The Letter Box Bandit

The Letter Box Bandit

You may have already seen something very similar to this image and that’s because we used it as the basis for a large scale wall piece we did on Sclater Street in the East End a few weeks ago. This piece was actually painted first and the wall was based on it rather than the other way round.

The Letter Box Bandit comes from a newspaper article I read, about someone who was going around stealing post out of peoples letter boxes. You have to wonder why you would bother doing such a thing because most of the letters I receive are bills or adverts. It just seems a complete waste of time. Supposedly this thief was quite determined though and carried his campaign of thievery on for years. Maybe he had a list of all the local birthdays…

Although there wasn’t a picture accompanying the article I was wondering what kind of person would be a letter box bandit and I came to the conclusion he would look like some sort of odd school teacher who has nothing better to do with his time after he’s been let out of school at 3 in the afternoon. He’s got a few hours before his wife or friends finish their work and he doesn’t want to spend it in the pub as he’ll just be drunk before anyone gets home, so he decides to embark on a criminal crime wave and become the letter box bandit…

Cheers

id-iom

Title: The Letter Box Bandit
Materials: Acrylic, spray paint, paint pen and charcoal
Size: A2
Please email if interested

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• The Letter Box Bandit (thisisidiom.wordpress.com)

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Repressed Beauty

Repressed Beauty

They say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder and I certainly believe that’s true. Here we have something of a repressed beauty as she is currently hiding her light under a bushel and hoping that Prince Charming will come along and appreciate her for her fine analytical mind rather than her good looks. Anyway I can only wish her the very best of luck in her quest…

Cheers

id-iom

Title: Repressed Beauty
Materials: Acrylic, spray paint, paint pen and charcoal
Size: A2
Please email if interested

They’re just like candy!

They’re just like Candy

When I was growing up I had a t-shirt that featured anime hero ‘Akira’ with a pill on his tongue and the legend ‘They’re just like candy”. For some reason this has percolated in my mind over the years (update: I’ve now found the image and it’s at the bottom of the post) and it’s recently found a way to get out again.

We’ve done a similar piece to this one before and whilst it was in the studio waiting to be sent to its new owner, somebody else popped by and after seeing it commissioned us to paint something similar for him. We were a little reluctant to start with but after the client stated they didn’t want the QR codes of DJ mixes but instead wanted us to come up with some new text we thought we’d proceed with it.

So, there you have it. Pac Man munching through his power pills and enjoying them like a bad little Akira.

Cheers

id-iom

Akira: They’re just like candy

Dead Dog Squad

Dead Dog Squad

Have you ever heard of ‘The Dead Dog Squad’? I would imagine that you’ve never heard of them but let me assure you they do actually exist, they are very much real and are also very very good at their job. If you don’t know what they do then I’m certainly not at liberty to tell you. But you can rest assured their job is vital to your continued existence although you’ll never know it. The man in the picture is a retired member of the team and that’s the only way i could get to paint him. I probably shouldn’t be telling you about it but i’m sure i’ll be fine. Maybe.

Cheers

id-iom

Title: The Dead Dog Squad

Materials: Acrylic, spray paint, paint pen and charcoal

Size: A2

Please email if interested

The Band in Hand

The Band in Hand

The Band in Hand

As regular visitors to our local pub we were asked if we would do a painting for a charity night that they were holding for a bunch of childrens charities. As it was for those pesky kids we thought we’d better get involved. The pub is called ‘The Hand in Hand’ and the day in question was to be called ‘The Band in Hand’ – you can see what they’ve done there can’t you? – as there was to be a day of live music and general frivolity (including none other than the dog from the Go Compare ads. You can imagine the excitement was palpable.)

Anyway, as is usual for us, we left it to the last minute so whipped up a couple of designs and then decided on the tried and tested pretty girl routine. It was due to be auctioned on the night so we thought we’d make it as saleable as possible. As we were doing this on a huge bit of board we thought that most punters would probably be a bit put off by it’s size and so also did an A2 paper version (which we failed to get a photo of. D’oh!) Thankfully they both sold so at least we made a decent contribution to the day.

