Ok so the love child part is just lies and has nothing to do with the article, sue me. The rest is interesting… I spent some time following an issue so bizarre and brazen it’s almost unbelievable… I don’t do sports card you all know that but I am making an exception for this it’s just that freakish and it could hit any set with sketch cards sports or non:
Someone has been up to no good, what a shock it’s on eBay! In the red corner we have Ebay seller morgan_cc, this is a guy named Mike Morgan, and he’s an asshole aspiring sketch artist from Florida, and a pioneer in the areas of “drop shadow” work and the use of crayons, who may or may not be not be flatulent no one is really sure.
In the white corner we have professional artist Brian Kong who is well know, he has illustrated comic books and he has had a lot of card work, both in sports and non sports. He has a very photo realistic style on many of his cards and has completed work on several big name sets, his cards are often considered “top tier” . He did some work on “Topps Authentic” sports sketches and that’s were we pick the saga up. It seems one of his cards is up for sale on eBay, or is it? The card for sale has some slight alterations… the biggest one is that it hasn’t got Brian’s name on it anymore. I have reproduced the complete description of this item below; as you can see it is completely in CAPS which as anyone can tell you is the product of a diseased mind in and of itself…
“2009
ALBERT PUJOLS 1/1
AUTHENTIC SKETCH CARD
YOU ARE BIDDING ON A HAND-DRAWN SKETCH CARD OF ALBERT PUJOLS PRODUCED BY AWARD WINNING SPORTS CARD ARTIST MIKE MAKING IT A REAL 1/1. THIS ALBERT PUJOLS ARTIST SKETCH CARD WAS CREATED USING MIXED MEDIA (PRECISE EXTRA FINE INKS, LONG LASTING COLOR PENCILS FOR HIGHLIGHTS, AND METALLIC FINE POINT PERMANENT MARKERS). DESCRIPTION ON BACK OF CARD READS (HAND-DRAWN, ARTIST SIGNATURE, AND DATED 2009). THE ALBERT PUJOLS SKETCH CARD IS ALSO HAND NUMBERED 1/1 IN SILVER METALLIC INK. WINNING BIDDER WILL RECEIVE THE EXACT ALBERT PUJOLS COLOR SKETCH CARD 1/1 PICTURED IN THIS LISTING. THANKS FOR LOOKING AND GOOD LUCK BIDDING!
SPORTS CARD ARTIST FEATURED IN NEW BOOK!!!
“25 COLLECTIBLE SKETCH CARD IMAGES: #1 ONLINE BEST-SELLERS.”
WOW that was painful on the eyes, but before we look at what he said lets view the cards in question first Brian’s card and then the one listed.
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- This is Brians original sketch
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- This is the card up for sale notice any differences?
Now lets see them on top of each other:
Sketch Overlay from Scoundrels Art Community, because mine was rubbish.
The image overlay is conclusive, thats an exact match line for line, you really cant argue about this it’s a digital copy.
So taking into account the images and the eBay text several problems with this are apparent right away: first this card was NOT hand drawn by “MIKE”, I am quoting exactly from an email composed by Brian Kong, who said:
“I took a pencil and drew & colored it from scratch”.
That means MIKE didn’t. This is Mike Morgan by the way, he seems a little on the delusional side and he, as you will read makes several bizarre statements and seems to be constructing his own reality regarding this issue. For example, “Award winning” this is not something even with the power of Google I have been able to verify and MIKE hasn’t offered and more information on that, so we could be talking Nobel Prize, Oscars, or perhaps, and more likely, an award in art back in the third grade for not eating the most crayons… we may never know for sure but one thing is certain, most of us don’t care.
Another gem I enjoy are his comments about “the artist” (him) being featured in new book, (It’s not a book) which is coincidentally a #1 online best seller. (no it’s really not)
This is a “book” (still not a book) manufactured and published by the ebay seller who also happens to be the artist in question, it is in no way a best seller. Number 1 is very far from what it is, the thing hasn’t even got an ISBN. Watch out Dan Brown…
Mike seems to be under the impression that it is ok to do what he has done because he has made the card different, but what he has actually done is photoshop it a little, print it out, trace it over with pen and then colour it in with pencils. He stated it was his original work, and as much as he may wish it were it’s not. It’s not even altered enough to be considered a derivative of the work, it’s simply a poor copy with the artists name removed. Mike though cant understand this, he says :
“Sketch cards are just like paintings and no two are a like. My Albert Pujols Sketch Card has darker red and blue colors and I also added 3D drop shadows to the left and to the right of the image. The name on card is in Font: Mistral Size 12. Pujols face was colored with pink and light brown. I could go on and on about what I did to the sketch card differently. I worked about 5 hrs on the project. It will only sell for $20 – no big deal. If you want to talk further about it – I do not mind. Maybe one day Topps will hire me to make sketch cards and then I can stop selling on Ebay!”
