We recently reviewed and streamed a track off of ILSA’s Intoxicantations album, and one thing that stood out to us immediately (besides the killer music) was the album cover. We quickly found out that ILSA’s drummer, Joshua Brettell, was the one responsible for this chaotic visual symphony of animals, drugs and death. Joshy (as he signs his work) works in black and white, creating vivid imagery with an almost photographic realness to it. He has done the artwork for his own band, as well as work for Hooded Menace, Abyss, Deathammer and Hubris, and he is able to bring a twisted imagination but a clean aesthetic to his work. His portrait from The Exorcist is both sympathetic and revolting, showing the infected child as clearly as the rotting demon inside her. His work is full of texture and noise, with subjects often screaming out of the page, and at the same time there is always one or many eyes staring directly at you. It’s unnerving to look at one of his compositions because of those confronting eyes and screams, but the way he balances his imagery both in symmetry and color is soothing to the eye. After the jump, check out a small selection of his work…
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