by Gary Arlington
$14.95
Softcover
127 Full color images
90 pages
9 x 6 inches
ISBN-13: 9780867197570
Publisher: Last Gasp

Called “the godfather of Japanese erotica,” Toshio Saeki has cultivated a unique and shocking style – blending traditional Japanese technique with his own twisted imagination.

Saeki’s artwork is a synthesis of depraved vision and incredible artistic ability.

“A famous writer once described my works as ‘obviously peculiar’ and I cannot completely deny that,” he said.

“I want to surprise people, make them happy, and if possible, even completely enchant the minds of those who see my work. To realize that, I will choose whatever method it takes, and will not limit myself.”

Saeki embraces the controversial nature of his work. He seeks to challenge social norms by placing the unconscious in plain view.

“In the modern world, where one rarely stops to think about the truth behind the moment, you might enjoy it if you take a peep at my mysterious and strange illusions,” he said.

“To those who frown at them, I want to place the drawings right in front of your face and ask if you really disapprove. I’m always thinking, how wonderful it would be to give shape to psychological pictures which everyone hides and holds deep within them.”

111 Minna Gallery and Last Gasp Present
Toshio Saeki
Opens Thursday, Sept. 4th at 5pm
Show runs November 4th – 27th
21+

—

SAEKI’S TECHNIQUE

In a modern version of traditional Japanese woodcut printing, Saeki creates finished work in conjunction with a printing professional. The artist typically prepares only black and white originals. He does not apply color directly to these pieces, but instead uses overlays to enumerate the precise values of the colors he wants.

Saeki works with the terminology of the four-color printing process: cyan, magenta, yellow and black (CMYK). For example, he indicates a woman’s skin tone should be reproduced with 10% magenta, while her nipples should be 60% magenta. Most of the men in Saeki’s artwork have a skin tone that is 30% magenta, 20% cyan, and 50% yellow.

He calls this method chinto printing – the picture is complete only after it has been printed. It is a modern version of the ukiyo-e, a genre of Japanese woodcut prints or paintings produced between the 17th and 20th centuries. Ukiyo-e were works of collaboration between the eshi (artist) and the surishi (printer). Saeki is paying homage to this style, and considers himself an eshi.

ONIKAGE

A new book by the artist, which was just released by Last Gasp features a selection of Saeki’s previously unpublished works. The art is shown in a gorgeously large format. Throughout the book, paper vellum overlays re-create Saeki’s unique method for adding color to his black and white artwork. Both original black and white renderings and finished color artwork is shown. However, the reader is not allowed to see every image in all stages. Like the artist, the viewer must use his or her imagination to complete these peculiar pictures.

Preview Onikage by Toshio Saeki
56 pages, Hardcover, 11 ¾” x 14 ½”, Color and b&w images, paper vellum inserts
ISBN 978-0-86719-719-7, $39.95
Publication date: August 2010
Published by Last Gasp

BLABWORLD Book Signing
Sponsored by The Intuit Show of Folk and Outsider Art (with SOFA Chicago)
Navy Pier Festival Hall

Friday, November 5th, 2011, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM

Contributing artists, CJ Pyle, Fred Stonehouse, Michael Noland, Travis Lampe, Kari Laine McCluskey, Larry Day, and BLABWORLD founder, editor, and designer, Monte Beauchamp will be available to sign copies of the premiere volume of BLABWORLD, a 10 x 10 inch, full-color, 128-page, periodic hardcover book of works by leading contemporary painters, print makers, illustrators, and sequential artists worldwide.

Attend the book signing and purchase books at the Intuit Store, Booth 1524i.

Get a FREE 3-Day pass to both fairs!

The Blab Show at CoproGallery – Santa Monica CA

Todd Schorr: Designed for Extinction
Opening reception: June 26, 4-7pm
Book-signing for Schorr’s latest monograph American Surreal hosted by Last Gasp.

Designed for Extinction is a solo exhibition featuring the paintings of Los Angeles-based artist Todd Schorr, a leading figure in the world of “pop surrealism” and “lowbrow.” Schorr is undeniably inspired by Renaissance masters such as Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel, and Salvador Dali, as well as the early animated cartoons of Walt Disney and Max Fleischer, underground comics best exemplified by Zap, and classic films from the 1930s such as King Kong and Frankenstein. His highly polished, fantastic paintings are intricate narratives about evolution and the plight of man

Music by GLUE ONE, food by Rasta Tacos, and limited edition Todd Schorr designed T-shirt provided by Hurley.

Otis College of Art and Design
9045 Lincoln Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90045

Show runs June 26 – September 11, 2010

More Info
Full Press Release

Four decades • 300+ comix • 250+ books • A Who’s Who of Lowbrow Art

Last Gasp turns 40 this year and to celebrate, we are throwing a party and art show at 111 Minna Gallery in San Francisco.

The Last Gasp 40th Anniversary Art Show assembles a top-drawer lineup of artists – the haut monde of lowbrow. Over the past four decades, Last Gasp has published hundreds of artists in the underground comix, kustom kulture, pop surrealism and street art movements.

Artists in the show include:

Gary Baseman, Tim Biskup, Glenn Barr, Mark and Vaughn Bode, Robert Crumb, Richard Corben, Rob and Christian Clayton, Guy Colwell, Ron English, Tony Fitzpatrick, Christopher Felver, Camille Rose Garcia, Justin Green, Charles Gatewood, Bill Griffith, Rick Griffin, Ed Hardy, Jay Kinney, Frank Kozik, Joe Ledbetter, Carol Lay, Adrian Lee, Michael Manning, Chris Mars, Mats,  Paul Mavrides, Scott Musgrove, Albert Morse, Junko Mizuno, Liz McGrath, Laurenn McCubbin, Mitch O’Connell, Annie Owens, The Pizz, Mark Ryden, Michael Rosen, Trina Robbins, Spain Rodriguez, Dori Seda, Winston Smith, Stanislav Szukalski, Larry Todd, Eric White, Robert Williams, Basil Wolverton, Attaboy, Aye Jay, and many more to be announced.

