First ever Worldwide Online Tiki Art Show and PARTY!

Monday, December 15th
9pm to Midnight
U.S.A. Pacific Time
Pop on over and join the festivities, spock some killer art and purchase some one of a kind art! Read more here

New Art for The Forbidden Island Parking Lot Sale

Well... been doing my best to get my eggs in one basket for The Forbidden Island Parking Lot Sale coming up next Sat 9/13/08. Here are a few of the latest artistic items I will have for you to look at and purchase.


"Tribal Hammerhead" was made with colored markers, and a white gel pen for the highlights with an india ink background on watercolor paper. It measure in at 8" x 6"


"Puffie's Tune" started as a study for a painting, that I am going to try and have done before next weekend, that came out a pretty neat. It was done with Tombo brush pens in my sketch pad. I now wish I had done it on thicker paper. This buddy comes in at 8.25" x 12" I will try to post the rest of my finished projects as they become such...finished that is. Looking forward to minglin' with some of you in a few short days!

Tiki Crawl San Francisco

Well, I charged out to the city of San Francisco on Saturday to hook up with the crawlers at the Bamboo Hut. I thought I was on a lucky streak and popped into a prime parking spot, but was informed by the local bums that my parkin' place, which was unmarked with no tow away warnings clearly visible, was a in fact in a tow zone and that I would not have a truck waitin' for me when I returned . So after 45 minutes of looking for another parkin' place and ranting to myself how much I hate driving in the city I finally found a legit place to park. Sadly, by this time I had missed everyone at the Bamboo Hut and didn't realize it until about and hour later. I finished my drink and decided to try to meet up with everyone at Trader Vic's S.F. As I was leaving I walked past a lady talkin' on her phone who was saying she was gonna catch a cab over to Trader Vic's. I was quick to say to her "You Navigate and i'll drive." The deal was sealed and Kat and I quickly found T.V and a parkin' spot right in front. NICE! So we joined the party inside and had ourselves a blast. The folks at T.V. were super friendly and helped to make it a heck of a good time. Several Mai Tais and smiles later, I was back in the truck and chooglin' back to Santa Cruz. Thinkin' to myself that it was worth the drive and parkin' difficulty to see all my friends again. Once again, I took pics and here they be:

Tiki Crawl VII (South Bay)

The kick off of Tiki Crawl 7 was good fun! Although I missed the action live at Smoke Tiki I was able to watch some of the shenanigans via the live stream
that Hanford had hooked up through the dudes at Justin.tv. I had to remind myself that I was suppose to be enjoying it live so I packed up all my cameras and camcorders and headed toward San Jose to meet up with my ol buddy Bamzeno who runs Tikifreaks.com. We charged over to the San Jose Airport to visit the internationally known Martini Monkey. The bar was packed with friendly familiar faces who all looked to be havin' a good ol time. We were there for about the time it took me to finish my drink before we burned gears over to Trader Vic's Palo Alto. It was a bit more relaxed and quieter than over at the Martini Monkey, but it was much easier to talk with folks and move around. It seemed to me there was some drop off of people along the way but there was still a nice group of people hangin' about. I pulled out my camcorder and cameras while attempting to get some shots but I was plagued with tech gremlins the entire evening with all 3 cameras I had brought along. I am not sure what happened but very little of my video footage survived and what did was Crap! I did manage to get some pics taken by shuffling around batteries and memory cards between devices. So here is a slide show with what I did manage to not screw up.

Takin' it easy, crusin' the coast and hangin' out

After an evening of fun at Bali Hai, the next day was very low key. Big Tiki Dude managed to talk a few of us into getting breakfast at the Broken Yolk in Pacific Beach. Although loud, the food was good and we were seated instantly upon arriving despite the full house. Grog, Swampfire, Atomic Kitty, Kirby, Big Tiki Dude and I enjoyed a nice breakfast and interesting conversation. It was very interesting and cool listening to each other as we talked about art, our careers and the the highs and lows of trying to make a living in a creative field. I passed around a paper napkin and had everyone scribble a doodle on it.


After Breakfast we said so long to Big Tiki Dude and Swamp Fire and headed back to Humphrey's. The rest of us stopped by Trader Mort's Liquor store to take a look inside and get a few shots of the tikis that decorate the place. Grog, Suzy and Kirby dropped me off and hit the road. I tracked down Tiki Chris
and Tiki Racer by the poolside. We chatted a bit, I took a few more pics and then split back to Encinitas to drop off the van I had borrowed and too hang out with Sean, Erica and Kai one last time before headin' north. The next morning Chris and Steve picked me up and we started our trek north. We stopped at Tiki Farm too meet up with the always gracious Makedamug who gave us a nice tour of the warehouse and magoomba along with a short history of the Farm and a preview of upcoming projects. We picked up several mugs said our good byes and then charged down to Little Lost Tiki's art studio for an art jam/ Tiki Frat party. LLT hooked Tiki Racer and I up with art supplies and technique tips. We all got creative while Chris snapped some pics. A bit later Squid had stopped by and so did Big Tiki Dude and Jon Paul with some rum and snacks. It wasn't long before we were all laughin' and havin' a good ol time drinkin', creatin' art and makin' up names for Jon Paul to use as a handle on Tiki Central, most of which should not be repeated.

