Art Day with Sydney

For our Spring Break week my daughter and I came up with an activity for every day, and Thursday was "Make Art All Day" day. I cut up a bunch of cardboard for us to paint on and to build with. In fact it was so much fun that we decided to continue it but alternate with Sketch Klubb for an every other Saturday schedule. Here are a few of the things I made: Two small acrylic paintings on cardboard and a small bungalow house also from cardboard.

Center for Cartoon Studies Awareness Week

I want to encourage everyone interested in cartooning to check out the Center for Cartoon Studies. In case you weren't reading my blog last summer I took an awesome workshop there and wish like the Dickens I could go back (maybe someday). If you want to take cartooning to the next level that's the place to go, and you can get an MFA and draw on the experience of the best in the business. There is still time to apply for the fall semester so I encourage you to check it out!

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More odds and ends from my sketch books. The Lobster Johnson was based on an old pulp cover I saw. I need to expand on that one.

Snow Angels

The commissioned work from the fall that was designed to fit in a number 10 envelope made me think it would be fun to make our card that format this year too. The only drawback is we had to buy a box of 500 envelopes! Sheesh. I also like to dabble in that "no outline" style every once and a while for fun. Happy Holidays everyone!

SK Christmas Swap

Last year we did a White Elephant for our Christmas Party, but to avoid having to get stuff we don't want or need this year we each brought a piece of art instead. We just put all our names in a hat and each got another SK artwork. I did a little Christmas dame based on an old pinup magazine cover. This is the G version, the original is a little more PG-13 (just contact me if you would like to see it). Eric Pearce was the recipient of mine which is pretty lucky since he's a big Dan DeCarlo fan. This one is ink and Prismacolor Pencil on chipboard.

T. E. Lawrence

As played by Peter O'Toole in the film "Lawrence of Arabia". For my art teacher holiday gift exchange this year we gave the name of a celebrity we wanted to receive art of, but we didn't know who the art was going to be for. After checking out all the possibilities online and changing my mind a few times I chose this image mostly because he was young and it was also his most sexy role. It was also more challenging for me because it's always harder to draw attractive people that craggily old faces with lots of character. Every little subtle stroke can make a huge difference in capturing the likeness.

I also used one of my vintage frames for this project.

Painted this sketchbook cover

I'm trying to paint them all. Not all the sketchbooks in the world, just mine. And why am I always drawing myself I'm often asked? I have no good answer for that one.

Andre Delambre walking Diptera

The time has come once again for DOMY Books annual Monster Show. I had this idea for the Human Fly to continue my mundane classic monster series last year, but was too swamped with school to knock it out. Better a year later than never!

Bat Mitzvah

I recently got a commission for a bat mitzvah illustration and invitation design. Luckily the client is a professional photographer and he got a great shot of her in a grove of live oaks hanging onto one of those long low branches. The ceremony is at 10:30 am and the party is at 7 pm, so my idea was to make it two sided with a day side that has with her and the tree and a night side with her gone (presumably at the party).

Let's Swing!

We volunteered to create the marketing materials for Harvard Elementary's Winter Auction when we heard the theme was swing dancing. The committee had seen and really liked my work, and thought I would be perfect for making the illustrations (for reasons obvious to readers of this blog). It was hard to decide on a pose since most of what pops up in a search is people flying though the air, and really a function like this is more swing music than swing dancing.

The Center for Cartoon Studies

Over the Summer I went up to Vermont for a summer workshop on cartooning at CCS in White River Junction. It was an intensive, one week program to help you get a kick-start into cartooning with classes, help from the pros and lots of studio time. It really helps you get past the old "what should I do next" syndrome. I also wanted to others teaching cartooning so I could maybe improve my cartooning classes. The goal of the week was determined by each student, but most were able to complete an entire mini-comic. My project was to work on a story my friend Shannon Rasberry has been writing. I wont get into too much detail on the story, but I was able to storyboard the first chapter, tight pencil and ink the first five pages, which was about a page finished a day which they told me was a very solid rate. So enough words...time for pictures.

Lobster Johnson in a Rat Rod?

Of course, why not!?! This was a sketch for the Austin Sketch Squad blog, the theme being hot rods this time. I recently finished reading "The Satan Factory" (a Lobster Johnson novel) and it was still fresh in my mind and I'm always looking for an excuse to draw him. I'm going to try and make the time to ink and color this before the end of the summer. Heck I should just do an entire comic, right!

9th Annual Luck Of The Draw

Time again for the Luck Of The Draw Art Auction Fundraiser at Diverse Works Art Space. I couldn't squeeze it in last year so I made it a point to start early. This year the theme is "The Musical", so I thought I would make the proverbial fat lady, but I think she just turned out mostly super curvey. I couldn't get over there last night but I hope the show was a success!

Pinup for Kyle

One of my students has been working on a comic for Cartooning class in which he has a character who looks very much like me (a lot of them seem to do this for some reason). Anyway, one of our assignments was to work on pinup art and how it is not specifically cheesecake but really just one artists take on another artists character. So, long story short my student Kyle asked me to make a pinup of his two main characters and here is the result. Since the character based on myself is the “sidekick” to the main one I decided to make him the overzealous, gung-ho, annoying type.

Ferdinand the Bull

Here is the latest illustration in my long history of working with Stages Repertory Theatre's kid programming. This spring they are putting on a production of Ferdinand the Bull so I was glad to help. I've been experimenting a lot more with different brushes and textures, and I also decided to just go with the tight pencil this time instead of inking it for a change (I very rarely do that).

Combo Supreme Please!

This little mash-up is for the Austin Sketch Squad gang which I hope and plan on being a little more regular contributing to, especially now that school is almost out. I missed a few themes so to catch up I combined "Gangster", "Disguise", "Robot" and "It Came From Outer Space". I actually think it's fun when I combine themes like that, maybe we should randomly combine topics every time.

