Matt French is a wizard. He invited me to travel with him to a place called "Last Weekend," and here is what we found...

"They are arranged in chronological order and their mouths are progressively more open...." Matt explained to me at Evo's showing of The Collection - a compilation of works by Mike Ennen, Joey Meddock, Chad Swanson, Joe Tetrick, Mike Yoshida, and the wizard himself.

While setting up for the show, Matt started leafing through hundreds of impeccable pen & ink drawings. From natural inspirations to absolute imaginary wonderlands - it is no surprise that French's work satiates the graphic desires of companies like Mervin Mfg, Pocket Pistols, and Volcom.

Mister French knows his art history and it shows in this Esdee Scraper Board masterpiece...

In an email on December 12th, 2009 Matt wrote,

"Scraper board was made by Esdee, and was called British Scraper Board, as it was manufactured in Great Britain.

VC Johnson used it to create all of the skull graphics for the bones brigade, including Tony Hawk's first 3 pro-model skateboard graphics.

Scraper board is a rigid form of cardstock coated with a layer of fine white china clay. You can draw on it with black, and remove (with a scraping tool) and add black, until you have the drawing dialed to your heart's delight.

It isn't made anymore, so all of what I have is the last of it, so I use it sparingly, and on the most demanding of projects.

I was fortunate enough to make contact with the importer of it in New Jersey, and talk them out of the last few packs of it that they had in stock.

P.S: I'm working on a graphic right now that says "Baker or Bust". People can wear it while hitching a ride up to Baker!"

Prediction of the future is one of Matt's many magical skills. Sounds like snow is coming soon to the Cascades, and that HWY 542's migrants will reappear. If you're feeling really lucky, try thumbing to Portland in mid-January to see Matt and the rest of The Collection crew alongside INNATE, screen-printing fresh apparel of the artists' work!