung POW!

We had plenty of cool new items for sale and had fun sketching for anyone who asked. I truly am appreciative for everybody that stopped by to say hi!

 The best part of DCon though is that I get to see all my friends. They are the best because they not only are super nice but support what I do.

YAY!!! See you next year DCON! Tootles for now!

Monkey-Con Craziness!!!

It's been quite awhile since I've updated the blog and that's because we've have been busy these past few months working on new projects and exhibiting at a lot of conventions. Wanna see a recap? Why of course you do! The first convention of the summer was Anime Expo 2012.

For this year's convention we decided to get our own booth and due to Daisy's crazy work schedule I decided to brave the convention by myself for a couple of days. It was a pretty tough show for us for a variety of reasons, but rather than focus on the negative I'll say that it sure did make me happy to see everyone who stopped by.

Our next convention was amazing and held a super awesome surprise for us. On to our recap of San Diego Comic Con!!!

Comic Con is always a really fun and super crazy busy show and this year was no exception. Squid Kids Ink was awesome as usual and let us share a booth with them. On preview night we sold out of our Ninja Monkey exclusive within the first hour. What could be more crazy?

Well I'll tell ya! Early the following morning, Comic Con called me at 10:30 am to tell me that they had their own booth for me if I wanted it. So of course I said, "HECK YA!" Only problem was that I had to move into the booth right away. And if you have ever been to Comic Con you know how crazy the crowd is. Setting up and moving during the con was like swimming up a raging stream. But it was all worth it in the end.

Up next was San Francisco's 39th Annual Nihonmachi Street Fair!

This was our first year at the street fair and boy was it fun. Not only was the crowd super awesome and super supportive of our stuff, but there were so much yummy food to be eaten!

Our last convention of the summer was 2012 Stan Lee's Comikaze. We split a booth with Squid Kids Ink as it was our first time at the show for both of us and just wanted to test the waters. It wasn't the best of shows and was pretty slow for me. But again it was fun chatting with all the folks that stopped by.

Doing all these conventions takes a lot of preparation and physical work but in the end it's all worth it when you have so many wonderful friends that stop by and support what you do for a living. YAY!

Well that's it for now. Next week we have another convention to attend!!! And remember to eat your cereal and BE HYPERACTIVE!!! Tootles!

Memories Are Made of This

This past weekend I was able to partake in Super Cooper's 13th B-day/Art show extravaganza, "Memories Are Made of This" at Munky King. It would also be Munky King's last art show before closing their retail shop. I've been going to Munky King for several years and it's always been a great place of inspiration and place where many new friendships were made. Here's a couple of awesome pieces from the show.

 Here's my piece below. I called it "9 Childhood Monkey Memories". I painted 9 wooden sake boxes and each box represents a monkey character I wanted to be when I was young.

Super Cooper asked me if I'd like to do a live painting at the show. And of course I said, "YES!!!" Here's a couple of shots of me in action and the finished piece.

 All in all it was a super fun show and there were tons of smiling faces to be found. I'm a little sad that Munky King, the retail shop, is closing down, but I'm super happy about them moving to a bigger and better space. I know that they will continue to make super awesome art and toys!!! Tootles and keep monkeying around!!!

An Evening of Artistry

Last Thursday I had the honor of participating in "An Evening Of Artistry", a charity event benefitting the Everlasting Smiles Foundation. Everlasting Smiles Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to improving the quality of life for young people in the Los Angeles and Orange County areas who suffer from a life threatening illness by motivating them to smile and enjoy life as long as they live.  This is my third year that I have contributed an art piece to their silent auction and it is always a highlight of my year.

This year I wanted to do something extra special. So I sketched up this drawing on a piece of wood.

Then a few days later and a couple drops of paint, my piece "All Aboard The Monkey Cupcake Train" was completed! Voila!

I couldn't have been more happy to see Taylor, who bid on my piece,  win the silent auction. From one monkey to another, she really knew how to put a smile on my face.

What a wonderful evening of art and hope! Tootles for now!

Unique LA Spring Show 2012

 A few week ago, we exhibited at Unique LA Spring Show 2012. It was our first time exhibiting there. We had a very nice set up and had a great time!!!

 We even had some special guests stop by the booth like Caine from Caine's Arcade! He was super nice and we even traded t-shirts!

 UFC's Mayhem Miller also stopped by and we chatted about the awesome power of monkeys!

At the same time Unique LA was going on, Boombotix was a having a Craynial Custom Art Show at Big Umbrella Studios in SF. Boombotix is a portable speaker. Here's what it looked like before I customized it.

And here it is fully customized. I brought out the sculpey and spray paint. I call him "The Golden Monkey Idol!"

Well that's all for now. Be back soon for some more Hyperactive Monkey goodness!!! Tootles!!!

ABC's of Monkey Kung Fu!!!

Howdy Hyperactive Monkeyers!!! You wanna hear a story? Well of course you do! Here's a story about the creation of the book, The ABC's of Monkey Kung Fu! About 3 years ago I had to make an emergency work trip to Hong Kong (I only had half a day's notice that I needed hop on a plane overnight) to visit a factory. I didn't now how long I would be stranded in Hong Kong for. So on my downtime I decided to draw  some pages of an alphabet book incorporating our favorite characters from the Hyperactive Monkey universe. I never really thought too much about it and would just keep drawing pages even after my return from Hong Kong. Slowly and surely the pages began to add up. And after 3 years of drawing in my spare time, I noticed I had enough to make a whole book. Here's a snapshot of all the rough pages I drew and even a smaller printed prototype book.

Eventually our good friends from Fat Rabbit Farms helped us find a book printer and voila!!! Now we have are very own book available, The ABC's of Monkey Kung Fu. We are very honored to have sold quite a few already.

