Novel ideas

We love the work by Matt Kish, who every day is drawing a page of "Moby Dick" (hear, and see, more about the project tonight at Pete's Candy Store's Open City Dialogue lecture series).

This isn't the first project project of its kind. Here are a couple other artists who are literally drawing inspiration from the classics:

The Artist: Justin Quinn

The Book: "Moby Dick"

The Art: Influenced by the letter E, Quinn has drawn chapters of the Melville classic, often using the letter thousands of times to spiraling, dizzying effect.

Fun Fact: Jamie Hook, who organizes the Open City Dialogue lecture series, would love to show both Quinn's and Kish's works in a gallery one day.

The Artist: Zak Smith

The Book: "Gravity's Rainbow"

The Art: Drawings in ink, as well as paintings and photography, on every page of the Pynchon classic.
Fun Fact: Kish was inspired in part by Smith in his own illustration project, which was shown in its entirety in the Whitney Museum's 2004 Biennial and is now in the permanent collection of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.

Readers, know of other projects like this? Share in the comments section below.