Writers, including San Francisco Poet Laureate Diane DiPrima will do a reading.

Design radicals GAMA-GO will produce a limited edition tee shirt for the event.

21 + over; Free and open to the public

When: April 1, 2010, 6pm until late
Where: 111 Minna Gallery, 111 Minna Street, San Francisco, CA 94105
(415) 974-1719   www.111minnagallery.com   Contact: Jay Howell

About Last Gasp
Last Gasp is one of the largest and oldest publishers and purveyors of underground books & comics in the world, as well as being a distributor of all sorts of weird ‘n’ wonderful subversive literature, graphic novels, tattoo and art books.

Last Gasp was founded in 1970 by Ron Turner. Last Gasp’s first publication, Slow Death Funnies #1 came out on the first “Earth Day,” April 15, 1970. Subsequent comics included the all-women’s comic It Ain’t Me Babe, and Skull Comics. Over the years they have published, and in some cases brought to light, some of the most respected and talented artists working today, including such luminaries as R. Crumb, Mark Ryden, Justin Green, Bill Griffith, Frank Kozik, Todd Schorr, Winston Smith, Spain Rodriguez, and Robert Williams to name but a few.

Ron Turner’s enthusiasm for underground comics, and in particular their autobiographical aspect, has been the driving force behind many groundbreaking publications. Last Gasp published Justin Green’s highly acclaimed confessional Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary in 1972, a book that became an inspiration to many artists now working in the autobiographical style. “Art Spiegelman, who won the only Pulitzer Prize for cartooning, has said he would never have started to do the autobiographical story of his family (in the graphic novel Maus) unless Justin had done it first. And Robert Crumb said the same thing,” said Turner.

Today, Last Gasp publishes 12-20 new titles per year, focusing on Lowbrow and Pop Surrealist artists, as well as graphic novels. The company has 18 full and part-time employees and is based in San Francisco. In addition to publishing, Last Gasp distributes for large and small publishers worldwide, providing a steady countercultural stream of books and other printed matter that spreads over six continents.

Last Gasp books have been glowingly reviewed in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Playboy, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, School Library Journal, Juxtapoz magazine, The Guardian (UK), Hi-Fructose magazine, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Austin Chronicle, American Book Review, and The Los Angeles Times.

Co-publishing partners include La Luz de Jesus / Billy Shire Fine Arts, Porterhouse Fine Art Editions, San Jose Museum of Art, Grand Central Art Center, Smokemuse, JaPress, Moulinsart, Presspop Gallery, Ignition Publishing, NewSkool/Analog, Laguna Art Museum, and many more.

The readers of the San Francisco Bay Guardian named Last Gasp the Best Local Publisher in 2009.

First publications: Slow Death, 1970 (comic); Breather’s Guide to Invisible Air Polution (book) 1970

During the shoot:

The finished results:

Some other shots Randy took in the gallery:

Elizabeth McGrath says:

Hello,

I am pleased to announce the opening of my new show “American Animals” this Saturday, November 14, 2009 at Billy Shire Fine Arts (5790 Washington Blvd., Culver City, CA 90232; phone: 323-297-0600).
The opening reception will be from 7 – 10pm. The show runs from November 14 – December 5

Visit the BSFA web site for more details

I look forward to seeing you there!

-Liz

Book Preview & Interview with The Pizz

Ed Hardy, internationally renowned for breathing new life into tattooing, appears in person to discuss his art and life, as collected in the new book Beyond Skin (teNeues). Hardy will sign copies of the book, which contains drawings, prints, paintings, and his newest pieces in porcelain.

This is not Ed Hardy the fashion line. This is Ed Hardy the original, whose artwork integrates iconography from classic tattoo flash and Hollywood cartoons to the Old West, from Asia and Polynesia to Medieval Europe. Hardy achieves beauty by mixing the grotesque, humorous, subtle, and flamboyant.

Beyond Skin is a scintillating overview of an artist who has tapped the pulse of our time and an ideal gift for all who appreciate the mastery of art that defies generalization.

Presented by Last Gasp

Admission: Free

Ed Hardy
Beyond Skin
Text by Alan Govenar

Size: 10 x 12 7/8 in.
240 pp., Hardcover with jacket
c. 200 color illustrations
Text in English, German, French, Spanish and Italian
$ 98
November 2009
ISBN 978-3-8327-9352-4
To be published by teNeues in November 2009
Phone for press (about the book): teNeues, Anshana Arora (212) 627 9090 ext 19
Available from Last Gasp

Ed Hardy

At the age of ten, Don Ed Hardy recognized the unique force of tattoo art. Growing up in the center of 1950s and early 60s California pop culture, he went on to earn an art school degree and then learned to tattoo by apprenticing himself to master artists. Over the past forty years Hardy has revolutionized this ancient tradition while also bringing fresh energy to the classical mediums of painting, printmaking and ceramics through his exhibitions across the United States and abroad. His technical brilliance and mesmerizing imagery have created an indelible style on skin and in the worlds of fashion and contemporary art. Hardy’s sense of design is at once startling, seductive, frightening, and enchanting, transcending categories of time and culture, high and low.
Ed Hardy’s Tattoo City