Baby Tattoo Books – Page 20 – Dr. Sketchy's Baltimore

June 9, 2010June 25, 2010

Little Luna, at last.

I don’t know if you know this, but Little Luna of Gilded Lily Burlesque was scheduled to pose for us way back during Snowmageddon, which—with all the last-minute emergencies such as fires, arrests (not us), and traffic snafus—is the only session in two years we’ve ever had to cancel. Even worse, we couldn’t reschedule her immediately because nearly everyone after her was traveling from far away to pose for you.

I can’t count how many folks emailed or asked when she was being rescheduled. It was a lot. I’m pretty sure the wait was worth it. 🙂 Just between you and me (and you know, The Internet), if it had snowed again, we would have taken it as a sign that everyone’s favorite invisible friend in the sky with super powers hated her guts and all of us were a hair’s breadth from being turned into pillars of salt or something.

Oh, who am I kidding, salt, schmalt.

Our first contest of the evening was the opposite hand contest. If you’re left-handed you draw with your right, if you’re right-handed you draw with your left, and if you’re ambidextrous you should be behind the bar flipping cocktails for us, not drawing. The two winners got mystery drinks from Russell . . . which to date hasn’t killed anyone, but I’m warning you, they do look a little shifty.

Samantha Cimino

John Brewer

Brian Dugan

Next up was the random noun contest where someone from the audience shouts out a random noun, which this session was “octopus”. The prize was Animus by Seonna Hong, from Baby Tattoo Books who, besides putting out a whole slew of amazing art books also runs the Dr. Sketchy’s in LA.

Brian Dugan

Elstabo

The last contest of the evening was in honor of Pac-Man’s 30th anniversary, which apparently because of this front page on Google, cost the U.S an estimated $120,483,800 in productivity. The winner of the “best incorporation of Pac-Man” contest got TWO prizes . . . a Mini-Munny from Atomic Books in Hampden on the corner of Falls Rd and the Avenue . . .

. . . not only that, but the winner got a frame from Artist & Craftsman Supply across the street on the corner of North Ave. and Howard, with the stipulation that they had to put a drawing in the frame, right on the spot, to be included in the Dr. Sketchy’s Baltimore Art Show. The opening reception for the show (and for Voom!, an exhibit of stunning burlesque portraits by photographer J.M. Giordano) is June 9th (that’s tonight), from 7 to 9 pm at the Windup Space.

If, for some lame reason, you can’t make the reception tonight, you’ll have almost two months to catch the show, including Artscape weekend. And, of course, you can see the work at our next session.

The Pac-Man drawings (some of which are in the show) were pretty awesome.

Samantha Cimino

Brian Dugan

Tiny hats are awesome. Little Luna’s was made by the multi-talented Malibu, whose (literally) fiery performances are seriously amazing.

John Brewer

And here are some photos of Little Luna after the session, showing off some awesome drawings given to her by Elstabo (who also took these two photos). You can see these drawings in person at the Dr. Sketchy’s art show.

A trillion billion thanks to Little Luna of Gilded Lily Burlesque for not only making a hole in her schedule for your drawing pleasure once, but twice! (If you didn’t come see her, the rest of Gilded Lily Burlesque, and Mourna Handful perform on May 29th at the Windup Space, you seriously missed out on some serious sexy. Seriously.) Thanks as well to our generous sponsors, Atomic Books, Artist & Craftsman Supply (who also helped us frame a few additional drawings for the show), and Baby Tattoo Books; if it wasn’t for them, we’d have no prizes to give away. Also well-deserving of the thanking is Russell of the Windup for slinging drinks and songs, Bill for filming the documentary and bouncing creepy people out the front door, Jeff for taking all the great photos above (who, btw, has some work in the show as well), the artists who contributed work for this post, and Alexis for being your host. Conan should take her on the road with him.

So, the opening reception for the Dr. Sketchy’s art show is tonight, June 9th, 7 to 9 pm at the Windup Space! Don’t miss it, come down, have some drinks with us where, for once, we won’t be running around like chickens with our heads cut off. 🙂 Then, our next session (and second anniversary session!) is June 14th with Maria Bella of Gilded Lily Burlesque, who will be fresh back from performing at the Americana Burlesque and Sideshow Festival in Asheville, NC—with us in tow, in fact . . . so if the car breaks down, y’all are screwed. —Aaron

June 3, 2010June 16, 2010

Dr. Sketchy’s Gallery Show Reception and our next session with Maria Bella!

Hey folks, Dr. Sketchy’s Anti-Art School Baltimore’s first ever gallery show has its opening reception Wednesday, June 9, from 7 to 9 pm! Come see a collection of pieces done at Dr. Sketchy’s over the last year or so, get a drink with us, and just generally bask in the glow of your work. Not only that, but take a gander at the awesome photography of J. M. Giordano who’s been photographing the burlesque scene in Baltimore!

That ain’t all though . . . June 14th, Monday, from 7 to 10 pm is our two-year anniversary session with Maria Bella, the stunning founder of Gilded Lily Burlesque!

(Thanks to Jimmy C for letting us use his fabulous photo of Maria Bella for this session’s flyer!)

May 24, 2010June 16, 2010

An evening with the amazing Johnny Blazes!

Holy moley, even thinking of Johnny Blazes’s session makes me blush all over again. If never-ending quest to make every session different and hopefully better than the last, we decided to experiment by having a 5-minute performance by Johnny halfway through the session. Sabrina Chap had played a few songs for us a few sessions back, and, well, that had gone so damn amazing that we thought, “Could it work for anything else?”

