“Summoner’s Departure” 18x24 Oil on Panel 2025
Benj had been commissioned to compose a grimoire of darkest necromancy, but instead, he decided to write a sad story. When the “grimore” was read aloud in a cemetery during a magickal operation, all of those in attendance were driven to tears by Benj’s woebegone tale--a tale about a heart surgeon for broken hearts. Here we see the occultist releasing the young scribe to pursue a career in creative writing.
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🔶10 TIPS ON HOW TO FORM AN ENERGY PRISM AROUND YOUR BODY
🔶Forming a psychic energy prism around your body has become a bit of a trend these days, and with all of the benefits, it is easy to see why.
Here are a few great tips to get you started:
1. Meditate every day, all day
2. Make sure your brain is full of juicy brain blood
Here we see Benj lamenting in a dungeon. But not all is lost! Through his encounters with the Occultist and his flock of diabolical creatures, the young scribe has learned a bit of magick himself….
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This painting is currently available!
In this painting, we see Master Occultist Erie Oldfather selling Benj’s most recently penned grimoire to Anya the Onion Witch and her associates: Matilda, the tortured ghost of a childhood friend, and the cannibal, Bloodmouth Scarman. Benj desperately wants to quit his new job, but he is in too deep.
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Greetings Earthlings, here’s something a little different. For the release of my new book, “Tales from the Southwestern Bellows Vol. 1”, the publisher, Spire and Scribe, and I decided it would be fun to offer a few different purchasing tiers for pre-orders. At the top tier, we offered thirteen original 5x7 sketches depicting characters from the book.
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Following his sister’s extraterrestrial abduction and his breakup with the desert sorceress, Orren Mawson found himself alone and lonely. He spent most of his days deep in caves questing for crystals and valuable minerals that he would later trade for horse food, friendship bracelets, and fruit pies. Unfortunately, Orren was friendless. Then one day, amongst the stalactites and bats in the fathomless below, deep within his discontent, Orren met someone luring in the darkness. It was a fellow miner.
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Something fun happened the other day: I was informed that my art appeared in an actual film— a contemporary Western movie called “Broke” directed by Carlyle Eubank starring Wyatt Russell and Dennis Quaid.
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“Meditation Crystal” 16x20 Oil on Panel 2025 Here we see Dee, fully blissed out.
“Meditation Crystal” 16x20 Oil on Panel 2025
“Crystal Collectors” Painting 6/10
Pleiadian Meditation Instructor and Advanced Mindfulness Coach, Dee Mager, had the most embarrassing problem: He couldn’t meditate. He couldn’t focus for more than a few seconds before his mind would wander. He constantly reached for one of his many communication devices to check for notifications or was tempted by the gambling games on his handheld joy-time apparatus. Dee was terminally distracted. People were starting to unsubscribe from his channel and drop his meditation classes.
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Exciting announcement: I HAVE AN ART BOOK!!
THE SOUTHWESTERN BELLOWS VOL. 1 is now available for pre-sale! What you see before you is a curious hybrid creature--an artist's book that is also a book of illustrated short stories. This is my first such volume, and I hope it will be the first of many. It is also a tome of esoteric Alien lore and an accounting of events that transpired in a faraway land: a human breakaway civilization called the Southwestern Bellows.
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Send your loved ones a special handwritten card with a confusing picture of an alien. Grandmothers love this!
Greetings Earthlings, I now have a new GREETING CARD set in stock, perfect for Mother’s Day…2026! Why send a boring email when you can mail someone a picture of a Zeta Reticulan level 5 chaos mage handing a majestic Sasquatch an Amulet of Advanced Alteration? The set comes with 4 magickal 5x7 cards along with envelopes.
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“What Follows the Scribe“ 20×16 Oil on Panel 2025
Here, we see Benj walking home from another hard day of transforming the blasphemous ramblings of infernal summoned entities into elegant prose, portentous future predictions, dark spellcraft, and filthy jokes. But, despite the great pay and benefits his new employment offers, the young author longs to be writing his own stories, and feels crushed by the weight of his untapped creativity.
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This is a photo from my frightening abduction experience.
On Friday night, I was abducted by aliens. Ty Walker and the Humanoids landed in Fort Wayne and performed a cosmic country set at the Brass Rail, and it was so fun! Before the show, I played hacky sack with several of the extraterrestrials. I was later brought onboard their vessel (actually the green room/creepy apartment above the venue), where I got to try on Glarzak’s head and posed for a photoshoot.
Read MoreOn the doorstep of a humble abode, Master Occultist Erie Oldfather presents his young scribe, Benj, his "Ill-Begotten Reward." But the gold and treasures he holds offer little comfort, for they are the fruits of a trade he may soon regret. This painting, the fourth in my "Summoner and Scribe" series, tells the story of a dream abandoned and a pact made with the infernal.
