When he lived in New York City in the late 2000s, Charleston, South Carolina-based Brian Bustos made paintings of an alien humanoid character he called Ker-ij (pronounced “courage”) “wandering around collecting light to survive on earth,” as Bustos wrote on his Instagram. In frame after frame, Ker-ij peeks out from a bundled blue coat, almost a casing, like some Studio Ghibli character passing through a neon-colored world.

“Ker-ij originated from feeling like an alien mostly,” Bustos, the PureHoney artist of the month, says by email. “I was in New York City getting on the subway and felt completely apart from the people going to work or wherever they were going. That alienation, and separateness, has subsided some over the years.”

Alienation still figures into Bustos’ art brut creations: winged skulls, medieval soldiers, human and animal figures and figurines, and cryptic texts; or vaguely geometric characters with closed eyes, bodies linked by delicate strands. “I know we are connected in ways I can’t understand,” Bustos says, “and visual work is how I communicate, when I don’t know how to say it out loud to someone.”

He’s also made sculptures, collages and original films, and he’s writing books — a versatility he attributes to restlessness. Drawing is his favorite medium. “It is immediate and fast,” he says. “And while I listen to music, or watch a movie, somehow some lyrics or sentence will work itself into the drawing and make sense somehow.”

Artwork is rendered in a child-like hand by the self-taught Bustos using paper, pen, acrylics and scavenged materials, or pieces of drop cloth like he used when he worked in set design. His pieces are often created on the road.

“When I travel,” he says, “I usually wander around the first couple of days collecting scraps of paper, pieces of wood, whatever to use in my work. Then I make the work in my motel room, or Airbnb. I think the aged scraps of paper give a memory of the painting, or drawing. If I cover it up it’s still in there.”

The traveler’s method is an outgrowth of Bustos’ early experiences. The New Jersey native grew up in a military family that moved often. As an adult he’s sold paintings on the streets of New York City, lived on a sailboat in Oregon, and later in Denver, Cleveland and Pittsburgh, before touching down in South Carolina.

“I have never had a steady studio; the work is generally always created in brief intervals at home, or in motel rooms, or even in my van sometimes,” he says. A few times a year he loads paintings into the van and drives to New York City to sell pieces on the street. Though he’s had gallery exhibitions, he says, “I still very much have a punk rock ethos about my work being affordable and doing it myself.”

His use of color is vibrant and symbolic, and grew out of a long-ago job he had at a sign-making shop. “Over time, I’ve toned them down a bit, to be less aggressive,” he says. “In paintings from asylums, or mental institutions, the colors are always bright because maybe it is the only light that he/she has. I think I fall into that category. I’m a pretty dark person sometimes.”

Bustos also credits television cartoons from childhood as an influence on his style and approach. “I think a colorful cartoon-like image allows entryway into some philosophical ideas much easier than something serious,” he says. Childhood moments that stand out for Bustos cast animated kids’ fare as a refuge. “I would lay on the floor and watch cartoons and eat french bread pizza,” he says. “I don’t think I’ve ever been more at peace.”

The memory contrasts sharply with preoccupations in his work about the rat race of adult life. “I understand you have to make a living, but sometimes I just don’t get ‘why?’ it ever got like this,” Bustos says. “I don’t have an answer, I’m just asking questions via pictures.”

Surfing, hiking and retreating to nature help Bustos stay level and productive. “I think I’m going to Costa Rica soon to paint and surf,” he says. “I’m interested to see what kind of work comes from spending awhile doing my two favorite things next to a volcano.”

Find Brian Bustos at instagram.com/jungle_grundle and brianbustos.weebly.com. Read the full artist interview at purehoney.com ~ Kelli Bodle and Sean Piccoli