A few hours of mindless fun later we hit the road again. Tiki Racer kept a lid on his drinkin' and safely drove us another couple hours North to Ventura where we crashed my Mom's house. The following morning we fueled up at a local breakfast nook then pounded miles to Santa Cruz and made very good time. After we arrived at my Mom's other house up North we relaxed a bit with her and my Sis, then went out for some ono grinds at The Aloha Island Grille. As luck would have it a few of my friends from The Ukulele Club of Santa Cruz were having a small ukulele jambalamba. We ate our tasty hawaiian dinners, chatted a bit and listened to the uke players croon before poppin' over to Hula's in downtown Santa Cruz for a few Mai Tais, Zombies and more tiki vibes. A few drinks later we ended the evening.

We all woke up the next morning pretty early and said our goodbyes. Tiki Racer, who is now a good friend and all around groovy mate, is headin' back to jolly old England on Thursday and passed along to me some of his nifty Tiki London prints, a Mahiki menu that he designed and one of his crazy cool Zombie Mugs. Chris is stayin' in the states for a few more days so I will be hookin' back up with him during the 7th annual San Francisco Tiki Crawl. Which will be streamed live during the crawl for those of you who can't make it to the Bay area this weekend. Boy oh boy is this gonna be great!

Here are some of my pics and I am sure Tiki Chris will have some of his pics posted when he has some free time.

Tiki Magazine's Art Show at Bali Hai

After six days of non stop music, art, laughter and time spent with good friends and ohana I have finally gotten a chance to catch up with my blog. I left Kauai Thursday afternoon and flew over to Honolulu. Between island flights I had changed seats and left my ipod case along with my camera cables in the seat pocket in front of me. I remembered I had done so as we were taking off for Maui, but by the time I was able to get up out of my seat and go back to where I was sitting it was too late. Fortunately, a flight attendant had found it before anybody could nerp it. Unfortunately, he had given the case to the agent in Honolulu so I was without my tunes and worse yet my cables to get the pictures from my camera onto my laptop. I was hopin' this was not going to be the way my luck was going to go for the rest of my trip.

After what felt like a pretty quick flight, I landed in San Diego around 11:00 pm. My Friend Sean came out to pick me up and stay at his pad in Encinitas. The next day we got up early and caught some really fun (but kinda chilly) 3-4' surf out in front of his house at Cardiff reef.

Sean and his wife Erica lent me their van and hooked me up with a mattress inside so I wouldn't have to worry about driving buzzed back from the Tiki Magazine's Bali Hai Art Show which I was participating in later that night. I left early to get to the Bali Hai and give myself plenty of time to set up and chat before the show. However, I ended sitting in traffic for hours because some idiot was leaving pipe bombs along the highway thus shutting down huge sections of the freeways that lead into San Diego. Those damn Tiki Terrorist had struck again!


Eventually I made it to Shelter Island and was still early enough to get in some quality time with a few of the other artists and early birds as well as secure a nice spot to display my art thanks to Mean Gene at Falling Cocos. The quality of art was mind blowin' and my eyes were droolin'. Seeing so much fantastic art work in one place was making me dizzier than the Mai-Tai's I was slurpin' down. The Tiki Magazine and Bali Hai Staff did a fanatastic job of putting together a history making event that brought together an amazing amount of talent all under one roof. Adding to the ambiance was the smooth sounds of the Smokin' Menehunes and the swaying moves of gorgeous Hula dancers.


After the show a large gaggle of revelers found themselves partyin' with Ali'i in his room at Humphrey's By The Bay which is a hotel with a tropical theme and plenty of tikis near the Bali Hai. As usual, large crowds are hard to keep hushed so security was quickly there to say good night to us all. So we made our way to the club at Humphrey where we all got loose and shook our bones to a funky bunch of dudes singin' music I never thought I would ever ever listen to unless forced by gun point.

So after a few more drinks and the passing of time our troops began to thin. We all made our way to places to lie our heads and let the visions of tropical fantasy escort us into our dreams. Here is a slide show from the fun filled evening of art, music and friends:

My last So Cal roadtrip before I split for Kauai

Hot diggity dogz. Boy what a weekend!!!
The miles pounded can only be matched in number by the smiles and good times experienced over the past few days. I bolted out of Santa Cruz early Friday morning around 8:00 am. I got in a bit of a surf and a short nap in Ventura then buzzed down to my good buddy Kinny's art studio for a visit and art jam. I finally got the pleasure to meet Dave a.k.a Clysdalle and watch him and Ken lay down the fine lines of their crafts and answer my barrage of questions on their various projects and techniques. It just numbs my mind to see how effortless and tightly these guy can bring there mind candy to fruition. I had the idea of video taping or possilbly streaming the art jam via ustream.tv. Unfortunately, it looked like I had spaced the bag with my laptop and gear at my Mom's house in Ventura so I was only able to snap a few pics. Ken moves so fast when he is creating that he cannot be photographed unless using a special stop motion hi tech camera, but here are a couple pics of Dave finishing up work on a piece created on Santa Barabara driftwood that he was working on when I arrived.

