"Black Sunshine" (Black Skull)

“Like a slug from a forty-five True death, 400 horsepower Of maximum performance Piercing the night This is black sunshine.”  Damn, that’s cool. I’ve been looking for a way to incorporate my favorite White Zombie song “Black Sunshine” with this epic intro by Iggy Pop into a piece for a long time (it also happens to be the fitting nickname I gave my black convertible).  

The actual seed for this concept came from a few different places. The first was Ray’s realization that the blue reflection in another piece of mine, titled Silver Machine, was the sun shining through our backyard window onto the skull. I leaned on that as a starting point. The second piece of inspiration came from the Basquiat print titled Black Skull I have hanging in my dining room. When I realized this was a fitting concept for my long-awaited White Zombie nod, it all came together.

This piece is another shining example (pardon the pun) of numerous ideas and inspirations all converging into a singular image, and hopefully, vibe.  Since I started with Iggy’s epic intro, I might as well leave you with his equally epic outro:  “Finally, nothing moves high noon Black top rolling below the asphalt drive A concrete fascination scraping the edge of nothing This is black sunshine.”

About Stickman

Trevor "Stickman" Stickel specializes in musically based portraits that capture legendary moments, powerful ideas and raw emotion. His work is described as gritty-yet-fresh, complex-yet-simple. Graduating from a Jekyll and Hyde influence early in his career in which he divided his time between family portraits and design work on helmets and Harleys - Trevor had the epiphany to combine both styles while reading "According to the Rolling Stones". Two weeks later he finished his first canvas portrait of Mick Jagger that would thrust him into a different realm of the art world an aptly titled it "Please allow me to introduce myself".

The Mission

The idea or "mission" behind my artwork was to create an artistic tribute to something (music) and to the people (musicians) that have had a tremendous impact on me and basically shaped my world. Historically these tributes have been limited to photos/posters that have adorned the bedroom walls of teenagers and dorm rooms throughout adolescence. I wanted to create a style of art that brings these iconic figures back into our life, and do so in manner that we as adults can display proudly in our homes. When planning a piece I often imagine how the finished piece would look in a contemporary living room, dining room, lounge, etc.

The Concept

In order to achieve the mission stated above as well as explore my creative and artistic side, the idea of amalgamating different artistic disciplines on the same canvas was born. The concept is to take my portrait realism and juxtapose it with a background that expresses my feeling and emotions of the subject I'm painting. This method also allows me to explore other disciplines of art - many of my backgrounds will include Abstract, Expressionism, Impressionism, Realism, Pop Art, Street Art, Surrealism and quite often a combination of these. This is where I get to enjoy the artistic side of these pieces as well as paying additional homage to some of my favorite visual artists. My work is a true collaboration of music and art where I take a very influential subject matter and combine it with inspiration from artists such as Warhol, Bansky, Basquiat and Pollock to name just a few.