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Skelewags, an Everyday Work of Art - Literally
By Monica Valentinelli | February 23, 2008
You may recall that we recently posted a call for suggestions to review horror webcomics. Well, I’m happy to report we’re digging deep into all things gory and illustrated to provide you with a list of the best places to visit on the web. One work of horror comedy art turned up in a place so unusual we just had to let you know about it — your sewer.
Dubbed “Chewie,” this urban artist brings a Tim Burton feel to your local neighborhood by incorporating his “Skelewag” characters into the environment. Taking inspiration from pebbles, grass, water stains, and anything else he can find, Chewie lends us his imagination in those dark and dank places. The image here at left is of a piece that adds a touch of gritty humor by utilizing the background to add artistic elements like a horizon and light coming from a streetlamp. While the style may be something becoming almost cliche, after a fashion, taking pieces like plants and other environmental factors to tell a story is not only inventive, it’s a great way of turning the world around us into something interesting. Some pieces, like these featured on Ektopia with firefighting and miner Skelewags utilize color and cracks in the wall to tell a story.
One thing that makes these pieces really strong, is the contrast between organic details in an urban environment that are absolutely unique and often have fine features, with black-and-white characters that enhance the scene. You’ll notice that he adds only a slight bit of shading to add perspective to the characters and a sense of where the lighting is coming from.
To follow Chewie’s project, you can check out more of his pieces at this ConceptArt.org forum post by Chewie about his work or designer Baekdal’s review of Skelewags. Unfortunately, the Skelewags website has been down every time we’ve checked it; we’re hoping Chewie will get the chance to update it.
So whether you’re calling Skelewags urban art or sewer graffiti, in our opinion it’s a skeletal thumbs “way up.”
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