Cheers

id-iom

My brain is not dead enough for this (but my soul certainly is)…

My brain is not dead enough for this (but my soul certainly is)…

It’s been that time of year when as many artists as you’d possibly want in one place gather to show their skills. For UPFest the weather usually seems to be our ‘summer’ standard of grey skies and light rain. I’m not sure quite what we’d done to get good weather this year however we were fully prepared to take advantage of it. So, early on Saturday morning it was time to pack the car and head off on our annual pilgrimage to Bristol.

After arriving fashionably late (not entirely our fault!) we made our way to Bar BS3, which is a new venue for Upfest, where we had a 20 x 8ft wall to paint in the pub’s beer garden (which will hopefully become a semi-permanent feature). After a bold start with the tiniest rollers in the world we finally managed to make some headway then it was time to wrestle with some extra large stencils.

The picture was originally meant to have some words (which we’ve used as the title) but due to unforeseen circumstances we failed to get them completed before embarking on our road trip. As it goes I’m not sure if it needs the words anyway so I’m quite happy with the finished product. After we’d finished it was all merrily downhill with many drinks being quaffed. All good. Bring on next year…

Cheers

id-iom

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Head Jam – 8th June

Fellow artist and friend My Dog Sighs has invited us to paint down at Head Jam on Saturday 8th of June down in Southsea. If you’re in the area you should definitely pop by and say hello.

From MyDog Sighs:

I’ve been beavering away buttering up my very favourite artists and am very excited to announce ‘head jam’.
An intimate chilled paint jam in Southsea featuring some drop
Dead fantastic artists including Snik, id-iom, Wah graff, Korp, process smith and some bloke who paints tin cans. 

Check out the details via this link.

Cheers

id-iom

Nocturnal manoeuvers in Brixton

Nocturnal manoeuvers in Brixton

The night bus. For some people merely the mention of getting the night bus is enough for them to break out in a cold sweat. For these girls however it holds the key to the city. They’ve been bumping and grinding at various locations in and around Brixton and the night bus is like a private chauffeur service that is always ready to whisk them away to the next party. It looks like butter couldn’t melt in their mouths but, be warned, they’ve been pulling these nocturnal manoeuvers in Brixton for long enough that you should be more worried about yourself. It can be dodgy out after dark…

She’s about 49 x 47cm in size and has been completed on a 1980’s night bus map for the Brixton area. She has been completed using the magic of screen printing, paint pens, spraypaint and stencils. Signed on reverse and complete with our id-iom stamp of approval.

Cheers

id-iom

Title: Nocturnal manoeuvers in Brixton

Materials: Screen print, paint pen, spraypaint and stencils

Size: A2

Please email if interested

Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm

Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm

The quote ‘Anyone can take the helm when the sea is calm’ is attributed to Pubilius Syrus who was a freed Syrian slave writing maxims in Latin in Roman times and apparently making a good living from it.

Although the saying is nautical in nature it is widely applicable to life in general and means that when the sea is calm and times are good anyone can be in charge but when adversity comes calling and storm clouds gather you need a good captain with strong leadership skills to weather the storm. The sea can be a seductive yet treacherous mistress so I hope there’s a salty old sea dog at the helm…

She’s about 46 x 40cm in size and has been completed using screen printing, stencils and paint pen on a vintage cloth cycling map of the Lake District. I just love working on these old maps…

Cheers

id-iom

Title: Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm

Materials: Screen print with acrylic, spray paint and paint

Size: 46 x 40 cm

Please email if interested

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Me Not Pretty

Me Not Pretty

Can somebody help me get this monkey off my back? Actually it’s not a monkey but some kind of over-sized monocle wearing raccoon. You don’t see that every day. Now comes the science: looking at her T-shirt does that mean she is pretty or not? I’m not entirely sure what it means or what she thinks it means but I think she is a ray of sunshine in an otherwise dark and dank world. And so does the raccoon hitching a lift on her back it would seem.

That’s all i’ve got for today. I never promised it would make any sense…

Cheers

id-iom

Title: Me Not Pretty

Materials: Acrylic, spray paint, charcoal and paint pen

Size: A2

Please email if interested