Clysdale applyin' the enamel

Color me done.

Saturday afternoon, I met up with my ol friend Karl who happens to live right around the corner from Ken's studio. Karl took me for a ride in his new BMW and helped me gather a few last minute art supplies. We then went out for an awesome lunch of Lebanese food at a place on Tustin St in the city of Orange called Zena's. They served up really tasty food with excellent service at a good prices on a nice outside patio that had a cool little waterfall. After lunch Karl took me over to meet his family, show me his place and some of his photography. Saying so long to Karl and his family I then pointed my wheels towards the Inland Empire and the city of Rancho Cucamonga for the Tiki Treasures and Polynesian Pin Up Show.

Lil Wahine and Tiki Ray delivered a slam dunk of an event down yonder in the Inland Empire near the base of the San Gabriel Mountains. There was beautiful ladies, dazzlin' jaw droppin' art and plenty of friends both old and new to say hello to and lots of folks getting their tiki on. The Smokin' Menehunes long with very special guests, Bill Tapia and Palika on ukulele, founding member Spike on guitar and the man they call Squid on the skins. The fellas brought with them the musical ambiance to set the island mood proper. The time went by way to quick and once again didn't get to talk nearly enough with everybody who came out. Again, I had the notion to try and tape the event but was without my gear and therefore out of luck. I wasn't even sure if I would be able to get on a wireless network so the streaming experiment never even got off the ground. I headed north around 1:30 am listenin' to the CD Lucas Vigor had given me and drinking coffee. I pulled into Ventura around 3:30 am ready for bedtime and a nice round of sleep.

The first thing I did was check to see if my laptop and equipment were inside my Mom's house. They were not. I freaked thinking at one point my computer, ipod and everything else in my bag was taken from the truck when I wasn't looking. I was completely tired, but so completely bummed thinkin' about my missin' other brain, that I had a sleepless night wondering where my laptop was and who had all my music, information, addresses, phone numbers, podcasts, pref settings, work templates, notes and everything else that sits on my hard drive. I have a back up of most of the data, but there is plenty on it that is irreplacable and if lost it would be gone forever. The next morning I called my Mom, who was home in Santa Cruz, to tell her the sad news of my "stolen" stuff. Well it turns out, the people who live next door to her in Ventura called and let her know that my bag had been sitting in the driveway. I must of been so busy when loadin' up that I drove off with out it. Fortunately, my Mom is the type of nice lady who takes the time and gets too know her neighbors so they all watch out for one another. Turnsout, the folks next door had spotted my lonely and accidentally abandoned bag and took it inside their home for safe keeping. Well, after hearing this news, I peeled myself from the ceiling, I wiped the tears of happiness from eyes and went next door and got my gear. WHEW! What a dum dum I be, I am so happy I didn't lose my belongins' and that the neighbors were lookin out for me. It would of been a terrible blow to suffer and very difficult to recover from especially with my move only a few weeks away. So with this happy endin' I will leave you with a slide show of some to the pics I had shot during my trip.

Slide show from Forbidden Island's 1 year anniversary party

Tiki Farm Parking Lot Sale 2007

Here are some of my pictures from my So Cal vending expidition to San Clemente for the Tiki Farm's Parking lot Sale. I had a great time and I am very stoked to be a part of this event that kicked off the start of another Tiki Season. A heaping helping of Thanky to Holden, the Tiki Farm crew, and all the folks who pitched in to help make this a very cool event. More thanks to everybody who stopped by my booth to wish me luck on my move and purchased some my art. You all RULE!

Tiki Treasures and Polynesian Pinups

I will be there with some artistic creations for your lookin' and buying pleasure. Come over, take a peek and say Hello.

The Tonga Hut Winter Wonderland Art Show

After I saw the pics from the The Tiki Mag release party at the Tonga Hut and reading one of the funniest threads ever on Tiki Central , I knew I just had to burn gears and make a road trip. All the stars lined up so I found myself down in North Hollywood, CA for the Winter Wonderland art show and mug release party at the Tonga Hut. What a gas it was to see all the kick ass tiki art and good friends who live down in the southlands. Big kine mahalos to Atomickitty, Grog, The Tonga Hut crew, all the artists and fine folks who made it out despite the cold, wet wintery weather to make a very entertaining night. Here are some of the pics I took of the evenings festivities.