 Here's a little animated commercial for your viewing pleasure.

You can order a copy for yourself here if you'd like. Well there ya go!!! That's the story of how The ABC's of Monkey Kung Fu! came to be.

Well it's been busy in the monkey labs as we are going to be in this Spring's Unique LA. We are hoping to switch things up at this show and have a lot of hand painted art available for sale. You might even see this there.

The above piece is entitled "The Day In The Life Of A Hyperactive Monkey!" and it pretty much sums up how I spent today. Tootles!

Wonderful WonderCon Recap!!!

Well, a whole week has passed since last week's  WonderCon!!! This monkey is fully rested and ready to give you a full recap. There were some big changes to this year's WonderCon. First off  this year's WonderCon moved from the Bay to LA because Moscone Center was being renovated. Another big change was this year were had own on booth, but don't worry we were still next to Squid Kids Ink so there was plenty of squid monkey love around. Let's take a look at the booth we had this year. 

My lovely monkey partner in crime, Daisy, braved the weather and flew down from SF to LA to help me out. Also Michelle from the Hyperactive Monkey San Diego branch office decided to help out too. We debuted our Deluxe Ninja Monkey which sold out by Saturday afternoon. Thanks for the support everybody.

For us, the best part of doing conventions isn't making the sale, but getting to meet all of our wonderful friends, new and old!!!

Wowee!!! So many friendly faces. Y'all really know how to make this monkey feel loved.

So I've kinda fallen behind on my weekly sketch project. But here's just a sampling of all the sketches I did for those who asked for them at Wondercon.

I had tons of fun drawing these. I hope y'all liked them too. Well that's all for now. Stay hyperactive and eat your cereal!!! Tootles!!!

Street Fighter X Tekken Fight Club

A few weeks ago, Tsunami Syndicate asked if I'd be interested in doing some art for Capcom's Fight Club Street Fighter X Tekken Release Party. Being a huge fan of both video games I said, "HECK YA!!!" So did some quick pencils of some of my favorite characters.

After the pencil sketches I went straight to the computer and doodled away and few days later BAM!!! I came up with this action packed piece!!!

I have framed super limited edition 1 of 1 13" by 19" print for sale at the show and I'll also have 10 limited edition 8.5" by 11"  prints for sale at the show too. The show will be at the Majestic Halls (W. 7th Street Downtown Los Angeles) from 8pm to 12am tomorrow night, March 1, 2012. You can rsvp here. Hope to see all you fighting fans there. HADOUKEN!!!!

February Fun Fun Times!!!

Part of working for a big toy company for my day job, I get to take part in lots of cool company art shows like the one we had a few weeks ago. It was the first ever Zooble Art Show. Employees were each given a blank 6" Zooble like the one below.

I decided that this lil guy definitely needed to show some of his macho side so I busted out the paint pens and made him El Zooba-Lucha!

Pretty fun macho stuff huh? Well that was the first art show of the year and I have two more next week. I'll definitely show you my pieces for them as the shows approach closer. With that let's KICK IT off with this week's weekly sketch!!!

KICK IT INTO HIGH GEAR!!! See you soon!!! Tootles!!!

Chasing Dreams and Butterflies!!!

Wowee!! I'm only 4 weeks into the New Year and I'm already filled to the brim with upcoming creative projects. Currently I'm in 2 awesome art shows that are just looming on the horizon. We've also got some great new collabs and new products that we are proofing right now. I can't wait to share all these great new things with y'all. Here's a super sneaky peak of just a few new projects from the lab right now.

The great thing about doing all these projects is that they are all parts of a great big dream come true. It's so rad to go chasing after your dreams. You know what else is rad? CHASING BUTTERFLIES!!! Which leads me to the sketch of the week. Taaaadaaaa!!!

So there ya have it!!! Go chasing after your dreams and butterflies this week!

Banana Bonanza for a Birthday!!!

Howdy Hyperactive Monkeyers!!! Would you like some bananas? How 'bout some banana bonanza for a birthday. A few months ago a close friend mine named Sabi had a birthday party. I wanted to make him a special gift because he is one cool monkey. So I whipped up this special birthday print for him. Let's take a look. 

Sabi's one cool dude. I think he'll be the future Steven Spielberg. Let's also take a look at this week's sketch of the week.

This week's sketch pretty much sums up my 2012 so far. Tons of crazy ideas and projects are swirling in my monkey head. In just this past week, we've taken some ginormous monkey foot steps for some projects that we've been working on for quite awhile. This 2012 is gonna be amaze-balls!!! Talk to ya' soon!!! Tootles!!!

Hyperactive Monkey 2011 Year End Review!!!

Howdy folks! Well it's been one crazy hectic past year for Hyperactive Monkey. 2011 was a tremendous fun time for us. We started and completed a bunch of projects, exhibited at quite a few conventions, and made tons of new friends all the while. While we are still in our infant baby monkey stage, we are still striving to create great artwork and creative products. We hope to continue to do so not only in 2012 but until we, monkeys, go completely bananas. Haha!!! Get it? Anyhoo here's a little collage of 11 of our favorite projects and moments from this past 2011.

Pretty cowbunga stuff, huh? Like I've said before, we are very thankful for all the support that we have received not just in 2011 but from all the years before and we wish to continue our artistic drive this year too. We've already started on some super secret projects that will debut in 2012 that we are truly hyperactively excited about. With that said let's introduce our next online creative endeavor. I didn't necessarily complete the 2011 Post-It Project, but I'll try to do at least one Hyperactive Monkey drawing a week and post it to the blog. So here's the first one for 2012. It's a Hyperactive Monkey Art Trooper. Let's take a peeky-poo, shall we?

Well there ya have it! Stay hyperactive and be a monkey!!! Ciao, and see you soon!!!