The Art of Jim Phillips

Jim Phillips (San Jose, California, 1944) is one of my greatest art influences ever. His work inspired a whole generation of artists, and I remember back in the early 90s one of the first skateboards I got was a Santa Cruz Roskopp Eye, one of Jim’s artworks.

In more than 40 years he worked on skate-art, rock posters and surf artworks, and one of his most legendary and well known piece is the iconic “Screaming hand“.

While he was the Santa Cruz Skateboards Art Director, he designed Santa Cruz and Independent Trucks logos. When Jim founded Phillips Studios he gave birth to a whole new graphic trend with a lot of applications that endures to nowadays, and actually he still working on designs with NHS-Santa Cruz.

This past January Jim received the Eric Stricker Memorial Award from TransWorld SKATEboarding for his more than 40 years art life creating real skate icons.

All his artworks -and now cult graphic icons-, has a great story and a well defined process behind, so who’s better to explain it that Jim himself who gave me the chance to interview him.

R: First of all, thank you for your time and for answer my questions.

Hola! Thanks for acknowledging my art to the people of Peru! You have such an artistically colorful country, and I know that you also have a long surfing history dating from the ancient ones and the prehistoric origins of surfing. I remember reading the second issue of Surfer Quarterly how George Downing of Hawaii, father of the big wave surfboard, came to Peru in the mid fifties to help the local shapers design boards to ride the big waves of Kon Tiki. And hey, who can forget a Hector Velarde surfing headstand?

You draw since you was a kid, how much time it took to you to go from high school doodling to make your first illustration? When did you know that you want to do the rest of your life?

Yes I was doodling away my class time in high school, but if you follow my steps that may not work out so well for you. Besides I had a rocky beginning with grade school so I was without option. I was making those school drawings with pencil or Bic pen, but at home I was using Speedball pens and India ink with watercolor or ink washes. Among other things I made surfing portraits of my heroes and would give the drawings to them. One was Jack O’Neill, who held an exhibit of many of those drawings in his 41st Avenue surf shop showroom. Around that time, the 1961 Surfer Quarterly announced a surf car cartoon contest and I quickly decided to enter, as I liked to draw surf cars. So I made an old woody driving over a hill to some perfect point break. It only won honorable mention but was displayed prominently on the page. That was my first published work and it gave me enough of a feeling of accomplishment that I went on to draw more cartoons for surf magazines. The magazine exposure also gave me local prestige, established me as a surf artist and led to jobs and eventually a career of surf and skate art.

The WHARF, acrylic 1992

How did you gained experience besides practice through those early years of your career?

Experience is practice and visa versa. For a surfer it is time in the water whether pro surfing or pleasure. For an artist it’s time drawing, on the job or not. Many artists create but don’t actually draw much, but I think drawing is a surfboard for the artist’s mind. The hard part is getting wisdom and understanding to make a living from art, and that experience may be fraught with pitfalls. I might note that some “purist” artists think that making money taints the commercial artist, and I know one who spends most of his time as a longshoreman.

Many artists create but don’t actually draw much, but I think drawing is a surfboard for the artist’s mind.

The artists you had as an influence like Carl Barks or Ed Roth was some kind of starting point, but how did you discovered the techniques that later define your own style?

Every artist lays out his lessons for all to see. As a child I was first inspired by newspaper comic strips like Barks’ Donald Duck and George Herriman’s Krazy Kat, and I began to create my own cartoons. My grandfather heard about them and sent me a book, Pen Tips on Cartooning, which showed cartoon people with each particular Speedball pen shown as drawing the lines. When I was 11, my mom enrolled me in a free children’s art class held by Ralph Grey, a former editorial cartoonist and cousin to Harold Grey creator of Little Orphan Annie. Ralph was a master at cartooning and hand-lettered advertising. His cartoon logos rode all around town on delivery trucks, including one I saw last week on a Stagnaro fishing truck more than 50 years later! He made art interesting and I learned new techniques from him like using white ink. I was also fascinated by comic books and was both inspired and daunted by the masters of the Golden Age of comic books. My older sister gave me some old EC Mad comic books when she thought I was old enough to handle it. Mad had a hilarious satirical edge that I had never seen before and I became mesmerized by some of the artists under the zany direction of Harvey Kurtzman like Bill Elder and Wallace Wood, or “Woody” as he likes to be known. I looked at every detail on Woody’s panels and it made me want to draw the graphically shaded scenes like he could. I wanted to be like Woody. What I didn’t know that around that time the comic book industry was experiencing a decline in popularity and Wally was pouring his life and work into one soon-to-be-canceled title after another. In his 2012 biography Woody is quoted as saying, “If I had it to do all over I’d cut off my hands!” and shortly after took his own life. I’m glad I was oblivious to those terrors of my favorite artist’s life, because I remained stoked and was very lucky to wind up making a living for my family in surf and skate art.

