Here’s the CMYK companion piece to RGB. It’s smaller at about 16″ x 16″. I did it to hang in a show that was themed 3 Color. Well no, I did it because it was in my head, but it was nice to be able to hang it in a show. Personally, I consider black and white to be colors, but the parameters of the show said they weren’t so I got to bend the rules a bit. One thing about ‘rules’ are that you have to find which you want to play by and which you don’t. For instance, to me assemblage should be made from found objects. Yet, I ‘found’ the ping-pong balls in a store. It’s the only new object in the work, but I bent the rule I have in my head to make the piece better. It’s interesting to me to watch artists develop styles or ideas and then step away or push them further to make the art more interesting.
Sometimes I like to mess about with assemblage art. I find it fascinating that you can take a bunch of parts of things or found objects and combine them, sort them, arrange them into a larger work of art. I did this work for a show out of all recycled materials plus glue and paint. It’s called RGB. I’m currently working on a companion piece for it called CMYK. I also find it interesting to work in an abstract ideas. I really enjoy telling stories and most of my ideas and art end up being stories but when I get involved in abstract, I find it brings me back to focusing on elements and principles of art.
Where do ideas come from? Everywhere for me. Sometimes I hear people say things, I read a story, I see something beautiful; all of these things and more will make ideas pop into my head. A lot of times it something plus an idea in my idea. This 2 minute sketch of the first appearance of Michonne on The Walking Dead show was actually a real scene. But then I heard Laurie Holden (Andrea in the show) say that this new character was Andrea’s new BFF. So all that combines in my brain in a Chibi anime style. And I did this sketch on the dry erase board on the fridge while waiting for the tea to heat up. Also dry erase markers and board are hard to work with! They are very slick. Still it’s fun to have the board cause it’s like sand drawings on the beach. Not perfect and not permanent.
For me, over the last about two years, my style has really solidified. It’s been in short bursts and has been greatly aided by doing ATCs. I think signing up, having a deadline, picking topics that are both easy and not so easy have pressed my style far ahead of where it has been stuck. There are a couple of big factors that have also contributed to my current art state, but more on those later.
I think I can track the changes to this little Halloween piece I did. I have been sketching with Sharpies for many years; they are easy to carry, waterproof, they look good color-wise and they show a nice range on many papers. This Halloween piece was the first time I did an illustration in Sharpie instead of acrylic inks. I like acrylic inks and I still use them, but they are messy and not portable. Still, I had a lot to learn in terms of Sharpie use and line weight, which is easier with acrylic ink.
Do jack 'o' lanterns dream?, 8" x 10", watercolor, ink
Bad Lion, 2.5" x 3.5", wc & ink
Well I’m back to the beginning Vizzini! Actually with the new updated WordPress, I think the gallery pages are better. I’m rewarding myself with a day of board gaming at a friends house. I’m sure over the next few days I’ll make some other tweaks like adding alternate text and more SEO stuff, but now at least I’m not on edge about my site not being available!
OOPS! ihad a bad install of wordpress that crashed and burned when i did a thing! also i don’t know php. i wish we had those plug in brain computers like in the Matrix. bear with me while i rebuild!