Koston & Taylor | Under & Over

Eric Koston and Grant Taylor plus pigeons, based off of a Ben Colen Photo

Eric Koston and Grant Taylor. I saw a Ben Colen photo a few years ago and it stuck with me right away—it feels like it’s right in the middle of a moment, not just a trick. Photos are great for documenting but drawings let you tell a fuller story in a single image. Originally, Koston had his feet down to make the photo happen but I wanted it to feel like he was moving on the bike while grant was threading the needle with his hippy jump. So I put Koston with his feet up, hand on the handle bar and his eyes as wide as I could. Grant’s face was hard, for whatever reason, lighting, expression, or something. Either way, I had to make a composite drawing from a few different photos of his face to make it look more like him. Im still not totally sure it looks like him. People make weird faces mid trick.

I added pigeons because they’re great at filling a composition while adding a little character and chaos. They help the image feel alive and give your eye somewhere else to wander. Im always looking a lot at Norman Rockwell drawings for inspiration—especially how he moves between really bold outlines with almost no shading, and then gets incredibly subtle shading in faces and hands. Drawing your focus to the important parts. It’s a balance I keep chasing. Creating focal points, balance, and guiding your eye. Or at least trying to.

Rockwell also wasn’t using an iPad, which is humbling. He seems to be able to do in a few hours on paper what takes me a few months on an ipad. Over the last year I spent more than 60 hours picking away at this drawing, slowly adjusting things, leaving it alone, then coming back. I wish I worked faster, but I tend to be slow in general. I still like the process though, and I’m trying to keep leaning into that. Keep pushing.