What kind of art materials did you use in your early years on Santa Cruz Skateboards and which ones do you use now? how do you manage the digital process from then to your actual work?

When NHS called for their first Road Rider t-shirt design I was primarily still doing pen and ink, because there was more work for black and white printing as it was cheaper. I used an inexpensive art board I found in the drugstore that worked good because it was thin enough to see through with a light box to transfer my sketches. Also it had a coated surface which made a clean line and I could scrape ink off with a blade. I used boxes and boxes of that art board over the years. That’s how my art was done for Santa Cruz throughout the 70s and 80s.

When color computer monitors became good enough, and the barely affordable memory for RAM, hard drives and removable storage was becoming available, I bought a Mac computer and scanner. Roy Gonzales and Salvador Paskowitz, noted surf artists from San Clemente, aided my transition to a color Mac to help me provide art for their new Surf Crazed comic book. They were displaying color printouts of their comic panels at their booth at the 1991 ASR Expo in San Diego and I was astounded by Roy’s yellow to red blends on the flames in his parody “Aloha from Hell”. Their art was drawn with pen and ink just like mine but then they scanned it into Photoshop to color. For me it was all about the color, literally millions of colors. I had to have it, even though it was super expensive for what today seem like computer’s stone age tools, I was sitting on what they call “the bleeding edge”. But at this time my wife Dolly had five years experience with a black & white Mac laying out catalogs for NHS-Santa Cruz so it was quite comforting to have in-house tech help during those painful mind-boggling early glitches and crashes that could sap my creativity. Eventually the digital format was becoming the optimal, and soon enough only, interface to the printing process. This factor made the computer all the more vital for the commercial artist. Today every artist has a computer with vast memory and it is expected for an artist to have one, along with a decent tech knowledge. I started in art for fifty cents for my bottle of ink and a pen, so now the bar is raised and can become an obstacle for young artists. And when they get computers they are drawn into the countless availability of images and filters to manipulate them that they don’t really need to draw. Artists usually begin by making doodles but if kids are using their thumbs typing on a smart phone instead, when will they ever start drawing?

Artists usually begin by making doodles but if kids are using their thumbs typing on a smart phone instead, when will they ever start drawing?

What kind of workspace is the ideal for you and what do you recommend for who begin in art?

Besides computers, the artist’s needs are modest. A drawing table with lamp, a taboret for your ink and jar of pens and brushes, and a not-too-comfortable chair or stool. I made my own light box for the cost of a 29 cent switch which I still use after 45 years service, it was and is indispensable. I need to listen to music so some decent music equipment. We had a small house so I put my table in the corner of our living room. Not very stylish but it let me work day and night surrounded by family and friends and whatever was going on. In 1988 I created Phillips Studios in a small house next door and furnished it with more than 50 feet of drawing and light tables. I missed my home studio but it was necessary for me to work there to direct my studio artists, an almost constant chore. In the computer era, I located the monitor and scanner next to my drawing table by making creatively fitting kidney-shaped tables.

Your creation process does always starts from a sketch? Which steps do you follow to create an illustration and how many hours does it take you -for example- to do the Roskopp face?

Yes the sketch is both the most fun and creative part of your work, however it takes only a fraction of the time of a finished piece. The rest is sweat and labor to make everything work the way it should for reproduction. After the sketch I use my light table to redraw it onto poster board in light pencil or non-repro blue ink for the final ink drawing. Now notice that the drawing is done three times. Many artists would limit the drawing to the least possible amount, but each time you draw something over you can improve it. Every line can be improved. So after drawing it three times it is much better than when you started. All told, the Roskopp Face drawing probably took me about twenty hours over two days.

Arriba: The Roskopp Face deck art y otros dos decks de la serie Rob Roskopp. Abajo: Rock poster del CHET HELMS TRIBUTE ’94 Maritime Hall y su respectivo boceto.

Abajo:George Clinton,’96 FD/Maritime Hall y S.F. Artists Show ’97 rock posters.

In the creation process of your illustrations, what kind of music do you usually listen, or maybe you prefer absolute silence for a better focus on your work?

Music is important to me for doing art. Artist are fortunate, because when the hands are busy the brain doesn’t have much to do, so listening to music gives it somewhere to go. For artists, the hearing is available, and music exists on a sub-level deeper than conversation which takes a lot of reasoning. Music never had much to do with reasoning. I’ve listened to all kinds of music, rock, classical, blues, bluegrass, hillbilly, jazz, folk, reggae, grunge, old wave, new wave, punk, world music, had my favorites, been band artist, rock concert hall studio artist and a rock production company’s art director, and followed a friend’s band on tour. I should be sick of music but I’m not, It’s just as fresh as ever. In fact, I still listen to the first surf music I ever heard, Sabicas Solo Flamenco. It was played it at the earliest surf movies I was able to see, either at peoples houses or theaters, and it became like an anthem of surfing to me. I remember playing the record when I drew my woody cartoon for the Surfer magazine contest, and it still evokes that time for me and it reminds me of who I am.

