Romy, pigma micron on Rives BFK, 22 x 28 inches, 2009. Click image to see it on Flickr.
This portrait of romy owens (whom you may have read about here) was created for the Seeing Other People show earlier this year. This piece will also be in the 24 Works On Paper show.
Yes, it did take a long time, about 40 hours.
Special thanks to Kelsey Karper for getting the photo for me.
Cover illustration for Friskee Trax 4 compilation from Friskee Media. Ink on found paper, 2009. Click image to view larger.
My friend Josh Heilaman of Friskee Media commissioned this cover for the Friskee Trax Compilation vol. 4. Head on over to the Friskee site to sample the tasty beats buffet.
The original drawing is about 5 inches square, a marker drawing on an old map.
Alison Bechdel is the creator of the comic strip Dykes To Watch Out For. Her recent book, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, is a frank and tender deconstruction of her childhood and adolescence. It's never easy to understand one's parents from an adult perspective, and Bechdel uses Fun Home to explore her father's identity through fresh eyes.
Note: If you are reading this blog (and watching the videos) in Firefox, good for you! (If not, please switch browsers right away. You won't regret it.) Since you are a savvy Firefox user, you might benefit from the Flashblock plugin, which reduces the load time for web pages with embedded videos.
This is your brain on vacation.
As you may have read, I have a piece in the Society of Illustrators Annual 51. The show for the Book and Editorial categories has opened, and I'll be attending the awards night this Friday, February 6th, with friends and family.
Other things I plan to do in New York include: Walking a lot Eating a lot, for example, at Sakagura Attending the Society's weekly Jazz & Sketch night on Thursday Catching the end of the James Jean show Kindling at Johnathan LeVine Gallery And maybe getting a haircut
Ciao!
p.s. Thanks to Shanna at Blue 7 for helping me find something respectable to wear.
Anonymous Niece, acrylic and colored pencil on Rives BFK, 2009. Click image to see full-size.
To learn more about Illustration Friday, click here.
Anonymous Niece was created for Seeing Other People, a show of contemporary portraiture by Oklahoma Artists. The show hangs in the OKC Underground Invited Artists Gallery from January to April 2009. There will be an opening reception this coming Thursday, January 22, from 5:30 to 7:30 pm. Please join us!
To create this fictional portrait, I worked from several photographic sources. My primary source was a picture I found in a stack of old family photos. There is no information on the photograph identifying the subject, just the name of the portrait studio: Jamiesons Studios, 3A High Street, Wrexham. (A quick search tells me that Wrexham is in northeast Wales, the country my family came from two generations ago. So it is likely the girl in the photograph is a distant relative.)
Following is a list of movies I listened to (on headphones, from my portable dvd player) while I worked on Anonymous Niece.