Hand drawn illustrations
My StoryOnce a fashion designer, I decided to quit my comfy job in NYC in 2014 and travel the USA, Mexico, Central and South America with my partner mostly by bicycle. Along the way I experimented with my creativity and played around with different forms of artistic expression, including drawing and watercolor. In the fall of 2016 I started drawing Phish song illustrations. The first, "Bathtub Gin" and "Slave", were drawn as gifts for two friends who went above and beyond to help my partner and I make a spontaneous trip from Colombia to Las Vegas for the Halloween shows. I had so much fun creating these illustrations and I was proud of the outcome, so I shared my work with the wider Phish community, where I was greeted with warmth and encouragement. So I continued to draw.
When we returned again to the US in June 2017, I was ready with prints in hand to tackle my first complete Phish tour since I began to see the band in 1998. It was an amazing journey, both musically and within the community, as I met so many wonderful fans, vendors and artists along the way. I was even invited to participate in a successful PhanArt Show in NYC during Phish's epic Baker's Dozen. It was a dream come true! I did it all again in 2018 and 2019, each time growing my art, my fanbase, and my adventure story all while following the story of my favorite band more closely than ever. When I am not on summer tour, I live in New Zealand where I spend my time drawing, learning, and exploring this beautiful country. In 2019 I taught myself to screen print. I built as much equipment as possible myself, and while my set-up is still very much DIY, I have fine tuned it to the point that I can create a beautiful run of nearly perfect prints... but not too perfect! By maintaining some of the manual elements of the process which I love, I feel I have been able to keep a bit of the magic that exists in original works vs. that which is mass-produced. I use the sun to burn my artwork onto the screens, and have a very simple printing press. Everything is done by my hands. Occasionally the artwork is created digitally using a drawing tablet, but most of the time I am still drawing with ink on paper. Along the way I have been given the support and encouragement of the wider music community, and have been commissioned to do album covers, official gig posters, artwork for events, and collaborations. Check out my portfolio for a look at a wider range of work, some of which is not available in the shop. I hope to blog from time to time, to share my artistic journey (the good, the bad, and the ugly!) so that I might encourage other artists and give some insight into my process. I also hope to share some of the stories I have from life on tour. Stay tuned! xoxo Brandy |
Madison Square Garden in New York: Phish's Baker's Dozen 2017
PhanArt Show in Tahoe in 2018
PhanArt Show in Boston in 2019
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Shakedown St. at the Gorge campground, 2018
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Camden Phish lot, 2019
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