HAND WAVE, Surf Crazed Comics, 1992

How difficult is the freelance illustrator career nowadays and how do you manage your time to avoid overworking?

Overworking? Me? Through most my life I didn’t feel alive unless I was at my drawing board. Drawing consumed me. I didn’t want to stop even to eat or sleep. I had to impose a strict 2:am bedtime rule on myself, because otherwise the next day would be shot. Then I would go surfing in the pre-dawn darkness so I could get right back to work, which seemed to rejuvenate me rather than burning that end of the candle. The irony is that I was a workaholic but I wasn’t making any money. Not at first. But if you are that inspired about art and life the money will track you down and follow you. Just don’t worry about it. I didn’t. If you want to look at it as difficult, ok it just is. If you dwell on that unfortunate truth it will compound the difficulty and I would venture to say that you will go through a lot of pain and either become an art director or drop out. Remember what Woody said.

The irony is that I was a workaholic but I wasn’t making any money. Not at first. But if you are that inspired about art and life the money will track you down and follow you.

You have three great books, the first one covering rock, skate and surf art, and the second and third about rock art and skate art respectively, how do you decide to make a book and how hard was the task to select the artworks among the editorial process?

Thanks for mentioning my books Renzo, the publisher is Schiffer Books and they’re available everywhere. It was a mountain of work, especially the first one.  I had a lifetime of work to organize and cram into a limited space then judge how much space to allocate for each image, balance with my life story and captions, and then how to decide what to leave in or out in the text? I sought out many friends to contribute quotes and old artworks of mine. I wanted to do it right so Dolly and I did all the page layouts ourselves, and printed two book proofs. I started out to self publish but eventually the complications of marketing, distribution and financing overwhelmed me and I gave up. I went in on one of my many visits to Rich Novak, owner of NHS-Santa Cruz Skateboards, where he sits in the coffee room and holds court. I gave him one of the proof copies since he was kind enough to write my forward and is generally one of my best friends. When he asked why I wasn’t printing it he sent the proof to Schiffer Books. Rich and I had recently helped supply Ryhn Noll with images for three skateboard history books they published, so we were familiar with Schiffer. Authors usually have to submit manuscripts to dozens of publishers so it was a surprise to land a good one on the first try and I was very thankful to Rich for taking the initiative. So you asked “how hard” I would say, hard enough to give up and I’m usually no quitter. Emerson said, “our greatest glory is not in never failing but rising up every time we fail.”

Last year a notice of a fashion designer ripping-off your art (and your son Jimbo art too) goes around the globe, as an artist I see from time to time this kind of things, but besides legal actions, what kind of protection does an artist must do to prevent their work being ripped-off?

I am very fortunate to work for NHS-Santa Cruz. They have a complete legal department who spend their time tracking down the constant illegal use of our logos and skateboard art. A freelance artist is usually quite helpless to prevent copyright piracy and they don’t usually tack legal fees onto each job invoice, but it can be an expensive necessity. I have prevailed in a Superior Court case based on the California Artist’s law of 1979, but it was local and the law has little power to enforce out-of-state or worldwide copyright rip-offs or bootlegs. Today when the rip-offs like the fashion designer with fake Phillips art on the runway models’ ensembles, Jimbo and I just enjoy the world-wide press squabble over our art. It must be some sign of success to have your skateboard graphics make a splash on the fashion world runway?

A freelance artist is usually quite helpless to prevent copyright piracy and they don’t usually tack legal fees onto each job invoice, but it can be an expensive necessity.

Finally, what advice you’ll give to the beginner artist?

I get a lot of email from young artists asking about my techniques or how to get in the business. A career in art isn’t easy and I don’t sugar-coat it. I often mention the words “starving artist,” the specter of which can suddenly shroud the happy artists life. Some people don’t have money worries and aspire to be artists but they will balk at the prospect of seriously hard and lonely work while they pay for it themselves instead of frolicking with friends at the seashore. In other words, and you’ve heard it before, you must to suffer for your art. But if you haven’t stopped reading yet, let me now say that I would not have wanted to live otherwise. I believe art, like music, is one of the highest and noblest of endeavors of human expression through which it is possible to encompass the most deeply satisfying and rewarding life if one is willing to devote themselves fully to it. My main advice is to stay in school and do all of your homework. Skate surf or whatever you like to do. Then draw. Carry a sketch pad and wherever you have to sit or wait and draw whatever is around you. Give your subjects the drawing, you will make friends, I did. Practice is experience, remember? And experience is everything.

Your work is good.

-Jim

You can see more of his work on his website: www.jimphillips.com

© All images are from Jim Phillips/Phillips Studio and are under copyright.