Our friend and photographer, Ye Rin Mok just sent us her latest photo zine, 28 Pictures. We are huge fans of Ye Rin here at Poketo, so much so she was the art director and photographer for our capsule collection for Target. Ye Rin has a visual aesthetic that is both quiet and strong, seductive and placid, the minimal, soft pink cover hints to the images inside 28 Pictures and the thread that stitches them together.

You can buy the zine here.

What is Jeremyville?

It’s a project based concept. A place where I can create things like books, art shows, drawings, apparel, toys, animations, street art. Anything. Basically it’s just a place for me to play, invent and grow, and for others to come and visit and hopefully enjoy the projects and the output.

You obviously have a fierce work ethic. What’s your average work day like? 

I try and work smarter rather than harder, I have a great team I work with, and that is the core of it all, working with great people who can multitask. When at my Bondi Beach studio, my day starts early, with a run along the beach, a swim in Summer, breakfast at Icebergs Pool, answer emails while there, sketch, plan, think. Then the day unfolds with various tasks in my intray. It really helps to have a daily intray for me, and a weekly one, so projects are broken down into smaller daily tasks. The evening is a swim or run along the Bondi to Bronte Beach cliff walk. Dinner, then ‘My 2nd Day’ starts again, that’s my expression for when other territories open up, like London and the EU at 6pm, the US around 9pm-11pm, so I speak in real time with clients there, have about 6-8 hours of extra work, like having a 2nd work day. It’s lovely. You have to factor that time difference in if you are in Sydney!  The evening always ends with some drawing in my sketchbook, to clear my head, just open up my mind. Put anything down. Random. let the pen just flow across the page. Stop thinking, just draw. Thats when I think the real art from the real you comes out. It follows a more direct path from your mind to the page.

When in New York, it’s similar, but there’s no ocean! so I run along the Hudson River, my studio loft is in Varick Street SoHo, so it’s not far from the Hudson. I always need to have a studio close to exercise areas like running paths, as that’s my way to clear my mind, and keep energy levels up. Health in creativity is underestimated! I know personally I create and achieve a lot more when I’m fitter.

Your comics are like trippy little vignettes. What is your process with comics/stories? 

Thank you, I’m glad you see them that way. I start with a general notion, then start drawing. I never add words, words to me detract and look more like a ‘traditional comic’, I approach these more like silent, still frames from an art house movie, like an Eraserhead, or Koyaanisqatsi, or Aguirre the Wrath of God, or Paris Texas by Wim Wenders. Films where the emptiness speaks as loudly as the dialog. I try and leave a lot of open space in the frames, both in structure and narrative, and I leave this space for the viewer to pause, add their own atmosphere and nuance. I also try and add a cyclical nature to the silent frames, so the ending could be the beginning. Or you could start the story anywhere along it, and it would still hopefully resonate when you completed the full cycle.  

Who are all of the characters, what are they about? 

I audition my characters like actors for these silent comic stories, they don’t have any dialog, so their presence needs to speak volumes. Not every character makes it through the audition. Most I meet randomly on the streets of Jeremyville, I approach them and ask if they would like to be in a silent comic. I prefer unknown actors to stars. I like the everyman who can portray a certain vulnerability through their presence. Sometimes I will create a whole comic story around a character I’ve met. The Mouse was a classic example, I just had to film his story. much of it is based on what he told me about his life.

What are the different approaches you take to commercial work as opposed to gallery work? 

I don’t see much of a difference, it’s all me. I put as much love and thought into every project i do, be it commercial or for a gallery. I could never do something ‘less well’ , or compromised, just because it has commercial parameters to it. It’s all a part of my output that I am proud of. I never release anything I’m not happy with.

Tell us about your wallet and tee shirt design for Poketo x Club Mumble. Why is it named “The So Far Away”?

I actually have just written 8 story books, this time with words, and ‘The So Far Away’ is an upcoming story, I thought it would be a nice idea to have the product first, then the story later! It’s backwards from how it usually works, but that’s fine.  The book will be released next year. It’s for all ages. 

You do everything from toys to apparel to skate decks to shoes…Does Jeremyville plan to take over the world? What’s on the horizon?

As long as I’m challenging myself, and learning and growing creatively as I go, then anything is valid to explore. I set no limits to my imagination in terms of medium, project, genre, or audience. I think true creativity is not about saying ‘I’m an author’ or ‘I’m a toy designer’, or any other label, it’s about just being. Just expressing yourself, and finding an audience for that output. That output can manifest itself in endless ways. 

Well that’s my view anyway, It of course needs to have a general consistency in vision, and I think everything I do is recognizable as mine. It’s about finding your voice, then learning many languages as you grow. Learning about say the fine art world, is like taking up another language, and trying to master it. It’s still your voice, but you speak in a different way. 

Part of the Poketo x Club Mumble project entails a re-release of Ground Beef, a skate zine from 1985, produced by my brother Tony Vadakan. Its contents explore art, friends, music, being young, community, and of course, skating. We sent you a copy… what kind of nostalgic anecdotes do you have about being young and skating? 

Awesome zine by the way, I loved the young Mark Gonzales interview. I grew up in Wonderland Avenue Tamarama, which is a beach side suburb in Sydney Australia, next beach down from Bondi Beach. So I grew up hanging out at the beach, riding down the hill from Bondi Road, eating potato scallops and milkshakes from Bates Milk Bar, swimming in Icebergs Pool. Bondi was such a quiet, sleepy seaside suburb when I grew up there, it sure has changed, but I like connecting with long time locals when I can, and keep the faith. There was a time when you could just ride your board down the middle of the street and cars just waited for you. Now cars rule the roads, riders should reclaim the streets. I think freedom and a carefree, revolutionary way of life needs to be renewed in our society. Everyone seems a lot more uptight, conservative. I think the world should just chill, and relax more. Stay Furry !

