pets iii: semper fidelis

digital

For those who've lost a good friend or two.

holiday v: happy christmas

Yesterday our family took down the Christmas tree, and I thought perhaps I ought to post this past year's Christmas card before the season disappears completely from people's collective consciousnesses.

A few months ago, my learned colleague and I attended a letterpress workshop, where we relived the vigor of our student days making holiday cards.  My homework I display for you here below.

It was a funnish workshop.  I recommend it to anyone with spare cash, a free weekend, and the vaguest of interest in letterpress.  I see no bright future in the craft for myself but I'm glad that I took it, had my moment of self-discovery, and acquired a new skill.

This season, if you were lucky (or unlucky, however way you see it: half-empty, half-full) you received this collaborative effort pictured below.

This prim, little fellow was engineered by aforementioned learned colleague and for a goodish amount of time my dining table looked like this:

If you want a deer go here and bother learned colleague about it.  I wash my hands of this bell-spanged, Santa-serving retinue.  Jingle and jangle to Hell and back if you so please, my white paper Friends, so long as the Muse that begat you returns in eleven months' time then I don't care one whit what you do in the interim.

The accompanying card was designed and painted by yours truly (watercolor, gouache, and ink for those so curious-minded).  They were printed, folded, packed with deer, and sent out with their respective missives.

watercolor & gouache

watercolor

Hope you all had a nice holiday.  If not: keep in mind life continues on without regard to your feelings so might as well carry on with a smile.

Wish you well in 2013.

doljanchi

A doljanchi (돌잔치) is a korean first birthday celebration and it's a pretty big to-do as, up until even my own parents' generation, children didn't survive their first year of life. 

That being the case, you would think that with the advent of modern medicine and lower infant mortality rates the ceremony would have become obsolete, but, no, the tradition is going on stronger than ever.

I personally blame cameras and the internet.  

It seems to me the Korean-American crowd is more dol-crazy than even native Koreans, but that could just be because my search engines are set to English.  A bit of worldly wisdom: being selfish for your children doesn't make you selfless, my friends.

Happy first birthday to a certain awful child.  Auntie hates you.

medium: pencil, watercolor, digital

pets ii

Ripping off Madonna of the Rocks.

Madonna of the Rocks is a personal favorite of mine because I love the sketches and the angels (both angels: London and Louvre).

I know there's a whole Da Vinci controversy as to who painted what and what painted who, but I find these images curiously compelling.  Whether Da Vinci drew them or not, painted them or not, is of little concern to me; I like what I like and I can look at these all day.

medium: watercolor and gouache on watercolor board

main site siphon ii: background

This assignment came out of our background painting class. 

This was....an unusual class.  The teacher who normally taught it ended up going to the east coast for a short-term job, so instead we got a series of substitutes, starting with the ever-energetic Sam Michlap, of Dreamworks fame, who, after a four week stint of black-and-white composition boot camp, left us with these parting words: "Don't suck."  

Following him was Donivan Howard, of Disney fame, who had us crash course through the four basic compositions (abstract, deep, flat, and, for the life of me, I can't remember that last one...)

And by the 8th week, we were taking bets as to who would be our third and final substitute, when in walks none other than Mike Humphries, of just...fame.

So this was my fourth and last class with Mike, who decided to make this into an acrylics background painting class. 

good times.

medium: acrylic on watercolor board

main site siphon i: mouse house

gouache

I'm beginning the long-awaited plan to transfer some of the rougher work off my main site and integrate them here.  Shift some of the burden onto her sister site so she can handle the weightier, "portfolio" quality work. 

This was the final for our gouache techniques class at school.  It was my third class with Mike Humphries and the assignment was to design a small house made of natural materials and use it in a composition. 

Rule #1: no trees.

helen consulting with mike on her first round of sketches: "And here's one with a tree stump..."(1)

mike: "No trees!"

helen (puppy-eyed): "Not even a stump?"

mike: "Mmm, no. I want to give you a challenge."

medium: pencil (sketches), gouache on watercolor board (color keys and final art)

1.  The following dialogue is by no means accurate. The spirit of it is spot on, but the word-for-word playback is completely dependent on my incompetent memory.

intermission ii

The intermission continues.

I'm not ashamed to say that I am not above fanart.  I like me my television and movies and random, frolicsome fictions.

It's nice to get lost in different worlds and come back again with intangible treasures.  And being in the creative field, it's only natural to want to build still more onto these castles--as much as you can and as gloriously as still more can be built--before the spirited moment subsides and the remnants of our constructive effervescence washes away to be reformed, rediscovered, and rebuilt into some entirely other thing across the ocean.

That being said, I'm not sure if I'm a fan of Once Upon A Time.  I think I just don't know what to think of it.  It's different.  And different is usually awesome...but not being different for the sake of being different.  And I think the show toes that line of trying too hard.

But the characters are so fun.  They're expressive (equal parts silly and tragic), they feel like caricatures, and you get two versions of each.  That's a fun energy to play with!

medium: scanner, photoshop, pencil (not necessarily in that order)