Mike, you will never work for Topps, you could try Marvel they have a lot of folks who do what you do (Hi Greg Land). I am starting to think Mike might be a little pill happy… without dissecting this logic to deeply (you really don’t have to) its easy to spot some flaws. He says he spent 5 hours on this, I can only imagine how this went, thankfully I found his diary entry’s online so I can let you all know how this great work is done! Let bust it down Min by Min Mike!
25 Min: find sketch card photo, right click save as and open in photoshop Use eraser tool to clear off unwanted elements, such as artist name… also click “Drop Shadow” to change the image making it mine! HAHA.
10 Min: look for printer paper
5 Min: Install printer paper
3 Min: click print over and over as PC seems to be doing nothing…
2 Min: cooking time on Microwave burrito
3 Min: eat Burrito
30 Min: locate coloring pencils* and “metallic pens” (* Normally this would not have taken so long however mom had moved them under the vintage original Batwoman deluxe Barbie (Mint in the box) when she came to the basement my studio to vacuum. )
1H 15 Min: coloring in, this takes several attempts as “staying in the lines” is HARD!
1H 7Min: Scan new 1/1 authentic sketch card onto the interwebs and list on ebay! (eBay is hard and you must use CAPS so people from other countries can understand you)
1H 21Min: Bask in the glow of havening truly created something… wonderful…..
But seriously he says he could go on and on, I really don’t think he could I think he explained exactly what he did in the email and that was it, if he spent 5 hours to make those changes then wow he’s really not very good at this…
Brian exchanged emails with this gentleman and this next quote comes from Mike in response to Brian.
“I am not deceiving the public because I have my own sketch card style. I guess if you like I will add another photo of the back of the Albert Pujols Sketch Card I am selling. I think that is something extra I can do to show the differences between my sketch cards and Topps. I will add the photo of the back shortly. Hope that is O.K.”
It’s at this point that Brian stopped communicating with Mike because:
“I did not reply since I felt like I was talking to a wall”
Mike took this silence as a positive approval, in fact he went as far as to say to the many folks questioning him now that he had talked to Brian and Brian was cool with it now because he posted a photo of the back of his card in the listing… that’s a big jump isn’t it? He is ok with this and I know that because he didn’t respond to me saying I would do it… hmmmm I am beginning to doubt Mike’s intellectual prowess…. For the record: Brian is NOT COOL WITH IT…. and Brian is you read this, it would seem that by not “talking to the wall” you have inadvertently given permission for him to use your art unaccredited and lie about you, as demonstrated by his next trick which was a stunner… he added something to his listing and it was this statement:
“Brian Kong has contacted me several times this week and we discussed my chances of becoming a sketch card artist. My award winning sketch card artwork is a hit on ebay! Good luck bidding!”
This is truly amazing, he is not in touch with the rest of the world and he is ripping people off. eBay are however not interested, at the time of publishing I know they have had at least 25 complaints about this listing. It’s still active. This has basically outraged a whole section of people many of whom are sketch artists. You can find them on scoundrels art forum (credit to them I stole the overlay image from them because mine wasn’t as good in fact if you click it it take you to there site) and there is a thread at the NSU forum. This guys is a conman and it looks a lot like he’s not a smart one. It highlights some interesting issues however, like what constitutes original work, and can slight alterations be considered enough of a change to skip crediting the original artist? If I invert the colour on the 25 Marilyns can I claim that it’s my original work? I don’t think so.
Someone needs to shut this guy down, because every time someone buys one of his cards and realizes they have been ripped off it’s one less real card they might have considered. If you create something it’s only fair that you get credit for it. Brian didn’t and that’s not right. So contact eBay (they will not listen but do it anyway) and anyone else you think might help and post this in as many place as you can so that people know whats going on.
This is the ebay item number and a quick click will take you to it: 110426468166
UPDATE: Brian has listed the real card on eBay now as well and you find the listing 160355764034 That might help him get it pulled from eBay. Once they can compare it to the real thing the monkeys at the Bay might figure it out. Rich Johnston over at bleedingcool beat me to the punch because he has no life! Check out his site as well.