For those who like to know some of the references and inspiration used please go to page 2. If you prefer to figure it out yourself, don’t.

Need to take a break from the Vulgar Army for a while. Regular updates probably won’t occur until I get back from Europe. Reasons for this are: 1) I am finding it very difficult to maintain interest in it over a long period of time, 2) I want to use media apart from pen and ink in it. Pen and ink just isn’t suitable for depicting a luscious attack of giant killer octopus of divers. It needs to be painted, not drawn. I have a list of various aspects of the octopus in media that have yet to be covered, so it will return!

Propaganda How-To:  

 

Octopus Propaganda:

 

Misc:

 

The Illustration Friday topic this week is/was “Pet Peeves”. I saw it as an opportunity to develop a sketch for the Vulgar Army project. It just happened the Illustration Friday topic was ideal.

My pet peeves are too numerous to recount. At the moment, it is generic by-numbers-octopus-propaganda and political cartoons. Not that I object to octopuses being used in propaganda/political cartoons. There have been some very imaginitive ones such as: L. D. Bradley, “Before the Trojan Horse is admitted, The Puzzled Citizen will have to be shown a little more fully, . .” Chicago Daily News, 3 February 1909 and the Harper’s Weekly cover Oct 6, 1900 showing the “Hunting of the Octopus” (Edit: “Hunting of the Octopus” by William Allen Rogers).

It is just, they are typically:

1) Write names of issues, organisations etc on limbs

2) Put head (or hat) of whomever you are trying to lampoon on octopus. Alternatively, tattoo their name across octopus forehead

3) Involve maps or globes.

Which isn’t to say these techniques don’t work. Take the Trojan Horse and the Hunting the Octopus. Both use labels to show what they are trying to represent. But they don’t just dump the octopus in the middle of the page, on a map or globe and stick someones head on it.

Edit (23rd March 3.30pm):

Links
David Hardy (April 2007) Octopuses and the NRA
TONMO.com (2003-2008) Octopuses & Propaganda
Quotidian Hell (May 2007) Quotidian Hell

This is the image is the source for the title of this project. Can you guess why it is called the “vulgar” army? Can you, can you?

This is a is a pen & ink and acrylic on ~5?×7? stretched calico canvas. I wanted it to look like a battered post card so I scuffed it with a piece of sandpaper. This is one of those images that I went, “drat, I ruined it” after I added the text. Oh well, I still like it.