Tag: texas artist

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blog Personal Spain/France '22

Mysterious 2022 European Adventure

I was teaching several subjects online for Varsity Tutors, including AP Art History, Java Script, Geography, Animation, Drawing/Painting and even Minecraft Coding Camps. My father, Timothy Szal, wanted to go on an extended trip to Europe for more than two months. So, I took a brief sabbatical from teaching, and we planned to go to Paris for three to four weeks and then walk across Spain on the famous “Camino Trail.”

My father had recently employed me to redesign and renovate a second building on the 1342 Meadow Glen property in Southlake. We had discussed my being able to rent out the place for two years in exchange for payment (I also spent a good deal of my own money on extra design elements like the turtle knobs on the bathroom cabinets).

My father “accidentally” pushed me down a steep cliff while we were passing from the border of France into Spain near the Pyrenees Mountains. The fall hurt my leg, and about halfway through the “Camino Trail”, I was forced to stay back and rest in Burgos while my father continued without me. He returned after several days with 5 Spanish thugs who tried to subdue me. I was able to run off, and they followed me on the trail for a day until I doubled back. I told my father I was going to the American Embassy, and we flew back to Dallas from Madrid.

I had several strange signs that my father did not plan on me returning. The most significant sign was that my Capital One bank account was closed because I had not had any activity in 60 days – yet my Adobe account for Photoshop, After Effects, and other Adobe products had a payment from that account on May 8th. I also had over $600 in Federal Savings Bonds that I mailed to the bank to turn into money, which got returned as a check (possibly so that anyone could cash them).

I can’t help feeling that after some of the events that took place last year, some of Timothy Szal’s behavior seems quite a bit more suspicious. I just pray that someone on the State or Federal level looks into what has happened. I have a small claims court case in the works now, so hopefully, this will all be resolved from these proceedings.

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blog

Betrayed by Maureen Flint

Maureen Flint

My company, Magick Mechanic, submitted a lawsuit against Frank Bufano for tortious interference. I consulted Maureen Flint, who is a tenured professor at the University of Alabama, about the lawsuit. She asked Frank about the case and he sold his house in Texas to move to California to avoid the lawsuit. I can only assume that Maureen was offered quite a large amount of cash to betray me and block my profile on Facebook.

I attended Pratt, the art school in New York City, in 2010-2011 with Maureen. She was in charge of the dorm’s floor monitors, which I stayed in during my first year. When my son Roman was born, I had to transfer to TCU to be closer to family even though I was on the Dean’s List at Pratt and enjoyed it very much. I learned many graphic design and animation skills during my foundation year, which all became quite important later in my artistic career.

I would never have been able to design the American Game Deck or animate The Flying Dutchess without my time at Pratt. I am so tired of having to sue people; I just wish that I was receiving better treatment from specific individuals. By doing well in my business and continuing my creative projects, I will seek the best revenge, which is living well. Thank you to everyone who has ordered a deck from my website; I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. I was delighted to see my cousin Ryan and aunts for our Thanksgiving in Upstate New York this year.

This is how I remember Maureen, with her signature platinum blonde hair, as a fashion major at Pratt
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blog Personal Professional The American Game The American Game Deck

New Job @ Adirondack Tire and some deck revisions

I was blessed to start a new job at the corporate headquarters of Adirondack Tire a few weeks ago. I am so happy to get to work on cars and do graphic design, combining two of my unique skill sets. I worked at Warren Tire for almost a year and never met the owner. I worked at Adirondack Tire for one day and met the owner plus his son.

I only have my son Roman visit during the summers, so seeing Sean and Larry together makes working for them a pleasure. It is so nice to see the owner preparing his son for his future role in a direct fashion. I gave everyone at corporate unique decks of the American Game for Christmas.

Roman and I (Summer 2024) at the MOMA in NYC

However, I have gazed at the cards on the wall for a few weeks now and have decided to make some minor changes. The Los Angeles card that might evoke a connection with the Los Angeles Chargers is changing completely. A few other cards will have minor edits, and I will update the master portfolio page. If you would like to exchange your deck for the updated version, please email me at mattszal@gmail.com, and I will gladly send you an additional deck for no extra charge. Thanks to everyone who has supported my work and family by purchasing a deck. God Bless you. I used the cards to do a reading for my cousin Ryan on Christmas Eve. We discussed the upcoming book that I am writing to accompany the deck.

My cousin Ryan (the famous architect) and I

This book shall be in the fashion of The Pictorial Key to the Tarot by Waite.

This is one of the tentative new versions of the LA card #2
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Art/Design blog Design The American Game The American Game Deck

Final ‘American Game’ Designs finished!

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Art/Design blog Home Studio Personal The American Game The American Game Deck

The American Game Deck for sale!

All sales of “The American Game” cards are on hold until the new redesign is finished and the new designs have arrived from the printers. We apologies for any inconvenience.

I have changed the cards several times, and I am on 5 different redesigns for the entire deck. The deck was officially released on Thanksgiving, which is when all pre-sale orders shipped. Thank you so much to everyone for supporting my artwork and designs; if you have any thoughts or comments on the designs, please email me at mattszal@gmail.com.

Carolina
Indianapolis
New Orleans
Pittsburgh
Earth
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blog Personal Professional The American Game The American Game Deck The Flying Dutchess

Armistice Day & Emblem Cards Update

In light of Judge William P. “Bill” Brandt’s military service, I have removed the last press release about him in honor of Armistice Day. One of the officers I was close with and who I designed things for in the Department of the Army (with U. of S. Carolina back in 2017-18) emailed me that Judge Brandt served in the United States Air Force for several decades.

