New Illustration

The Texas Observer hired me to draw their cover last month (my first cover for them is here). The cover story focused on Texas death penalty cases being reviewed by the Supreme Court and how they might rule now that Bush has had two appointments. This was supposed to be printed at the beginning of February but right before press time Molly Ivins died, leading to them putting out a Tribute issue.

There were a lot of elements they wanted included and it was difficult to figure out a way to get everything in. I had to show the "Texas Death Machine" with prisoners entering alive and leaving dead but they also needed to show that the judges were responsible for their fate. I tried a few different things:

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Elements from the first and last sketch were then combined into this

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This is the illustration I initially turned into them. I think it's one of my more successful illustrations and I did some experimenting to get a new effect (for me) in the background.

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The Editors felt the red was too aggressive and overpowering so they asked me to tone down the colors. This is the version that was printed.

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