Hostesses/Model and Artist:Cynthia Sheppard

Modern Alternative & Fantasy Art by Cynthia Sheppard

Ranging from dark and enticing to light and surreal, you just can't help enjoying this stuff! The work of artist Cynthia Sheppard has been garnering international popularity since her start as a working illustrator in 2007. With a history deeply rooted in traditional oil painting and drawing, Cynthia has been using similar techniques to create traditional-looking digital paintings since 2006, which now make up the majority of her illustrated portfolio.

Cynthia is currently one of 80 artists working on a large-scale collectible card game (similar to Magic-The Gathering) which is due to hit the shelves of Target, WalMart, and game shops around the country early this summer. Other projects include dark fantasy RPG manual illustrations, a major-label album cover, and a variety of private commissions.
In March, her art was accepted for inclusion in Spectrum 15 (the fantastic art genre's most prestigious annual publication), and has received several online accolades recently, including two of DeviantArt's "Daily Deviations," CGSociety's CG Choice award, and a 6-page spread in British digital art e-zine Forbidden Whispers.
In the Goth/Industrial scene, her work has most notably been shown at NC's Eccentrik Festival in Oct. '07, and at New Haven's Blacksun Festival in both '06 and '07.

Photogr aphy: Leon Armour Jr 

"The arts in its many forms, have always been a part of my life. As an only child and part of the Latch-Key generation, both parents still made time to make sure I was well educated, exposed to art, music, and theater. From the strong structured influence of a career military father to the emotional guidance of a free sprited, LIVE LIFE mother. I embraced the loving, stern, well traveled, multi cultural, and socially diverse upbringing they provided. I feel it made me the creative and emotional expressive artist I am today, and made the man behind the art."

When Leon was 11 years old he was given his first camera, Something that changed his life forever. At first, he was fascinated with just being able to capture a moment in time, that could later be viewed and invoke a full range of memories and feelings. Leon took the camera everywhere. By the age of 15, he had out grown his instamatic camera. He was then ready to move up to a real camera, a 35mm. He remember my Dad thinking that this was just a hobby and he was not going to buy a 15 year old kid a $500 camera. To find out how serious Leon was, he said if he could come up with half the money, he would match it. Well he worked his 15 year old butt off and earned the money. He gave Leon the other half of the money and became the proud owner of his first 35mm camera. Again the camera became an extension of him. Over the next few years, he learned as much as he could about the art of photography. Leon took classes, read books, and shot any and everything he could. This was the point where he began to draw from the other forms of art he had learned about earlier in his life, to incorporate them into the development and fine tuning of his photographic skills. There is one other thing that he did that he think enables him to capture the images he does today, he stopped LOOKING at the world and opened his eyes, and began to SEE the world.

Guest DJ: Hellraver

Hellraver first broke into underground NYC music circles over a decade ago, as both talent buyer for mega-clubs Limelight, Palladium, and Tunnel, and as the primary Industrial DJ for the city's longest running Gothic/Industrial club, Albion.  Shortly thereafter, Hellraver's reputation for hard-hitting, pulse-pounding mixes grew.  He secured residency status at Limelight and the Bank, as well as Guest DJ spots for innumerable big ticket after-show and record launch parties throughout New York City, among them, Nine Inch Nails/David Bowie, White Zombie, and Front Line Assembly.

Following his conquest of NYC, Hellraver easily acquired regular spots throughout New Jersey, and later, the entire East Coast.  It was during this time period that Hellraver sought not only to continue his DJ trajectory but to magnify his inherent music skills by creating some of the Industrial genre's most sought-after remixes; the likes of which include Think About Mutation's "Motorrazor" for German label
Machinery Records, Spahn Ranch's "The Aftermath", and My Psychotic Motor's "Let Your Mind Drain" on US-based Cleopatra Records and Suburban Dance Records, and Deathline International's "Wild Boys" on COP International Records. The remixes were well received worldwide and brought his skills into the forefront of the international music scene.  Having whet his appetite for music creation with the remixes, Hellraver then went on to form his own band, Earthshock!, creating the original track, "Fallen Angel", which appeared on Cleopatra Records' "The Unquiet Grave 2000" CD, and the cover version of Front 242's mega-hit "Rhythm of Time" for Cybertec/Cleopatra Records' tribute to the Industrial legends. Despite having traveled from coast to coast, and throughout clubs in Canada, Hellraver strongly resisted stereotyping himself as a stringently Industrial DJ.  In 1999, he shattered the boundaries of Industrial music
subculture in NYC with the introduction of a multi-dimensional, cyber-electronic music format at primary residency, AlbionBatcave. Rather than retaining the same music format and style that has garnered him great acclaim in the industry, Hellraver pushed the limits of his technique to encompass a wider range of genres, reflective of his own expansive interests.

Melding traditional, old school Industrial and its hard-hitting beats with the fluidity of Electronica and bass-heavy Techno, Hellraver has successfully bridged the long-standing chasm of the New York City club scene.  The result has been resoundingly positive, as new music-thirsty club kids crowd to AlbionBatcave at Downtime each week to sample
Hellraver's refreshingly innovative sets.  Not only does he succeed in attracting this new breed of club kids; he also welcomes in the club-weary scensters of years past.  Tired of
the same music sets, the same one-sided approach to format, and the limited variety of the crowd, old faces are resurfacing and are reveling in Hellraver's new take on the underground scene.  This, above all things, is what motivates Hellraver's work.  It's the theory that if you take several things, all similar in certain aspects, and tweak key elements of each, you can create a homogenous mixture that appeals to many, rather than one specific group.

And he also does this other music project called Terrorfakt