As a working artist, Greg Ruth realized that spending all your time doing work for other people can end up making it nearly impossible to create work for yourself. To remedy this, he devised a clever way of playing hooky from "real work," and thus was born The 52 Weeks Project. Greg challenged himself to create a new illustration each week, just for the heck of it. Now, thanks to an outpouring of support from friends, fans, and followers, his side project gets to take center stage. The finished book, which we received in the mail this week, contains a body of drawings that are wildly unrestrained, taking you deep into the hidden chambers of Greg's imagination. It is at once intimate, glorious, and liberating to flip through the pages of the book. 

Accompanying the book was a personal letter of thanks from Greg:

The book itself is filled with curious and bizarre images, part illustrated stream-of-consciousness and part waking dream. Insect humanoids, giant bears, samurai, and anthropomorphism abound (Totoro even makes an appearance!):

I wish I could show you every single page, because it's truly a remarkable thing to behold. As Greg reminds us in his thank you letter, "...any act of art is meaningless without someone to witness it." Here's hoping Greg continues to distract himself from real work, because I'm ready for another 52 weeks.