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“The Astral Body” 16x20 Oil on Panel 2019
When I was a kid, I was especially interested in astral travel. Around the age of nine or ten, I checked out books on astral travel, ESP, and psychic abilities from the library and diligently practiced the protocols each night while going to sleep.
Read More“Alanzo and the Cactus Witch”
By Mark Rogers
The Cactus Witch lived in a little desert cottage just south of Dead Chapel in a land called the Southwestern Bellows. She wasn’t the most famous Witch or Wizard in the Southwestern Bellows--for there were many--but she was known for her cactus-based potions, poisons, and mystical drugs. It was said that the Cactus Witch had the feet of a bird. It was also said that she was on good terms with the Aliens.
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“Wizard of Cups” 24x18 Oil on Panel 2022. The Grand Recital 1/9.
Greetings Earthlings, at the time of writing this, I have been sober for over 6.5 years. Yay! The reason I wanted to share was that when I was thinking about quitting alcohol, I remember scouring the internet for articles about “being sober as an artist”, “sober painters”, or “how to be sober and still be an artist”. I wanted to know if other artists like me out there who quit drinking and how that affected their lives. So, I am writing this quick blog for my past self, and for any fellow artists out there considering sobriety.
Read MoreGreetings Earthlings, here is the first post in a series of posts dedicated to world-building the imaginary land where all of my paintings take place. All of the content about my imaginary world is either scribbled in my sketchbooks or typed out in scattered computer files, so this series of blog posts is an attempt to formalize the material. Eventually, I plan to compile all the posts into a single Wiki page on my website called “Stories”. In addition to the Southwestern Bellows World Compendium, it will also include the narratives from my past series of paintings and juicy details about recurring characters and….aliens.
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Greetings Earthlings, recently someone on Instagram asked me for my top three UFOlogy/Alien-lore book recommendations. The question really made me think so I decided to answer the question in this quick blog. Also, a quick disclaimer: I am not a UFO/Alien expert, just an artist with an interest in the paranormal. My work is fiction and definitely inspired by this stuff, but I remain open-minded on the subject. I don’t have the answers and I doubt I ever will, nor do I necessarily take all of the below materials at face value. Nevertheless, there is something going on in the skies and I love thinking about and exploring these spooky mysteries.
1. “Communion: A True Story” by Whitley Strieber
This book was one of the first that I ever read on the subject and it tells the first-hand account of Strieber’s own abductions and extraterrestrial visitations. It is oddly surreal, spiritual, and chilling. Strieber has written tons of books on the subject and his fiction work is great too.
I was very inspired by this book
2. “The Threat” by David M. Jacobs
And speaking of chilling, this book expands on the abduction phenomenon and the hypnosis work David M. Jacobs has done throughout the years with abductees. Not a good book to read alone at night before bed, because this is some pretty scary stuff. Jacobs explores the phenomena through the shared experiences of people he has worked with over the years and has put together a fairly sinister model of the phenomenon. He specifically discusses the grays, their capabilities, and their hybridization program.
3. “American Cosmic: UFO’s, Religion, Technology” by D.W. Pasulka
This book is very different than the other two! Amazon sums it up better than I can: “Over the course of a six-year ethnographic study, D.W. Pasulka interviewed successful and influential scientists, professionals, and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs who believe in extraterrestrial intelligence, thereby disproving the common misconception that only fringe members of society believe in UFOs.”
I won’t spoil it, but I really liked this book because one of the people that she interviewed was a technology entrepreneur who appeared to have been receiving downloads from extraterrestrials. I also liked it because it was kind of different.
BONUS:
4. “Chariot of the Gods?” by Erich Von Daniken
This book is a little outdated now…it came out in 1974…but it is basically the TV show Ancient Aliens. This is where it all started and Erich Von Daniken is the O.G. of UFOlogy. If you are really into the subject these ideas might not be all that new, but the book is still worth a read.
5. “The Anunnaki Connection: Sumerian Gods, Alien DNA, and the Fate of Humanity (From Eden to Armageddon)” by Heather Lynn
Whoa, what a long title! I read this book a few years ago after hearing the author speak on a podcast and remember her book being very entertaining. In UFOlogy there is an Ancient Alien thread about the Sumerian Gods being powerful aliens who created humans to be their slaves, and who still rule us from the shadows. No matter what you actually believe, I felt that the arguments in this book were compelling and fun to ponder.
This isn’t an exhaustive list, but a few books I either read recently or just really liked. Gosh, writing this list has rekindled my interest in reading the work of these researchers. I have never read anything by the famous paranormal researcher and UFOlogist Jaque Vallee, but I think I’m going to buy one of his books this week.
Again, I don’t have any answers, but I find it all very inspirational for my paintings. If you have any suggested UFOlogoy books for me, put them in the comments below!
