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Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Lost & Found - A Mixed Media Drawing.

After two years of being out of contact, a good friend and I were able to catch up in person last week. Most of my college years were spent sitting next to this guy, both in class and out. He was someone I trusted when it came to sharing ideas, crappy drawings, or my fears of talking in front of the class. 

Something that came up during our time together the other night was my lack of a sketchbook. I feel like I've talked about this in the past (or maybe I've just been thinking it), but I almost never sit down and draw anymore. I usually figure out what I want to work on, gather my reference, and work it from start to finish in one shot. At most, I have little stacks of bond paper lying around that I might rough an idea out on, and then throw back on the pile. 

So, I decided to take the first step and reclaim the cleanest sketchbook I own. Tucked inside the back of the book, I discovered a treasure: a marker and would-be colored pencil drawing that I had to have started around three years ago. I have memories of sitting behind the bar that I worked in at the time, smoking cigarettes and furiously throwing in layers of color between customers.

All of this time later, (still) sans cigarettes, I finished up the drawing. I was shocked to find that I still had the reference photos. Unfortunately, the resolution was so incredibly low that most of what ended up on the page was guess work.

No matter. I still like the color choices I made all of those years ago, and it was neat to look back and see how I was going about its creation. For sure, I've refined the process since then: smoothed things out and all.

All of that aside, I believe the drawing was totally worth salvaging and I'm glad to be sharing it with you today.

6" x 7 7/8" with a 3/4 inch border,
marker and colored pencil on marker paper.




I made good on my other promise to myself and finally scraped my oil palette as well. Hopefully I'll have some new work in that department to post here soon.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Lettering.

Calligraphy is something I used to play around with when I was younger. Any time an occasion came along that required a greeting card, my father would inevitably slide the envelope and pen my way. Recently, I decided to give the hand-lettering another try (beyond my usual birthday and Christmas cards) with a birth announcement for a friend's new addition.











The verdict? I'm rusty and need to buy paper better suited for the job (I'll think up any excuse to buy paper; I have a problem). That being said, I had fun working on this and will probably keep my pen nibs and ink within reach for a while.

Monday, January 23, 2012

A New Double-Portrait & Etsy Updates.

A new portrait on Rives bfk. I'm not certain that it's finished, but it's sprayed and put away for now.

6 1/2" x 11 1/4"




I've spent the morning winding up on coffee and making some much needed changes over at the Etsy shop. You'll have to go check out the updated/additional shots I've added to some (most) of my items!

Monday, January 16, 2012

Happy (belated) New Year!

I could kick myself for having gone so long into the new year without posting anything. Alas, we've had a few hurdles to overcome recently, so everything else had to be put on the back burner. Among the lighter of these hurdles has been the looming end of my laptop. My work horse. My holder-of-reference-and-progress-shots. It hasn't been determined yet if it is completely borked, but I'm not getting my hopes up at this point. I'd rather not dwell on what may or may not be lost if it decides to give up the good fight.

I have a mixed-media piece that I'll be posting about as soon as it's done at the framers and put into the hands of the person receiving it. Currently, I fear the ruining of the surprise, so instead, I'm going to have to bore you with a random mix of photographs. I'm finding that there are just so many things I'd like to be doing right now, that I'm unable to pick a direction at all. If I can get my head together and actually finish a few projects, I may still be able to salvage the productivity of this first month of 2012.


What would the holiday season be without the food? (Who am I kidding? Any moment of the year that isn't consumed with art and my little family is almost always lost to being a foodie.) Here are a few juicy snippets from the last month or so:


 The beautiful Jenn (ever-accommodating to our vegan ways) putting together a tasty lasagna for our pre-Christmas get-together in Tennessee:


And a few inedible shots: