TVSquad

The deviantARTist known as Space Coyote recently received copius praise and accolades for her anime-renditions of characters from The Simpsons and Futurama. Now, it seems her drawings have also captured the attention of both Bongo Comics and 20th Century Fox. According to a message on her deviantART page, Space Coyote has been hired to draw for a one-off Simpsons comic in manga style for Bongo Comics. She further writes that 20th Century Fox has also contacted her about doing work, possibly for the newly-resurrected Futurama.

She also writes on her Live Journal that the details are still being hammered out, but needless to say, this is a great example of a relatively unknown artist getting some decent exposure through this crazy thing called the Web. She has also worked on the Web comic Saturnalia since 2002, which is also worth checking out.

[via Digg]

Toby Keith, country star and supporter of the rectally-inserted footwear approach to terrorism, recently starred in the movie Broken Bridges, about a country star who returns home to his high school sweetheart and a sixteen year old daughter he's never met. The movie also stars Willie Nelson, Kelly Preston, Tess Harper and Burt Reynolds. CMT Films produced the movie along with Paramount, so if you missed it in the theaters you can catch it on CMT Friday December 15 at 8 pm before the DVD comes out on January 9. CMT will also be airing several specials centered around Toby Keith, just in case you have a deficiency in your Toby system and need to get re-energized. Remember, the surgeon general recommends four servings of Toby a day. At least that guy at the bus stop claimed he was the surgeon general. I was somewhat suspicious since he was telling this to a half-eaten can of peas with his pants around his ankles. Still, one must respect his elders.

If you're a fan of Looney Tunes and find yourself in the 181 Martell gallery space in Los Angeles this Friday (tomorrow), that's a good thing. A street artist by the name of Dr. Romanelli (a.k.a. DRx) was picked by Warner Brothers to create new designs of characters such as Bugs Bunny, Tweety, Sylvester and Daffy as part of a new urban marketing campaign that will eventually include T-shirts, toys, and a limited-edition Chuck Taylor sneaker. The new designs are said to reveal a darker, more insane side of the characters. You can see a couple small examples of what the new designs look like here and here. I'd really like to get my hands on those Chuck Taylors, those would be pretty sweet.

Oh yeah, a bunch of DRx's designs can be found here, too.

PBS' American Masters series will be airing a two-part special on the life of eccentric New York artist Andy Warhol tonight and tomorrow night with both parts airing at 9 pm. Warhol's career spanned over thirty years, his most notable work probably being his paintings of Campbell's Soup cans and his multicolored images of celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe. His multimedia show "The Exploding Plastic Inevitable" introduced the world to the band The Velvet Underground. Andy Warhol: A Documentary Film was directed by Ric Burns, who previously made documentaries on playwright Eugene O'Neill and photographer Ansel Adams. Ric is the brother of documentary filmmaker Ken Burns, best known for his PBS miniseries The Civil War.

For over thirty years, Dina Babbitt, once a teenage girl imprisoned in Auschwitz, has been trying to reclaim paintings she made while in the concentration camp. Josef Mengele, the infamous Nazi doctor, took a liking to Babbitt's artwork and asked her to paint portraits of the gypsies on which he was performing his horrific experiments. It was, in fact, these paintings that kept Babbitt alive. After the war, Babbitt came to California and worked as an animator for both Warner Bros. and Jay Ward Productions. When it was revealed that seven of her Auschwitz paintings were on display at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum in Poland, she tried to get them back, but the museum has consistently refused, claiming the paintings are not personal works of art, but rather documentation of the events that occurred at Auschwitz created under the orders of Dr. Mengele. The artistic community, including former DC Comics artist Joe Kubert, have rallied around Babbitt's cause, as have congresswoman Shelley Berkley, and a former director of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington. Efforts to help the 83 year old Babbitt reclaim her artwork were stepped up recently due to a heart condition that is threatening her health, though I would assume that if she were to pass away before the issue is resolved her family would continue the fight.

[via Toon Zone]

There's this artist out there named Brandon Bird who has a special place in his heart for everything that is Law and Order. I own his original Law and Order coloring book ("An Adventure to Color!"), which follows Briscoe and Curtis as they seek a murder suspect and then on to the trial. The last page is a word scramble to figure out the verdict: LYTIGU. Funny stuff.

Now Brandon has it in for Law and Order: SVU. He has created some Valentines featuring the main characters from that franchise. My favorite is Ice-T, with the saying, "I'm on your tail". You can actually order these things for Valentine's Day. Check 'em out here.

In addition, Brandon does a bunch of cool Star Wars drawings, including this Ewok poster that I totally want. He also seems to have a bit of an obsession with James Woods, Christopher Walken (who doesn't?) and Edward Norton.

[Via Boing Boing]