John Garcia is a artist and illustrator, born in Los Angeles and currently living in New York City. John’s work is greatly influenced by his roots in Southern California, something we’ve bonded over for the past couple years. While I’ve been painting California wildflowers, he’s been drawing surfers, bikes, and composing crazy street art inspired pieces. He works in every scale and medium – from watercolor to woodcuts, scraps of paper to murals. His sketchbooks are layered explorations for finished pieces, and often become finished work themselves. In a sketchbook class we took at Parsons, John’s book was always the most interesting and unexpected. On one page there’s a loose marker drawing, and the next, a rendered painting and textural collage. John and I are currently working on a printed tote together that should be out soon — think, a jumbled pattern of puppies and kitties in Lisa Frank colors. You can see more of John’s work and sketchbooks on his website here.

© Julia Rothman 2007