interviewdancroiser


	Dan Crosier interview continued




	See more of Dan's work at www.thothengine.net

	Grits: How did you get into drawing? Where did you get your start? Did you get going as a kid? Dan: I started illustrating pretty much from what my parents tell me shortly after I was born. I was pretty much born with a pencil in my hand. In the third grade, I got held back because I never did my homework. I was always doing art in our daily journals in third grade. I was drawing G.I. Joe or Transformers. I think from early on, I was a comic book artist and it's taken me awhile to come full circle because I experimented in a lot of genres of expression and art. Grits: Where do you get your inspiration for your original pieces? I see that you do have some of your stuff that's based on the Green Lantern, and other pieces, I see those, but I also see some of your original work. Dan: My inspiration is pretty haphazard. It comes from a lot of different areas, most of it just crazy Red Bull impulses. It just really depends on what my mood is at the time. I can knock something out on assignment that I might not really care too much about. A lot of this stuff here, like with the spray foam brain and everything, that's based on a story that's coming out next year. The imagery has a lot of suggestions to propaganda and things of that nature, mind control manipulation. I guess as far as the more fine art influences and backgrounds, politics do play into it, with that type of commentary. As far as specific influences, as far as illustration goes, guys like Jim Lee, which you and I talked about last night, and Marc Silvestri, those guys really got me motivated to go to college for illustration. Also, fine artists like Francis Bacon, I think, is my favorite painter of all time, very expressionist surrealistic painting that borders on macabre. His work is very pointedly about the human conflict, human element, the human condition. Then there are the obvious influences too, like Alex Ross, a very contemporary comic book painter. I also looked elsewhere for influence, like music. You got your Black Flag, your Henry Rollins, and I was talking about that a lot last night too. Music gets me really pumped up even though I'm not a musician. I take that drive a lot more seriously than any of the visual stuff and I put it towards the visual applications. Film has also been a really big thing. Filmmakers like Akira Kurosawa with "Seven Samurai" and "Rashomon". Also contemporary filmmakers like Takashi Miike who did "Ichi the Killer". Anybody that is doing anything really creative and out of sorts that can really capture my attention for more than a couple seconds is great. I am obviously a child of the MTV generation…and a coke fiend laughing. That has just confessed to using drugs. laughing again And I’m out of caffeine. Mostly. Grits: laughing I don't want to take up too much more of your time. One more thing; do you have a website or somewhere we could direct our readers? Dan: Yeah! You can go to www.thothengine.net. That's my personal website with all the visual art. It links to film projects, films that are on the Internet. Also there is my performance group, odAm fEi mUd, where we do the samurai choreographed fighting and ridiculous over-the-top Gwar-esque armor, bloodletting, and good times had by the entire family. We even occasionally make balloon animals. Grits: laughing Alright Dan, thank you for your time, and try to stay off the Red Bull. Dan: Not gonna happen! Dan’s artwork is unusual even without considering the mediums on which he works. While he has some more traditional super hero pieces he has worked on, it’s his original art work that will catch your eye. And as he mentions in the interview, he is involved with a performance group called odAm fEi mUd. All of his work, both art and performance, can be viewed on his website, www. thothengine.net, or at his My Space profile, www.myspace.com/thothengine. If you ever meet Dan in person, make sure to bring him a Red Bull and an escape plan. You may need them both. Grits – End Of Line Return to Main...



	Dan Crosier (left) and BusyGamer Grits (right) at Wizard World 2007 - Arlington, Texas. Photos by Reverend Torres ©2007 BusyGamer. IMAGE IMAMS Comic cover art by Dan Crosier (right)