My new studio is on Lamrock Ave and Campbell Parade, right on Bondi Beach, and I can see and hear the skate park right near me. It’s awesome, the kids are so much cooler these days, I was never that cool as a kid! I was very introverted, kept to myself, didn’t really hang out with a crew. Nowadays I see lots more crews, back then for me it was like, just riding because I needed to, just wanted to. No other reason. There was no huge skate scene when I grew up, that all came later. Now the Bondi Beach skate park holds many international skate events, riding is huge now in Bondi. 

Check out Jeremyville’s Poketo wallet and tee shirt!

More from Jeremyville at Jeremyville.com.

Travis Millard is a native Kansan and did some time in Brooklyn, NY before settling in Los Angeles. His work, characterized by intricate detail and sarcastic humor, can be seen on shoes, skate decks, shirts, gallery walls, zines, and now in the Poketo x Club Mumble t-shirt and wallet series. Following are some insights into Travis’s methods.

Could you tell us a bit about your t-shirt graphic for Poketo x Club Mumble, what’s behind all of the ghosts in your work?

Those creeps popped up in a drawing a couple years ago and I’ve been kind of reinterpreting them since then. I like the ghosts because they don’t seem menacing, but it could go either way I guess.

How do you incorporate found objects or surfaces into your work? How much of your work is done in this fashion?

I like working on found paper from the sidewalk or interesting envelopes that come through the mail.. just something that seems like it’s gone through some life on the road before falling on my desk. There’s also nothing like a clean sheet of thick hot-press printmaking paper though.. that almost sounds dirty… paper lust.

Your work is wonderfully detailed and complex. How do you usually get started on a piece?

Sometimes an idea for a larger drawing will come from a small doodle in a sketchbook or scratch paper.. but generally getting started on a piece works best when i don’t even realize i’m setting out to officially start something. I have a couple drawers of starts-and-stops that are good to sift through and pick up whenever it looks good.

You produce a great number of totally rad zines. How did you start creating zines, and do you see yourself publishing a compilation of them as a book someday?

I found the zine shelf at my local record store in Lawrence, Kansas and had a friend who encouraged me to try one. I really just loved passing it to friends for them to absorb later.. that kind of sparked it for me. I don’t have any big plans to publish a compilation but that might be fun someday.

What are your top three secret places in LA? Why do you love them?

There’s a spot at at end of our dead-end street that is pretty desolate and beautiful in it’s own scummy way. You can hear the 5 freeway plowing along over the ridge but somehow you’re still alone in the woods. There’s always some interesting old trash to discover and lovely foliage. I think that’s the only secret place I know of.. everyone else seems to know where everything else is. Somehow I feel like I just blew the spot.

Part of the Poketo x Club Mumble project entails a re-release of Ground Beef, a skate zine from 1985, produced by [Ted's] brother Tony Vadakan. Its contents explore art, friends, music, being young, community, and of course, skating. We sent you a copy… what kind of nostalgic anecdotes do you have about being young and skating?

I really enjoyed reading Tony’s Ground Beef zine. It reminded me of my youth before the internet and how slow time seemed back then. My Kansas hometown skateboarding experience was mostly spent on curbs in parking lots or after-hours loading docks with one or two friends. It was better to skate with a friend because you were likely to get hassled by an older teenager in a truck and cowboy hat. It also gave you someone else for back-up to act like a maniac and pretend to be a rabid animal to spook the cowboy hats off and laugh about later.

Thanks so much to Travis Millard for collaborating with us on the Poketo x Club Mumble series. Be sure to scope his wallet and t-shirt.

Remember any purchase of a wallet and tee shirt from the Poketo x Club Mumble series, including Travis’ designs, will get you a FREE copy of the Ground Beef zine, while supplies last! You can check out Travis’ body of work at FudgeFactoryComics.com.

While supplies last, we are giving away this re-editioned, issue of Ground Beef, a skate zine my brother, Tony Vadakan, made back in 1985. This was a zine made back when Tony was just in high school. Now over 25 years old, a significant piece of Southern California culture and skate history.

What’s incredible is reading 25 year old interviews with skater/artist/director Mark Gonzales, comic strips by prolific artist/filmmaker, Thomas Campbell, and amazing skate photography of Steve Caballero, Tom Groholski, Christian Hosoi, Mark “Gator” Rogowski and more- all when they were just youngsters and the zine made by a bunch of kids whose passion was just to talk about skating, neighborhood gossip, music, and just having a good time. There is no pretense, it’s just a fun, genuine zine. This is one of about six issues that have survived the years. I wish so badly I could find the rest of them.

Tony put this together with the tools of the trade at that time, no Photoshop or Indesign. Just plain, old exacto knives, rub on lettering, typewriter, glue, a committed group of friends, and a xerox machine that jammed constantly. You can read more about the inspiration of this series here.

We are giving away the zine to celebrate the launch of the Poketo x Club Mumble series featuring the work of prominent artists in the skate community, Bob Kronbauer, Andrew Pommier, Jeremyville, Tony Larson, and Travis Millard. Purchase a tee shirt or wallet from the Poketo x Club Mumble series and the zine is yours. We only reprinted a small run, get it fast while supplies last.