Son of Witz

I really had no idea that I was going to do 5 paintings of Mr. Bungle. This inspiration came out of nowhere, but Hot Damn, those Mr. Bungle “Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny” concerts were amazing! I’m not sure if any of us were expecting these shows featuring their old demo album to be as amazing as they were. I tried to approach these paintings like I would have done them in high school as well. I’ve been painting on non-absorbent media for a while, it was fun to paint on paper like I did when I was starting out. I think I’ll do more.

Scroll past the paintings for video of the process.

The band was not involved in this project.

I was lucky enough to get to see them twice, thanks to a friend who gave me  a ticket for the second SF show. So much fun. Mike Patton was as balls-to-the-wall nuts as he usually is. Trey Spruance was shredding insane solos, like some sort of parody of Kerry King, but better. Trevor Dunn and Dave Lombardo laid down a juggernaut rhythm section while Scott Ian gave one of the most enthusiastic performance I’ve ever seen. He was having more fun than anyone. The songs were a seriously punishing stew of relentless thrash metal riffs that were firmly old school, yet in really unusual and unrelenting arrangements. I loved it. I listened to bootlegs on repeat while making these paintings, looking forward to the newly recorded version. The album is out now, check it out. Buy a copy!  

Process Video

I recorded a lot of the painting process, which you can see in the playlist here. The sketches were drawn digitally and transferred manually to 300g watercolor paper. The text behind the portraits are song titles from the album.