During his distinguished military career, including active and reserve service, he has served in numerous flying, staff and command positions all over the globe–including Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom. 

https://www.judgebillbrandt.com/about

World War One is my favorite conflict to study in history, along with the Napoleonic Wars, the English Civil Wars, plus the civil war between Sulla and Marius in ancient Rome. We get Veterans Day from the original Armistice Day, which is the anniversary of the eleventh month and the eleventh day that the armistice was signed to end the First World War. I would also like to thank my uncle John Szal (Captain in the Marines) and my old roommate Wes Ellett, who went to TCU on the G.I. Bill after serving in Iraq, for their service today.

This is a Flying Dutchess character concept I made based on an English Admiral that uses the Tarrant County District Attorney as a reference – Phil Sorrells.

In other news, I am working on the 4th different version of my “American Game Deck” of cards, which will be available for sale on my website starting Thanksgiving. Each card has a different NFL team, a different zodiac sign, element sign or special major card, which all equal 52 playing cards like a traditional deck for playing poker or spades. The NFL teams only have the city name and team colors since their logos are copyrighted. I have selected +500-year-old emblems mostly from Claude Paradin’s Devises heroïques, first published in 1551. I have redesigned the emblems to coordinate a theme idea and color palette to represent each of the 32 teams. So you could shuffle the deck in strange ways to help you pick your predictions for some sports gambling at West Gate in Las Vegas, then play go-fish with your friends while you watch the games.

I want to elevate American culture to an almost metaphysical place and have this deck hold a space similar to the traditional Rider Waite Tarot Deck. These timeless emblems from centuries ago still have a familiarity yet an elusive quality that makes each one feel eternal. See the “Atlanta Card” for an example. It has the official CMYK red of the team with an emblem featuring a falcon-like bird (Atlanta Falcons). Some teams are doubles, such as New York and Los Angeles. Yet, with color and imagery, I attempted to make each design fairly easy to distinguish. The teams are the number cards and the four elements (32 teams + 4 elements = 36) – Earth, Wind, Fire & Water.

The royal cards are the 12 zodiac signs and four unique cards from special emblems, which I thought would increase the mystique of the deck as a whole composition. Some cards have emblems with related imagery, like Capricorn, which has an actual sea goat on which the sign is based. Other cards are more subtle references, such as Taurus, which features an emblem with a “Dexter Dei” (hand of God) with a sword and a trowel, which makes a shape similar to the horns of a bull.   

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Studio The American Game The American Game Deck

The Making of the “American Game” Football Tarot

NFL Football season is back once again, so I thought I would share some more information about a project I have worked on for the last couple of years (there are three different deck versions in total).

This video covers much of the physical process behind the making of my “football tarot” cards. I used emblems from the 500-year-old book Devises Heroiques. Each emblem has a conceptual or actual reference to a modern-day NFL team. For example, I used an emblem with a bear for the Chicago Bear’s card.

Below is an example of what the emblems look like in the book version:

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blog The Flying Dutchess

Flying Dutchess Update

Howdy everyone, I thought I would give all my blog readers a sneak peak at some of the new The Flying Dutchess (TFD) content in the works.

The idea of having a “broom-craft carrier” is influenced by WW2 style aircraft carrier’s with planes that take-off and land. Instead of having the flying units (mid-ship mages) run off the deck, an opening door in the rear allows magick users to fly in and out as well as hippocampus (Greek: water horse) drawn boats/individual riders.

I have also been working on several aquatic scenes with ocean animals such as this seal, dolphins and turtles to name a few. Every magick user in the series has a naval dirk that they use to cast spells and a flying animal plus a land/water animal that fly on the end of their broom.

The first battle of the Anglo-Dutch war takes place near the Straits of Dover ( also called the Battle of Goodwin Sands). This is Dover Castle which is visible from this area. It has a magickal shield that protects it from attacks in the air and sea.

These images show off the new style of the series (it has gone through several different stylistic variations), which is an 8-bit/16-bit retro Game Boy Advance aesthetic. This image below is of Astrid casting a spell with her naval dirk, in the finalized look for the show.

Visit the www.theflyingdutchess.com for more content and updates along with the instagram account: @theflyingdutchessoffical

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blog watercolor

Pershing Square Watercolors

I was blessed to move to Los Angeles last year at the end of September 2022. As many of the Old Masters once painted the buildings and sculptures in the parks and squares of cities they lived, I have endeavored to do so in reverence to them.

Title Guarantee and Trust Company Building – watercolor on paper, Oct. 2022

In an attempt to cure my insatiable love of Art Deco buildings, I visited Pershing Square. The Title & Trust building is an Art Deco gem situated off the square, named after prestigious WW1 General Pershing himself, mastermind of the Argonne Forest Campaign. In this watercolor, I did not do any underdrawing with pencil or pen and painted this with the brush from observation with no reference photographs. This process increases dexterity with the brush and better economy of line with each brush stroke.

View from Pershing Square Two – watercolor on paper, Oct. 2022

Pershing Square was redesigned by Ricardo Legorreta in the 1990s and these elegant, orange spheres feature prominently in the square vibrant new look.

A photograph of the Title Guarantee and Trust Building with Orange Sphere in foreground