Airbender Time

Brushing up on my Illustrator skills.

Chalk the Block and My Newest Mailer.

This September, I got to do some chalk artwork at Chalk the Block in Easton, OH again.  Since it's a family event, I wanted to make a family-centered image that was also focused on the season.  Here are some of the thumbnails and sketches I came up with while still working out my idea.

 

Here are some process images from putting the drawing on the sidewalk.  We were given Blick soft pastels, and I was able to finish my square well under the six hour time limit.

I really liked the results and wasn't tired of the image, so I decided to paint it with watercolors.  When expanding the sketch, I decided that I wanted to make this my next postcard.  I expanded the top to make room for my name, and used some of the initial sketches from the project on the back of the postcard.

 

Maybe you'll see this in your mailbox at the end of the month!

Rock the Ville

Last week I participated in Rock the Ville in Westerville, Ohio.  I got a 10x10 foot square and a couple boxes of pastels and the opportunity to make whatever I wanted.

The image I chose was one that I made for a small pastel piece a few months ago.  After a long, drawn out argument with the pastels, the original drawing is sitting, unfinished, next to my desk.

 

I changed the composition to fit a square, keeping most of the elements of the first one intact.  I am just now noticing that I forgot the mohawk-seahorse, which makes me a little sad.  I do plan on painting this one at some point, so don't fret, little mohawk-seahorse, your day shall come.

 

 

 

 

 

I really enjoy the opportunity to make art in public.  I had little kids, impressed, asking me how I learned to "draw so good." Stay in school kids, stay in school.

Sketchbooks

Ever since my first trip to the Illustration Academy, sketchbooks have been vital to my artmaking practice.  I kept sketchbooks before then, but it wasn't the same.  After seeing beautiful sketchbooks by illustrators like Sterling Hundley, and my classmates like William Godwin, I knew that they could be a place for experimentation and observation as well as a place to get your ideas out.  I decided to document some of my sketchbooks here today, some of which I have never documented at all.

 

A good number of my sketchbooks are handmade by Nicki Crock.  Her generosity in making them for me allows me to control the type (or usually types) of paper that go into them, size, thickness, and what they generally look like.  This allows for lots of fun.  I have sketchbooks covered in fur, hand-dyed fabric, and old clothes with the pockets still attached.

With these two books, we played with different kinds of closures.  The first is held closed with magnets, which are embedded in the board of the cover.  The second uses a flap with clasps.

 

Hairy sketchbooks.

 I do still buy sketchbooks once in a while.  Hand Book sketchbooks are a personal favorite.  They're Moleskine-sized but have much nicer paper that takes watercolor paint very well.

 

Sketchbooks are personal for me, like visual diaries.  I can often flip through a book and remember where I was, what I was doing, who I was with, and what made me want to draw what I was drawing.  This one is the exception.  I don't remember where I was when I looked through it.  Flipping through these pages was a pleasant surprise, and I know I have never shown this one to anybody.

Here are some links to my other sketchbook posts over the years:

One

Two

Three

Four