Spontaneous Monsterfication: Local (and this week's cover) artist Dan Smith’s “52 in 52” exhibit, currently on display at Flicker Theatre & Bar, provides a crowd of brightly colored and boldly outlined cartoon monsters, calaveras, luchadores and other randomly personified objects like a tooth, pickle, pair of underwear, light bulb and block of cheese.

“It’s the lowbrow art of skateboards, tattoos, cartoons, comic books, graffiti and the like that I’d consider my biggest influence and a high art form in its own right,” says Smith. The influence of early Mexican printmaker José Posada, best remembered for his satirical black-and-white calavera engravings, is also evident through Smith’s frequent use of festive Dia de los Muertos skull imagery and the inclusion of “A Few Calaveras,” a small collection of works appearing alongside “52 in 52.”

After a stint of creating primarily large-scale abstract paintings while pursuing a BFA in Painting and Drawing and a MFEd in Art Education at UGA, Smith returned to the more cartoonish style of his youth, incorporating techniques introduced by famed skateboarding artists Mark Gonzales and Ed Templeton.

“Thrasher Magazine was like an art magazine to me. Skateboarding turned me on to punk rock culture, which was brimming with outstanding ‘low art’ and this spectacular energy,” he says of his teenage years. “Now, as a dad and an elementary art teacher, I have a constant connection to all the cartoons and creative stuff that kids are seeing today, just like I did when I was young. So, I guess my art helps me refuse to grow up in a way.”

Painting on a strict one-per-week schedule with Saturday nights as the deadline, the mission of generating 52 paintings within 52 weeks was carried out between January and December of 2011. While the ultimate goal was, of course, to end the year with a large body of work in hand, a significant part of the experience was the commitment of setting aside time each week to dedicate solely towards creating art.

“I painted one of them on a trip to the beach, so I didn’t even take a week off for vacation,” Smith says.

Smith also has a separate art exhibit currently on display at Kumquat Mae (18 Barnett Shoals Rd., Watkinsville). “Assorted Fun Size Paintings,” named after the popular miniature candies handed out to trick-or-treaters at Halloween, features a random selection of recently finished works, as well as some dusted off from the archive. Both “52 in 52” and “Assorted Fun Size Paintings” will be on display through the month of October, and a closing reception for the latter will be held Sunday, Oct. 28, at 3 p.m.

"Mornings Are Evil" by fantasy illustrator Mark Helwig is on display at the Baxter Street Jittery Joe's through October.

Magic, Myths and Mayhem: Halloween is nothing without the suspension of disbelief towards the supernatural, and each of science fiction and fantasy illustrator Mark Helwig’s seven pieces, on display at Jittery Joe’s (1480 Baxter St.) through Nov. 15, offer viewers an escape into an imaginary world. In the cleverly titled oil painting “Still Life,” a woman holding a feather duster lies lifelessly beside the shadowy stone statue of a dignified looking vampire head. In “Gastro-Fiend,” a horrific, hairy creature with glowing, red eyes and a drooling, fanged mouth leers around the corner of a dimly lit city street. Influenced by pioneers such as Michael Whelan, The Brothers Hildebrandt and Frank Frazetta, each of Helwig’s works hold the ability to convey its own story within a single, enchanting scene. Helwig, who teaches courses including Beginning Fantasy Illustration and Basic Drawing locally at the Lyndon House Arts Center, works professionally in the field of fantasy art by creating book covers and gaming illustrations, and can be found participating in conventions such as DragonCon and ConNooga.

Bloody Beauties: Keith P. Rein’s “Slaughterhouse Starlets” series, on display at Walker’s Coffee and Pub through October, includes a collection of portraits of actresses depicted through an unexpected lens of horror and sensuality. Because none of them are characteristically associated with slasher films, each featured actress, despite her bloodied weapon of choice, remains more alluring than frightening. A mischievous Emma Stone stretches coyly in lingerie as she holds a baseball bat spiked with nails behind her back, while deer-in-the-headlights Zooey Deschanel clutches a dripping fire axe and experiences a nip slip. Mary-Louise Parker, smiling over her shoulder while wearing nothing but a bright green apron, best exemplifies the juxtaposition between their pleasant demeanors and heinous crimes, as she carries a chainsaw in one hand and a pie in the other. While it may have been easier to secure reactions of fear or disgust by drawing from the abundance of actresses already known for their roles in horror films, there’s something much more unsettling, and maybe even amusing, about Rein’s choice of nice girls doing naughty things.