SpongeBob Illustration Art for The Village Voice Magazine’s "Best of NYC" Issue

SpongeBob playing the ukulele in Hawaiian grass skirt Village Voice cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen

A few years ago, the Village Voice decided to use a SpongeBob theme for their year-end "Best of New York" issue. I got the opportunity to create the cover and eight full-page illustrations for the inside.

The editors at the Village Voice gave me almost zero input, so I really had an incredible amount of creative freedom on this job!
Each one of the SpongeBob illustrations is for a specific topic...The Hawaiian-themed page at the top was for an article on the best live music in New York City.

SpongeBob Gary the Snail and Snelly Village Voice love hearts cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen
This illustration with Gary the snail and his girlfriend Snelly was definitely the hardest concept to come up with -- believe it or not, the topic of this section was the best sex in New York City (The Village Voice used the term "bodily pleasures" to sound better).

I'm pretty amazed that Nickelodeon gave the Village Voice permission to use SpongeBob throughout the body of that Village Voice issue, but having the SpongeBob characters associated with hot topics like sex was really surprising!

SpongeBob cooking flipping Krabby Patty burger flipping Village Voice cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen
SpongeBob flipping Krabby Patties for the "Best Food" article

Click on any image to open up a HUGE SpongeBob Illustration

SpongeBob making exotic drinks as bartender Gary the Snail Sandy and Patrick dancing party cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen
SpongeBob as bartender (!) for the "Best Drinks" article

SpongeBob Mr. Krabs selling antiques from a city dump junk yard in Bikini Bottom Village Voice cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen
This junkyard scene with Mr. Krabs was for the article on the best places to shop and to find bargains in New York City.

In the next post, I'm going to put up the rest of the series! I hope you'll stop by and check it out!

All images: Drawing and Inking by Sherm Cohen
Coloring and Painting by Peter Bennett
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Here's a quick look at the next batch of images
from the SpongeBob issue of The Village Voice:
SpongeBob Gary the Snail and Jellyfish in Bikini Bottom Village Voice cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen SpongeBob and Squidward painting and drawing sculpture art artists Village Voice cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen
SpongeBob blowing bubble floating over traffic cars boats Bikini Bottom Village Voice cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen SpongeBob and Patrick acting silly in Bikini Bottom with Mermaid man and Barnacle Boy and Sandy Cheeks Village Voice cartoon animated drawing by Sherm Cohen


SpongeBob © 2009 Viacom International Inc. All rights reserved. NICKELODEON, SpongeBob SquarePants, and all related titles, logos, and characters are trademarks of Viacom International Inc. SpongeBob Created by Stephen Hillenburg.

7 comments:

  1. Bob FlynnJuly 17, 2009 at 4:23 PM

    The perfect treat for SpongeBob's 10th anniversary. These are SO great, Sherm. There are so many great details I could pour over them for hours. They look like they're hand inked—not Illustrator. Am I right?

    My favorites of the bunch are the bartender and snail love illustrations.

    You're being super generous with the hi-res uploads, too.

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  2. ShermJuly 17, 2009 at 4:43 PM

    Hi Bob...these were all hand-inked. This was just before I learned how to use Illustrator. Sometimes I miss that chunky randomness that comes from inking with a sable brush and india ink...

    I forgot about the "10th anniversary" angle, so I'm gonna go back and retro-fit the text to accomodate that event. Shh!

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  3. Bob FlynnJuly 17, 2009 at 6:33 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  4. Bob FlynnJuly 17, 2009 at 6:35 PM

    They brushwork is great. Really brings the characters to life—something about super perfect vector can sterilize a drawing. Which is one of the reasons why I like the inherent randomness that comes out of inking by hand.

    I've had SpongeBob on the brain. He's been everywhere the past couple days :)

    Working on my last SB comic for NickMag, too. Which is fun, but sad.

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  5. Will FinnJuly 18, 2009 at 5:38 PM

    These are beauties Sherm. Great custom expressions on them too. Hail to the Sponge!

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  6. ChirsJuly 19, 2009 at 2:59 PM

    Wow, WONDERFUL stuff Sherm! And Bob's right, great timing. ;) Thanks for sharing!

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  7. ShermJuly 19, 2009 at 3:04 PM

    Hiya Will...re: the expressions: Steve Hillenburg always encouraged us to have fun with SopongeBob's expressions -- I'm glad to hear that it shows!
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    Hi Chirs -- ...and thank YOU for the nice comment! Thanks for stopping by ^_^

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