![thebeach-7-2006[1].jpg](http://www.bostonist.com/attachments/boston_katie/thebeach-7-2006%5B1%5D.jpg)
Bostonist has known since college (and repeatedly confirmed at our first office job) that no Internet-researched and keyboard-typed task can be completed without a healthy dose of procrastination. There are lots of very important things to do before you start that pending assignment. You need to check your e-mail (all active accounts), Facebook, myspace, weather forecast, local news, and of course Bostonist.com. One Internet destination that has been dear to our hearts throughout our desk-bound years is www.explodingdog.com. Initially started as a joke by creator Sam Brown, the site has blown up in the past five years and now is expanding into books and art gallery shows. Bostonist ran out of archived illustrations to laugh over during our 9-5 so we e-mailed Sam Brown for an interview to get more information on his explodingdog world. Read on to learn more about this hilarious site, as well as a very disturbing story from his time in Boston.
Can you describe your concept for this website, and why did you start it?
The whole idea behind the explodingdog website is that I draw pictures to people's titles submitted by e-mail. The whole thing started as somewhat of a joke and it was only going to be up temporarily while I was working on another version of the original explodingdog website. At first I put up a couple pictures that I had drawn on my computer saying I would draw more if someone e-mailed me titles. I figured it would be up for a week and I only gave the website address out to a couple friends. By the end of that week, I was getting 20-30 e-mails a day from people I never met -- so I kept doing it.
When did this start, and how did it grow so popular? Did you try to promote it, or let “word of mouth” work its magic?
It started in January of 2000 and was just passed by word of mouth. It was very interesting because often it would be a link in internal e-mail newsletters from different companies. So for a couple days I would get several e-mails from just one company. Then those people would send it to their friends and the company would switch. It was interesting to see all the channels of communication that you never think about.
The pictures are so simple, but when matched to the title it seems you’re striving for an ironic (almost philosophical) message. Your thoughts on this?
I do try to play around with how the words and image relate, but I wouldn't say I am striving for any specific type of message. Sometimes the combination of the title and image is ironic or philosophical but sometimes it is just silly or dumb. It is an experimental process.
Besides the titles you get e-mailed to you, what inspires you to draw?
I have been drawing my whole life but it was never something I took seriously. I went to art school but spent most of my time there doing video work and I drew on the side. The whole style of the drawings I do for explodingdog came from when I was playing around doing animation and needed some simple figures to work with. I wouldn't say that I am inspired to draw, but drawing helps me think and clear my head. I imagine it is the same thing that happens for some people when they run or play tennis or some other activity. Drawing works the best for me -- which is good because I hate running.
What do you do besides explodingdog (jobwise)?
Once in a while I do freelance design or illustration work, but explodingdog is pretty much my full-time job. I design and publish my own books, sell shirts, and do gallery shows.
What do you do besides explodingdog (hobbies)?
I read books, take photographs, have a vegetable garden, do drawings, and have many other mini-hobbies. I also have a one-year-old daughter so most of the time i am not working, I spend with her and my wife.
What’s in the foreseeable future for explodingdog?
Hopefully I will have another book out by this winter. I am also working out leads on a couple new gallery shows -- but right now it is all up in the air.
Because this is for Bostonist.com, can you tell me about any connections to Boston?
I lived in Boston for a few months; some of my really good friends still live up there. Two of my close friends run a coffee shop in Bay Village called Rachel's Kitchen.
Any interesting stories you have to share from your time in Boston?
I did have a run in with a crazy landlord. I moved up to Boston for about four months while I was transferring between colleges and was staying with a friend for about month until I got my own place. She and her roommate had just moved in and they had an extra bedroom, so we talked to the landlord and he was cool with me. So I decided to stay. It was a good apartment, but I sometimes had this odd feeling of having no privacy.
One night I went out with some friends and ended up spending the night at their place. Around 5 a.m., I got a call from my roommate, saying that I couldn't return to my apartment. The landlord had come up to the apartment waving large kitchen knives saying he was going to kill me. He ran through the apartment yelling and stabbing the knives at the bed I was supposed to be sleeping in. He said his reason for wanting to kill me was that he had security cameras in the stairwell that had caught me having sex with prostitutes...later he changed his story to that I was having sex with "men he couldn't see". In reality I was not doing any of these things in the stairwell or anywhere else.
So we all moved out on a Sunday morning when he was away. We managed to move out in a couple hours and as we were moving out, we talked to the people who lived upstairs. They said they thought he actually did have hidden video cameras in the apartment we lived in. I got curious so I was looking into the basement windows to see if I could find any evidence of video cameras and I saw that he had rows of little black and white monitors -- all showing different views of the apartment I had just left.
That's is my interesting Boston story.
Some of Bostonist’s favorite Explodingdog pics:
I'm sad for two reasons. you're there. i'm here.
It will lead to hell
I'm not sure this is healthy . . .
I am never going to work again
He was getting wet
What does god say?
Stephie poo, I am still madly in love with you
I don't understand my job
Why can't we be friends!
Right now, I'm crying inside.
NEED BEER
This post was contributed by Victoria Daskal
add to digg
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
email this
add to facebook
add to del.icio.us
WTF?!?!?! That story is messed! I would have sent a molotov cocktail into that little peep haven of his. And whay did he make up such messed up stories?! Just goes to show, you gotta watch out!