Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Illustration Friday..."Wrinkles"


I made a quick sketch of a woman, getting older...seeing more wrinkles every day and thinking she looks too much like her sharpe, and imagines how it would feel to live life as her puppy "wrinkles". Her friends put the final touch to her vanity and position a feather hat on her crown.
"There! Perfect and lovely!"

I tried a different approach in medium, using a black graphite pencil to outline the painting, it turned out shinier than I wanted and didn't scan so well. I used watercolor, manganese blue hue, deep scarlet, and quinacridone gold on Arches CP.

Sunday, April 27, 2008

Revived!



I attended the SCBWI conference in Belleview WA this weekend and I just returned to my partly rainy/warm residence on the hill. I don think I am over exaggerating when I confess that it was a seriously life changing and affirming experience.
Yes, I learned techniques, exercises and formulas, but the most significant realization I had was not that I only have the technical ability to create imagery, but have a spark to learn how to master storytelling. This has drawn a huge smile inside of me and I feel a new passion to treat illustrating books as a serious career.
Here are a few sketches I did during an inspirational lecture with Martha Chodos-Irvine and one at the end of a more writer focused drawn out discussion from Arthur Levine...

I highly recommend this conference to ANYONE interested in illustrating for books, it woke me up in so many ways!

Friday, April 11, 2008

Landscape


I started this thinking I might potentially submit it to 4culture's call for artists, requesting landscapes abstract or literal. Still deciding if I'll paint up a few more like it.