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« October 2007 | Main | December 2007 »
I wish they had more squid at the zoo. I was inspired to do this by the awesome cuttlefish in the Living World portion of the St. Louis Zoo. If you sneak up on them and wave your hands at them, they'll move from one place to another and instantly change colors to match their new surroundings. Kieran and I have found tons of activities like this at the zoo to provide hours of entertainment.
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Well, I'm giving Threadless another shot. I decided to go through all my old illustrations and figure out what I might want to submit. Turns out, there are a lot of them. Here are the first two. They're just in the critique phase right now, so I'd love any comments you may have. Just think, if I win this, then I get a ton of free shirts and I won't have to do laundry for weeks! Now if I could only win some underwear to go with it...
Just click each image to go to its critique page.
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I've been having a lot of fun making these little drawings. My method consists of drawing a head, then just making lines until it looks like something. It's very freeing, and I hope to use these characters (or their traits) in larger drawings. For now, these little guys are up in my shop, and should be followed by more very shortly.
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Yeah, so I'm obsessed with mixing cute with creepy. Maybe I read too many Gorey-illustrated books as a kid. Is that such a bad thing?
I'm entering these three pieces into the Art Coop Fire Sale holiday art show. They've recently moved to a new space, which I love. It's actually directly behind the house where I grew up, and I think it's great that they're helping to build up that neighborhood with awesome artsiness.
The point of the Fire Sale art show is that buyers get to name their price in a silent auction. If you've ever wanted to get an original piece of art for $1, this may be your best chance. I'll post more info later, assuming I get in. Now, I'm off to apply.
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Some people might say that I'm obsessed with stripes. Taking a look at my outfit, I just might agree with them. I tried to figure out what it is about stripes that I love so much. The answer came to me while riding along in the Pirates of the Carribean at Disneyworld: everything striped is awesome and everything awesome is striped. Here is the list as I have compiled it so far: Cheshire Cat, pirates (of course), old-school criminals (yeah, they're awesome, so what), Beetlejuice, lots of goblins in Labyrinth as well as Toby, Alice's stockings (and don't forget her rockin' Mary Janes—even her shoes are a drug reference), Jack Skellington, jesters and/or jugglers, elves, tigers, and circus tents. I know there's more out there, so would anyone care to add to the list?
Well, these little stripey guys consumed every flat surface in my studio, as you can see:
These are for the Sampler, but if you are not a subscriber (You're not? What's your excuse?), I also have these in my shop.
I went out with Holly again last night, as well as her friend Emily and Emily's friend John. I bumped into two people I went to high school with, which was awesome. All of us, with the exception of one high school friend, went to Art Attack, where they put two paintings in a boxing ring and ask the audience to cheer for the one they like the best. The winner makes it to the next round, where it will compete against a different painting, and the loser must be purchased right away or else it gets chainsawed. All in all, a great evening, although my desire to see someone's hard work destroyed did expose a bit more of my destructive side than I'd like.
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This is next up in a series of senseless images that has popped into my brain that I have drawn without question, and I have to say this seems to be a good trend. I guess I should question myself less often. Any thoughts?
Also, I started a forum topic on Etsy asking about any and all crafty events and opportunities. As it seems that everyone cool lives in Portland, and many cool folks have commented on my blog, I can deduce that at least someone that reads this must live in Portland. (Take that, syllogism!) So, any thoughts? (Again.)
P.S.: Oregon, not Maine. I'm not exactly a lobster fan...
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Here's the "Rainbow" nymph I mentioned earlier. I haven't finished "Smoke" yet, but my sketches did yield another idea involving volcano heads and waves. We'll see where that one goes.
All these girls were starting to look like Rainbow Brite characters, so it only seems fitting to give them a rainbow-headed leader. Also, I finally have these up at the Cranky Yellow gallery if you want to see them in person.
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Yesterday, Kieran and I went to the art museum and took a few more portraits, which are up on my Flickr page. Quite inspired, I started working on some larger pieces. Usually I just make drawings and paintings that are smaller than 5" x 7", but this one is a whopping 9" x 12". I have another one that I'm planning, but it hasn't gone past the character sketch phase.
I also went to some art openings last night with an amazing artist I met at Venus Envy, Holly Gallaher. We saw one very cool installation, and now I'm inspired to go even larger than this size. I just need to find a room and an idea to put in it.
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Well, whatever these things are, they do care for their young. I suppose ghosts could do that, or sperm, or tadpoles that only ever grow one more leg. The world is such a vast and mysterious place.
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This week, I did three illustrations for Illustration Friday. The first is the Duchess from Alice in Wonderland, and the others are Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum.
There is a great video about my Girls! Girls! Girls! show at the Cranky Yellow blog. If you can't make it, this is the next best thing. And if you have already made it to the show, this will still add new dimension to my work. Or something like that.
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Please don't ask me what this is. All I know is that it wouldn't let me go to bed last night until I drew it, and I couldn't stop humming Peter and the Wolf while doing so. Given my proclivities for ghost-drawing, I'd guess it's some sort of spectre, but it's really anyone's guess. I drew more of them last night, too, so maybe when the painting is finished, we'll be able to figure this one out together.
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I'm officially obsessed. I just love coloring their hair. The one above is "Fire" and the one below is "Night Sky." I'll do "Smoke" and "Rainbow" next, I think.
I'm adding prints of these to my shop, and the originals will be available at Cranky Yellow for the duration of my show there. I wanted to make sure I didn't offend anyone with this little bit of nudity at Etsy, and it seems that I've started an interesting conversation.
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In my efforts to think outside my box, I decided (with David's help) to do some nudes. These are inspired by nature, and I like to think of them as nymphs or sprites or goddesses. I have a lot more in my head, and I can't wait to get started on them. First, however, I need to head to the art supply store to get a new palette. I've found that having a shared palette for acrylics and watercolors results in lots of gunk in my watercolors, and since I'm forcing myself to paint more, I think it's a worthy investment.
The first nude is called "River," and this one is "Plum":
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The Girls! Girls! Girls! show is up and running at Cranky Yellow. David did an amazing job making the space look spectacular, so everyone should go and have a look. The show will be up until November 30th, so you have a bit of time left to see it. Don't forget to check out the rest of the shop while you're there!
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I finished up the last of my pieces for the show on Saturday, and without a minute to spare, as you can see. While I was taking photos of the apple for the Apple Girl piece above, David somehow mystically transformed into an apple himself. I always thought I'd be the one to transform, seeing as how we are what we eat. Hmm...
And I finished the two long-necked girls. I liked doing these drawings, but I'm getting really tired of coloring things digitally. Now that I've tried acrylic, I'm not sure I can go back. Hmm, again...
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