Our Local Santa Cruz Featured Artist for Sunday, July 12th is freelance/Cabrillo College artist, Nicholas LaPlaca. For LaPlaca, art is both a form of communication and a miracle of mystic nature. He says, “Illustration is the only occupation that has stuck with me throughout my life and honestly, I couldn’t imagine doing anything else. To me, art is just a more pictorial way of talking, and most of my work just demonstrates that I know at least some vocabulary.
“I understand how, as a medium, illustration provides endless opportunities for bridging the mental barriers between persons where many others may fall short. The idea that mental images can be captured and transmitted between brains is a concept so unearthly and magical that I’m inspired to strive to utilize this graphic medium to its fullest possible potential.” LaPlaca’s visual communication has certainly not been disregarded, and does seem to be living up to its full potential.
Rakakoons by Nicholas LaPlaca
His charming old-timey cartoon style is both clean and fun, and everything seems to be intentional. “These three were inspired primarily from memories of Jim Woodring‘s Frank comic in that they project a sort of modern cartooniness. These drawings are from an ongoing set I refer to informally as ‘Character Splotches’. These are simple, character-centric illustrations meant to encapsulate a very focused theme or idea,” explained LaPaca. “In this case, the theme for each drawing can be narrowed to a single word–for Rakakoons, the idea was to illustrate ‘whimsy’, the figures possessing cloyingly cartoonish anatomy and posture.”
Sealegs by Nicholas LaPlaca
“This format of planning and composing a drawing works well for me because it allows me to control myself and hopefully end up with a work that deviates from my original intention as little as possible (sans, of course, the healthy and numerous alterations that pop up along the way).
This artist’s work is not only deliberate, but totally entertaining and even lighthearted in some cases. “As for Sealegs, I will struggle to defend as not based entirely on the pun alone–the idea here was ‘maritime,’ and evidently a pantsless sperm whale sporting naval tattoos and talking oceanic nonsense out of it’s blowhole.”
Treemunzers by Nicholas LaPlaca
In other cases, LaPlaca’s mixed media illustrations can dig a little deeper. The artist elaborates: “Treemunzers–or ‘tree monsters,’ when said in a semiconscious state–stands to represent [the concept of] ‘Night’. Night is a very ambivalent concept to me. It is calming and lets us sleep (center figure), but it is also a very weird and uncertain time (left); and even today, [Night] remains a very real source of danger (right).”
Though LaPlaca’s work is an ultra-satisfying revival of style and visual communication, it’s definitely not disconnected with modern time nor place; the artist explains their deep connection to Santa Cruz: “I am tightly bound to the whole of Santa Cruz County, where I have lived for the entirety of my life. Much of the inspiration for my art stems from a typical walk down Pacific Avenue, wherein one may experience a myriad of emotions and flavors sufficient to spur all manner of creative intent. I am also an amateur animator, my biggest work being a soon-to-be-released animated music video for the incredible
Doug Wood.” I think I can speak for all of us at Local Santa Cruz when I say that I’m excited to see Nicholas LaPlaca’s animation and other future work!
For more information and art, please see LaPlaca’s
website.
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