Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Comics, entertainment, film, jeff quigley, kevin smith, Yoga Hosers

From Fan to Working With the Fat Man: Jeff Quigley Talks Kevin Smith, Yoga Hosers and Sundance

By Dylan Gonzalez

Jeff Quigley is an artist who has achieved a personal dream. From a young age, he pursued his love of illustration and gradually worked his way from a hired gun t-shirt designer to a freelance artist and Creative Direction and now a collaborator with his idol, Kevin Smith. When I chatted with him, Quigley regaled upon becoming a part of Smith's new film Yoga Hosers, his time at the Sundance Film Festival and how the creative bug got the bite on him.
Dylan Gonzalez: You started out as a Kevin Smith fan. Now, you have illustrated a comic written by him. What's that feel like?

Jeff Quigley: It's still very surreal. I have seen all of Kevin's films, but early on it was Dogma that solidified me as a fan. How could that film not have a profound affect on a kid that went through the Catholic school system, right?

I live just outside Halifax, Nova Scotia. Not high on the list of places I thought Kevin would appear. I was stoked when I found out Kevin would be putting on a few shows back in 2011. All I wanted was to do was get a Smodcast 200 poster I had created signed. Kevin and Scott [Mosier] obliged and I thought that was the end of it.

I posted about the Smodcast 200 experience and a few months later, this dude named Jim Edelston emailed me wanting to talk about team designs for Kevin's street hockey league, the View Askew Street Hockey League. The league has 12 teams and assembles every June in Brantford, Ontario, for the Walter Gretzky Street Hockey Tournament. The VASHL, as they call themselves, are the real reason for all this bru-ha-ha between Kevin and I. They are fans of my artwork and at every chance they have put my work in front of Kevin. Was it was force-fed to him? I don't know…but here we are.

DG: How did you get involved in the Yoga Hosers project?

JQ: Let me set the scene here because it's kind of f**ked-up. It was Christmas Eve and my wife, our kids and myself were sad as hell. I mean in tears. We had to make the hard decision to have our dog, Sandy, put to sleep that morning. Not something we were expecting, so obviously it was not a joyous day. Later that afternoon, I pulled out my phone, jumped on Instagram and noticed that a Yoga Hosers illustration I posted a few weeks earlier got a like from Kevin. It was not the first time he liked a post of mine; he posted a shout-out on my birthday featuring my "KFS – Kevin F**king Smith" illustration in November. So seeing that he liked the Yoga Hosers illustration was a bit of a cheer up.

Jump to December 26th. It was an unusually warm Boxing Day in Nova Scotia. I was on our back deck, lighting the BBQ as out-of-town guests were arriving for dinner. I was on my phone and noticed another Instagram notification. This time it was a direct message from Kevin that said, "Jeff! Hit me up at my email address. I've got a job for you!" I replied and then Kevin emails me this:

"Love the Yoga Hosers piece. Possible to draw an entire comic book? 20 pages of varying panels and a few splash pages? By Sundance? I'll provide script…Okay to say no if real world gets in the way."

I replied that it would be a tall order, but that I would be up to the challenge. Kevin then posted the Yoga Hosers illustration on his Instagram with his "art begets art" comments and everything blew up from there. "I guess we're making a comic" was what I sent back.

DG: How much time did you have to work on it?

JQ: I had a week! The next day, I was at the art store getting supplies so I would not have to leave the house. But I couldn't even start until I had the script. Kevin sent the first ten pages on Monday evening. By Thursday, I had all 20 pages roughed out in blue and ready for scanning. The following days were spent inking in Illustrator and on Sunday night, I uploaded the final pages to Dynamite Comics' FTP. The next day, I went back to my real job! That week, Nick [Barucci] and the Dynamite crew blasted out the copy and color and then it was finished. Those guys were great and kudos to all of them for putting up with all my art director nitpicky crap.

DG: You took the comic to Sundance, where Yoga Hosers had its premier. What was that experience like?

JQ: Fantastic! I took my oldest son, Liam, with me. He's 17, aspiring to be a writer/director in film and he helped with the comic. Sundance was a glimpse into his possible future and a great bonding experience for the both of us. We flew out of Halifax to Chicago's O'Hare airport and then flew into Salt Lake City for the festival.

Sunday evening was the midnight premiere of Yoga Hosers at the Library Theater in Park City. Kevin introduced the film and let it roll. Since I needed to pull elements from the movie into the comic, I had seen it already, but it was great to see people's reaction to the movie. I was not just seeing the film, I was involved in it now, so I wanted to see these reactions! During the development of the comic, Kevin asked me in a text message what I had thought of the movie. I told him I had another "WTF did I just watch?" moment, explaining that this was the same reaction I had after the Tusk premiere in Toronto the year before. He replied that he was probably damning himself with these "weird movies." He felt Yoga Hosers was like "Strange Brew for girls" and just happy it now existed.