Have a cool day, friends!
Greetings Earthlings! As I write this blog, it is July 2nd, which is World UFO Day! To celebrate, I am going to share my UFO sighting:
The UFO that I saw looked a tiny bit like the fireball that I painting in this piece, “Prayers to the Magi“ but without the long tail.
My sighting happened back in 2009 in Springfield, Oregon. It was summertime and the occurrence happened right at dusk. My now ex-wife and I were walking down Centennial Boulevard from our house to the corner store when we saw the object directly to our right, flying above the houses. I say “object” because it didn’t look like a craft or a saucer. It was roughly the size of one of those old Volkswagon Beatles; egg-shaped and glowing weirdly as if radiating some sort of energy. It was orange like fire, but again, it appeared to be composed of energy rather than flames.
The object was extremely low in the sky. It was flying--maybe cruising is the better word--only ten feet above the neighborhood utility poles. It flew West to East at a casual 15-20 MPH and disappeared behind the trees. The experience only lasted a few seconds, but I will never forget it. My ex saw it too, and at the time we were so excited, but we were also left with the feeling of wanting more. It was kind of a letdown, but I suppose this is how these things go. They were unscripted occurrences and I am sure the retelling of the story isn’t all that exciting.
You had to be there I guess...
The UFO that I saw looked a lot like one of these objects.
Later we bought a telescope and spent the rest of the summer nights in the backyard hoping to see another UFO but sadly never did. I would love to have another experience.
On a final note, I will mention that coincidentally 2009 is the year that I first started painting. Are the two events related? I don’t necessarily think so, but you never know…
Happy World UFO DAY!!
“Time Life: Mysteries of the Unknown“ I loved these books as a kid. And as an adult!
The most common question that I get asked regarding my art is, first: “Have you had an encounter with, or been abducted by aliens?” The second most common question is: “Where do you get your inspiration?” This post is about the inspiration question, but I promise I will circle back to the aliens question later.
The short answer to the inspiration question is that I am inspired by literally everything! I am a very curious person, and I am constantly fascinated and awestruck by the world around me. If I have to get specific, I could come up with a few different categories of things that inspire my paintings.
Stories
The Paranormal/UFOlogy/ESP/etc…
Fantasy/Horror Fiction
Mythology
Occult Esotercisim and Magick
Folklore
Local History (True Stories)
Art
Medieval and Dutch Master Painting
Golden Age of Illustration Painters
Also Edward Gorey
Experiences:
Places I have visited
Places I have lived
Random things I am interested in or experience in real life. Often these things or situations allow me to poke a little fun at myself.
At the core, I am most inspired by STORIES!! Like a fantasy author, my paintings take place in an imaginary world that I call, The Southwestern Bellows. The narratives are about things that capture my imagination, like UFOlogy, folklore, and local history. I was raised Catholic (I am no longer practicing) and grew up with a magical worldview which piqued my interest in all things paranormal. To this day, I still believe in magic. Also, I grew up in Oregon in the 80/90’s when shows like Sightings and X-files and Unsolved Mysteries were popular. My Dad and his boyfriend had the entire collection of “Time Life; Mysteries of the Unknown”, and I couldn’t get enough of those. Bloody vampires, summoned demons, alien abduction, evil sorcery, and grimoires written on human skin… These were the things that excited me as a kid and still do today!
The Oregon Trail video game! Very inspiring!
Another Oregon fascination was the video game, “The Oregon Trail” which I first played on a floppy disc at my elementary school. From that time forward, I have been fascinated by pioneers and pioneer history. I love history museums.
As for actually being inspired by art, most of my art inspiration comes from the past. I love old master painting techniques and I aim to emulate some of them in my work. Bosch, Bruegel, and Durrer are my favorites. I especially resonate with medieval paintings featuring angels or devils or both. (To me, angels and devils are similar to…aliens.) When even I visit a new city, a visit to their art museum is always at the top of my list.
Another area of inspiration is things that I see in real life. I paint a lot of desert scenes, and although I would never want to live in the desert, I have been to the Southwest many times to visit family; Phoenix and Palm Springs. I find the landscape beautiful in a hot harsh kind of way, and fitting for tales of extraterrestrials. I lived in Eugene, Oregon for fifteen years. A lot of the characters I make up are inspired by my days in Eugene as a former stoner pizza-dude, and rock-and-roll band guy. Back in the day, I used to love people-watching in Eugene. So many wacky, hippie, punk, and studious people.
Inspiration is a funny thing. Everyone is different. Some people/artists are inspired by bug collecting, anime, or building robots. Some people love bowling and math. Maybe I am crazy. I am not sure why everybody isn’t into 16th-century paintings, ceremonial magick, the Oregon Trail, and the Betty and Barney Hill Incident. That’s just what I am into, and that is what inspires my art.