Well, great googly moogly, Johnny Blazes’ performance was akin to someone rolling a holy hand grenade of drag, burlesque, and honky-tonk right off the stage and into the crowd. For two years now we’ve been tickled pink with how the sessions worked, but honestly felt there was something missing, i.e., it’s one thing to see, say, Paco Fish on stage in his frozen glory for the benefit of your sharpened pencils and it’s an altogether different to see that glory when the game of Red Light/Green Light is no longer stuck in red.

See, our woe has always been that you, for the most part, really never get to know any of these great performers. Sure, there’s some occasional chatting with the audience, but you don’t get to see what THEY are good at, their art, that flare that they’re famous for in various performance houses up and down the East coast (and sometimes places as far away as Australia).

It’s no secret, but Alexis and I are burlesque junkies. It’s rare you won’t see us in the crowd at various shows around Baltimore hooting and hollering for all the folk you’ve seen modeling the last two years. If you check out our calendar page, you’ll see the various upcoming shows we know of. We tell you about them during the sessions and we try to tweet as many of them as we can.

Folks come up to us all the time and say, “Wow, I really love Little Luna, she’s an amazing model!” or “I could draw Maria Bella all day long!”

. . . and we’ll reply, “We know!! S/he is amazing! Have you seen her/him perform?”

“Umm, errr, no. S/he performs?”

“DUUUUUUUUUDE!”

Well, maybe not “dude!”. Unless we were tipsy. Come to think of it, at that point, we’re often tipsy….WHETHER WE SAY DUDE OR NOT ISN’T IMPORTANT.

What is important is that for now on, if the model is a performer and they’re up for it, they’ll give you a five minute peek during the middle of the session at WHY they’re posing for Dr. Sketchy’s and why Alexis and I squeal and titter like three-year-olds over the fact that they’re posing. These guys and gals who pose for you are some of the smartest, most talented, creative people we’ve ever met. To be blunt, they’re just damn COOL, and we want you to see why.

Now, Little Luna won’t be able to do one this Monday since she’s doing two performances this week anyway, but she WILL perform this Saturday with Gilded Lily at the Windup. More on that later, though.

Anyways, on to the show! (And believe me, Johnny Blazes brought it.)

And with that, someone pulled the pin on Johnny and all hell broke loose….to the tune of “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” by Trace Adkins, no less. She was moving pretty fast, so most of the pictures were pretty blurry, but here’s the best one Jeff was able to get.

After a cold glass of water and maybe a shot, we started the five-minute poses and contests.

The first contest, for two mysterious drinks from Russell’s mysterious (i.e., scary) brain, was the opposite hand drawing contest. If you’re righty, do it with your lefty; if you’re a lefty do it with your righty; and if you’re multi-handy you’re cheating and are going to be rewarded with a drink for your shiftiness.

Brian Dugan

Second up in contest land was best incorporation of Monty Python, since it was international Monty Python Status Day, with the prize being a Johnny Blazes t-shirt.

(Gift to Johnny Blazes from an anonymous artist.)

Brian Dugan

The third contest was in honor of Frank Franzetta with the two winners getting either a beautiful frame from Artist & Craftsman Supply right across the street at the corner of North and Howard, or a Mini-Munny from Atomic Books in Hampden on the corner of the Avenue and Falls. Why a frame from Artist & Craftsman? If you just asked that, I’m going to cry. I will sit in the middle of the next session and sob. Trust me, it will be embarrassing for all of us.

So, why? Because June 9th is the first-ever Dr. Sketchy’s gallery art show along with an exhibit of the stunning photos of J.M. Giordano! Do you have a drawing or painting that was done or inspired by Dr. Sketchy’s over the last two years? PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE bring it to the next session with Little Luna on May 24th (you can bring them after that, too). Want to know the specifics? The blog post right below this one has everything you need to know, just scroll down. If you’ve EVER drawn or painted something at Dr. Sketchy’s, PLEASE bring something in. We want a salon-style show, i.e., want the wall stuffed with as many pieces as possible, touching frame to frame if we have to. All it has to be is ready to hang.

Where were we? Oh yeah.

Here’s what a Mini-Munny looks like….they’re customizable DIY toys that you can paint/draw/mold into anything you want.

(Another gift to Johnny from an anonymous artist, who won first place in this contest and chose the Mini-Munny.)

Brian Dugan

Last up for the evening was our Baby Tattoo Books contest, who you should know by now runs the L.A. Dr. Sketchy’s. The prize was a copy of Shag’s newest book, Autumn’s Come Undone, for the best incorporation of Mad Men.

Brian Dugan

And that was that for the evening. Easily one of my favorite sessions. Special thanks to Johnny Blazes for making an amazing session amazing. Thanks as well to our sponsors Atomic Books, Artist & Craftsman Supply, and Baby Tattoo Books who without our contests wouldn’t be possible. Thanks to Jeff for the always stunning pictures, Russell for DJing and slinging drinks, not to mention having us at the Windup, and of course to everyone who came out to make Johnny Blazes feel welcome.

Our next session is Monday, May 24th (tomorrow!) with Little Luna of Gilded Lily Burlesque! Little Luna was supposed to pose months ago but got SCREWED by that whole Snowmageddon bullshit . . . a lot of folks have been waiting for to come back, so make sure to come early to get a good seat!

Don’t forget, Little Luna & the rest of Gilded Lily Burlesque will be performing this Saturday at the Windup Space . . . if you haven’t see a show before, come out, pull up a barstool beside Alexis and me . . . I guarantee it’ll be one of the best Saturday nights you’ve had out in a long while. Plus, we’ll be giving away two tickets (well, spots on the guest list, technically) for this show at tomorrow’s session!

Anyways, that’s it. Monday night, the doors open at 6!