After the screening, Yoga Hosers got beat up pretty bad by the critics, but who cares? Kevin Smith fans get him and I applaud him for having the balls to do what he wants and how he wants it. And look where all those bad reviews got him; he's up in Winnipeg scouting locations for Moose Jaws, which has been green lit and moved up to a July shoot, pushing the production of Mallrats 2 back to the fall. He's on fire!

I got to hang with Kevin and the cast in the green room later on during the weekend. It was a great experience and you can see all of the photos on my @jeffquigley Instagram account.

DG: In regards to your art, which you can find at www.jeffquigley.com, what would you consider your style and who are some of your influences and favorite artists?

JQ: As a kid in the 70's, I lived and breathed Ed Roth's Rat Fink, Krass & Bernie by George Trosley, CARtoons magazine and the art of Pete Millar. Those guys really showed me how to illustrate. MAD Magazine was also a big influence in my early development, which my mom would reluctantly purchase for me. I remember her saying to me "Oh Jeffrey, these magazines are for pervy old men" on the way to the Save-Easy cashier in Timberlea, Nova Scotia.

In the 80's, my family moved to Ottawa. I discovered Heavy Metal magazine and was blown away by the artwork, H.R. Giger in particular. This piqued my interest in fantasy, sci-fi and pinup artwork. When the animated Heavy Metal movie came out, I knew I wanted to be an animator. In my last year of high school, I enrolled in a co-op education that helped me get into the Hinton Animation Studios, producers of the CBC series The Raccoons. I worked on it for two episodes. It was a great experience and I actually worked with some of the people that worked on Heavy Metal, but it only showed me that a career in animation was not the direction I wanted.

As for my style, I really can't box it up into a package and label it. Maybe that's because I have been a paid artist since I was 19. Working in art departments for t-shirt companies in my youth meant I took customer requests and I had to adapt my style. I started out cartooning, then pointillism and eventually air brushing. I tried everything!  Then one day a manager dropped a computer on my desk and said, figure this thing out. So I did! CorelDraw beta version! My "Ottawa" is starting to show through here.

Today, I look to Instagram for inspiration and artists that blow me away. Jared Moraitis (AKA @beastwreck) is a guy I always look forward to seeing pop up in my feed. His artwork is fantastic. I love his line work and inking techniques. He is the reason I revisited a tablet and graphic pen. Prior to a year ago I was all mouse! I have always said that I am at my best when I have another artist sitting next to me. Working remotely from home, the internet is the closest I have now. So, Instagram is my copilot that kicks my ass into gear. "Art begets art."

DG: Where did the creative urge come from?

JQ: I'm not exactly sure where it came from. Maybe from my Mom and Dad. They both really encouraged me to draw when I was a kid, though neither could illustrate. My dad could draw a Corvette coming over a hill, however. He drew that repeatedly on his empty cigarette packs.

I think the "urge" might have come from the attention I got from kids in school. Drawing let a kid into the cool circles in elementary, and in high school it was acceptable for the girls to request drawings in their year books

DG: Can we expect more comic book work from you in the future?

JQ: I don't know. I would love to work with Kevin again. I told him at Sundance that I roughed out the "Death of Silent Bob" scenario he hinted at for Moose Jaws. I have even illustrated a cover for "True North Detective Mysteries" based on the Manitoba man hunter Guy Lapointe from Tusk, Yoga Hosers and the forthcoming Moose Jaws. It's another piece of fan art, of course, but I'm doing it for me. And when you think of it in that light, it's the reason why we are even having this conversation. I did a Yoga Hosers illustration for fun, ended up working with Kevin Smith and attending the Sundance Film Festival. Look ma, I did good!

DG: Do you have any other current projects in the works?

JQ: Freelance keeps me busy, as well as my real job as a Creative Director for an ad agency based out of New York City. So yes, there is always something "in the works" with me. Currently, I am waiting for embroidered patches of my TK420 design to arrive. That is the First Order Stormtrooper/Silent Bob design that I did which Kevin ordered for his jerseys. I am also trying to focus on some t-shirts and wearables that I am calling TeeBones, which will feature my art, and VASHL keeps me busy with jersey artwork!

You can find Jeff Quigley's work on his website, www.jeffquigley.com, and follow him on Instagram at @jeffquigley.

Dylan Gonzalez happens to love beer and comic books and luckily found a place to write about both because he has no idea how to actually make money in the real world. He lives in a cave in New Jersey.

Tweet him at @BeardedPickle, follow his own beer blog at http://boozegeek.tumblr.com/or email him at dylan.gonzalez1990@gmail.com.

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