Who Arted?

This is just a little 'ol t-shirt design I made for my art department at the high school where I teach. Our department head Lisa S. came up with the tag, I made the art, Drew and Meghan had the shirts made (and of course a shout out to Vickie for team spirit!) They are a school approved shirt so we hope to have every kid in one of these babies. Sketch Klubb fans will probably recognize the "Brap" cloud.

The Idea Fund

This year Sketch Klubb was awarded an Idea Fund Grant. Here is the official spiel: Through the Warhol Foundation Initiative, Aurora Picture Show, DiverseWorks and Project Row Houses have come together to support art at its source by providing direct grants to artists. The Idea Fund provides cash awards to artist-generated or artist-centered projects that exemplify the unconventional, interventionist, conceptual, entrepreneurial, participatory, or guerrilla artistic practices that occur outside of the traditional frameworks of support. Basically they are giving up a nice amount of cash, and we are going to put on a more elaborate Nerd Garage Sale this summer. A kind of Flea Market meets Sideshow Freak Carnival show. More details to come on that. Here are some photos from the reception on January 21 at Diversworks Artspace.

SKNY

My art collective had a show at the Texas Firehouse Gallery in New York City on November 21, 2009. I know I posted a sketch earlier about this but I've been uber busy with school, that's my only excuse. You can read more about Sketch Klubb here. 2009 was kind of the year of gallery shows for Sketch Klubb with the Houston, Austin and NYC shows, but we are going to stop those for a while. The best thing about the New York show was just being there with the guys. Here are a few photos from the trip. Good times.

Robot Petrushka

The art teachers in the Alvin ISD High Schools got together and had a secret Santa exchange this year, with everyone picking a theme ahead of time. I got Meghan Anderson and her theme was Robots (very cool!) I have always wanted to do a petrushka doll set and this seemed like the perfect opportunity, so after doing a few little thumbnails in my sketchbook I primed and painted the wooden dolls with that chrome spray paint. Then I painted on the details with a Pitt Brush pen and then sealed it with Crystal Clear. Now I want to make some more!

Happy Holidays!

Here is this years card, and as a first I'm also going to include the process by popular request. First I did a little blue pencil sketch about 3 inches tall, then did a tighter graphite pencil over the top. Scanned that in and enlarged to 8"x10" and tweaked it a little. Printed that out and then inked on hot press Bristol Board and Pitt Pens. Scanned that in and then did all the color in Photoshop (you'll notice that I even changed a few things on the inked art in Photoshop even at that stage). I'm really in to trying to simulate a watercolor look these days, although I still like to do the real thing.

NYC Placemat

Just got back from NYC (more on that later). Here is a little sketch I made on a placemat at a diner close to our gallery. We were right on the East River and I could see the Chrysler Building peeking over the other buildings from where I was sitting.

Evolve Group Show

On Friday and Saturday I was a part of a group show called Evolve at Winter Street Studios here in Houston. It was mostly a bunch of old friends from the long gone Houston Society of Illustrators. It was great seeing everyone again after so many years, and I even made a little cash to boot. That's Sydney in the lower top photo. All photos by Miss Anne.

Drawing At School

I apologize for the lack of posts, but for those who don't know I just started teaching High School Art so I've been rather über busy. I'm teaching mostly Cartooning and Digital Graphics and Animation. It's amazing that they offer stuff like this for kids now days, they really don't have any idea how lucky they are. Every once in a while I'll sit down with them and draw the same project (hopefully more in the future), and here is a little something I did today. Pencil on paper.

Elephant for Lunch

Sydney had a field trip to the Zoo which called for a little art for the lunch. No bag this time though, it had to be in a clear, zip-lock bag (so they can throw them all in the cooler I guess). So option two is a napkin drawing. I think I was channeling a little Suess on this one.

Sketch Klubb: Houston's hardest crew

Our opening last night was covered by the online arts people at the Houston Chronicle. There's even a video interview with Russell and Rene and a shot of a spread that shows a page of my drawings, pretty cool! Check it out quick!

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Odds and ends from Sketch Klubb. Our show is this Saturday, June 20th at The Joanna. If you are in Houston come by between 7pm and whenever to see what a bunch of weenies we are.

Peter & The Wolf

Another illustration for Stages Repertory Theatre. This production is modernized a little I think (the duck doesn't die in this one). These are always a lot of fun. Inked, scanned then colored in Photoshop.

Days Long Past, No. 21

This is the latest for the DLP sketchbook, drawn while at ComicPalooza (see previous post). This image was found in a stock photo book. Pitt Brush pen and green Copic marker on paper.

ComicPalooza 09

Comicpalooza is the free comic festival held each year here in Houston. I'd never actually been myself because it involves leaving the safety of the "inner loop", but a bud of mine from Scanner Darkly days (Kennon James) asked if I would share a table with him on Artist's Row. Now I've never done something like this before so I didn't know what to expect but it was a lot of fun, and I actually made back my investment too. When I do something like this again I'll be more prepared by having more things to sell. As it was I just put together a couple of Ash Cans to sell. One with monster art and the other with the old photos I like to copy. It was fun just to sit there and draw all day too, but people do have a lot of strange questions.

Stone Soup

Sydney's first grade class put on a production based on the Stone Soup story. I did this quick illustration for the program cover.

Deiselpunk Factory

At least that's what it reminds me of. I especially love the giant analog gauges on the giant wall instrument panel. Can't remember where I found this photo though. Pitt pens and Copic markers on paper.

Two Ladies and a Beach

I haven't been working in my Days Long Past sketchbook lately, trying to remedy that. Pitt pen and watercolor on paper.