Playtime by Aron Wiesenfeld Preview

 

 

Aron Wiesenfeld has a long history in comics. I loved the Vertigo series Y: The Last Man, so it's super cool to learn he contributed to its success. Here's the info on his latest project:

Renowned Painter Aron Wiesenfeld Collects His Post-it Note Drawings in New Book, Playtime

Playtime is Now Live on Kickstarter

The artwork of Aron Wiesenfeld has been featured in 15 solo exhibitions and captured the attention of fans around the world, including Oscar Award-winning filmmaker Guillermo Del Toro and legendary cartoonists including Mike Mignola, Jim Lee and Kevin Eastmen. Wiesenfeld’s striking, large scale paintings are renowned for their dreamlike quality, often featuring evocative and solitary figures, whose presence suggests a general air of melancholy, isolation, and of leaving innocence behind. Before Wiesenfeld was an accomplished and acclaimed fine artist, he was a comic book artist whose brilliant art for Marvel’s Deathblow/Wolverine comic book earned him an Eisner Award nomination and his eye-catching comic book covers helped set the tone for the seminal series Y: The Last Man. Now the artist is once again experimenting with a new storytelling format with Playtime: The Post-It Note Drawings, a complete collection of Wiesenfeld's ink drawings on Post-it notes, which have never before been published. 

The book will spotlight roughly 100 pages of drawings which will be interspersed with short writings or poems. The 120-page deluxe hardcover is being published via Kickstarter. "I think of these small drawings like short stories, they are based on inspiration that I found in daily life,” said Wiesenfeld. “My hope is that you will browse through it on a rainy day, and be inspired too.”

Wiesenfeld traditionally works in oil paint and charcoal drawing. His technique draws upon the traditions of master painters from history, though his subject matter is decidedly modern. Sometimes described as “liminal”, his young subjects are often placed in the ignored in-between places on the outskirts of cities. These settings are echoed by an unconscious “in-betweenness” in the young protagonists, who are adrift, indecisive, in peril, or in search of something.

  

Here’s what people are saying about Wiesenfeld’s art:

“Aron Wiesenfeld. Like Hopper he is concerned with solitude, like Magritte he is bewitched by mystery.”—Guillermo Del Toro

“I love Aron Wiesenfeld’s work.” — Hellboy creator Mike Mignola

“Aron Wiesenfeld’s book is like opening a door to a half-remembered dream.  Each figure is a mystery and each landscape a story that rewrites itself every time you see it.”—

 Bestselling cartoonist and MIND MGMT creator Matt Kindt

“Terrific.” — DC Comics Publisher and artist Jim Lee

“Extraordinary.” — Teenage Mutants Nina Turtles co-creator Kevin Eastman

“Like a master chef balancing flavors, Aron creates a perfect visual feast, pairing subtle color palettes with suggestive narratives, atmospheres and moods.”—Juxtapoz 

“Quiet scenes of youthful melancholy and mystery.”—Colossal 

“Beautifully-rendered and atmospheric.”—Hi-Fructose

“There is a richness in Aron’s color even when it appears to be a grey cheerless world filled with ghosts.  The viewer can be both charmed and haunted by his work. Categorizing his painting style can also elude us. Surrealism doesn’t seem to be the perfect classification. Both cartoonist and classic realist seem to equally apply. I don’t know Aron well, but if an artist's work is a representation of themselves, it makes me want to know this very original enigma of an artist better.”— William Wray

"I am simply mesmerized by Aron Wiesenfeld's work." — Acclaimed painter and illustrator Peter de Sève

Playtime: The Post-It Note Drawings captures a contemporary master, experimenting with form and materials and rejoicing in the act of play.

Now, let's take a look inside:

 

 

Now, let's here from this extraordinary artist:

“It's always good to put limitations on yourself,” explains Wiesenfeld. “In this series I only allowed myself to use black pens on a 3x3-inch square of yellow paper. It became a challenge to see if I could capture some of the key elements I love in large oil paintings: mood, atmosphere, time of day, weather conditions, character, and story.  I wasn't always successful, but was often pleasantly surprised with the results anyway.  When you see your lines blown up, every quiver of the hand is captured there.  No falseness, or flourishes of style are even possible, it's just too small for any of that.  The results always felt ‘real’ to me. One of my heroes is Gustave Doré, who, constrained by the printing limitations of his time, was able to tell visual stories that felt like paintings, but limited to only using black and white engraving lines.”

Fans can support Playtime on Kickstarter. For more updates follow Aron Wiesenfeld on X, Instagram, and Facebook. 

 

About Aron Wiesenfeld
Born in 1972, Wiesenfeld grew up in Santa Cruz, California and now lives in North Carolina. He studied painting at Cooper Union School of Art in New York. After a brief career illustrating comic books, he continued his studies at Art Center in Pasadena, CA. His paintings have been in galleries and museums around the world, including New York, L.A., San Francisco, London, Oslo, Amsterdam, and Rome. His work has also been seen in publications such as Hi-Fructose, Juxtapoz, American Art Collector, Drawing Magazine, Wall Street International, and The Huffington Post.

 

Thanks to Aron Wiesenfeld and Superfan Promotions for sharing this preview with us.