The other day this spiritual woman told me that my work contained the essense of the subject rather than the subject containing the essense of the work, sounded good. I love hearing what people like and how they interpret my stuff and we talked more and she said that my flowery figurative pieces were reminiscent of an Ayahuasca journey. I asked her about Ayahuasca and she said that it was forbidden to discuss with others. Maybe not forbidden but personal, no problem, mum's the word! After talking with her I was inspired to make this piece, I drank a few cups of coffee before I started.
Here are a few new illustrated DVD covers for the good folks at Lynda.com. Are there any other educators out there using Blackboard 9? I am getting up to speed with the program and migrating all class handouts and assignments to Blackboard. Actually, I haven't started yet but I'll figure it out by tomorrow afternoon.
The sea is very clear and the bottom becomes fantastic with hurrying, fighting, feeding, breeding animals. Crabs rush from frond to frond of the waving algae. Starfish squat over mussels and limpets, attach their million little suckers and then slowly lift with incredible power until the prey is broken from the rock. And then the starfish stomach comes out and envelops its food. Orange and speckled and fluted nudibranchs slide gracefully over the rocks, their skirts waving like the dresses of Spanish dancers. And black eels poke their heads out of crevices and wait for prey. . . . A wave breaks over the barrier, and churns the glassy water for a moment and mixes bubbles into the pool, and then it clears and is tranquil and lovely and murderous again.
Cannery Row, John Steinbeck
I fell in love with sea creatures through my families many childhood camping trips along the west coast beaches and the sea of cortez. It was the tide pools that did it for me, micro worlds of strange and fantastic sea creatures. My brothers and I would sit, watch and explore until the next tide came in. That was then and this is now.
When the BP oil spill disaster hit it was so upsetting and then I heard on the radio that endangered sea turtles were being burned alive in oil slicks in an effort by BP to minimize the uncontrollable surface oil. This event was just too much so I created 2 personal pieces in response.
Sea Turtle 1 | Monotype | 12"x15"
A week or so after I posted my work to Drawger I was contacted by the Sea Turtle Restoration Project and they invited me to be a featured artist at an upcoming art show and auction titled, Save Them All. This invitation was a honor and I created these new Monotypes for the show. If you are in San Francisco Saturday August 14th please come by for music, food and art. I will have a space selling original work. Funds raised will help the Sea Turtle Restoration Project (STRP) restore endangered habitat destroyed by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. This event is sponsored by Deutsch Design Works.
Sea Turtle 2 | Monotype | 12"x15"
BP is currently spending millions on their PR effort with one task changing the name of the spill from, "The BP Oil Spill" to, "The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill"
Sea Turtle 3 | Monotype | 12"x15"
The Gulf of Mexico supports an estimated 1,000 functioning oil rigs and an uncounted thousands of abandoned rigs.
This was an assignment for Brown Alumni Magazine. The story was about a hair-raising day of combat in Afghanistan from the perspective of a military doctor and Brown Alum. This doctor worked in the Helmand Province and the Now Zad District Center and I used Google Image search to view the area of combat and it is not pretty, I really feel for our armed forces and their families. Titled, "Through the Fog" this story describes the emotional experience of “The fog of war” which is a phenomenon unique to armed conflict. It is the intangible force that encompasses the uncertainty, ambiguity and complexity of war. I worked with Design Director Lisa Sergi who commented after receiving my sketches, "Push it further, you can go abstract". How often do you hear, "Push it further" ? Thank you, Lisa!
Sitting around waiting for the phone to ring ain't my cup of tea. When I don't have a commission I do 4 things. First, I ride my bicycle and after that I pull weeds in the yard and then I panic and finally,,, I start making some work and feel right. Here are some new Monotypes that I created over the last couple days. There is some motive behind the pieces. I was invited to have a booth at the Lake Tahoe GreenFEST a couple of weeks ago and I went for it. It was much more fun than you would have thought so I signed up for "Truckee Thursday" the following week. Truckee was good so I made these pieces for this Thursday. If you are interested in any of these please let me know.
Available
Available
Sold
This series of work was loosely inspired by the 1992 song, "Blood of Eden" by Peter Gabriel and produced by Daniel Lanois. But, I found this while looking for it, a favorite, enjoy.
Here are some new illustrated DVD covers for the good folks at Lynda.com. I am a big fan of the graphic work of M.C. Escher and I saw a retrospective of his work at the Crocker Art Museum a few years ago and I was completely blown away. I was so intrigued with his work that I didn't look up to read anything about the mans life. Who did he do these pieces for and why, were they commissioned? hmmm, don't know. I can't think of any other artist whose work embraces the spirit of modern technology the way Escher's work does. No surprise that he influenced some of these new pieces.
OneNote 2010 by Microsoft
Avid Media Composer 5 “The worlds fastest film and video editing system”
More Than A Feeling | Oil on Wood Panel | 12" x 15" x 2" | 2010
Cathie and Edel did a rockin' job of putting together a show at La Luz de Jesus during ICON 6, The Illustration Conference. Here is the piece that I made for the show. I hope that you can all make it to the opening. KABOOM!
works by Picture Mechanics La Luz de Jesus Gallery
July 14, 6-11 pm
I created these pieces in response to the latest news that endangered sea turtles have become victims of BP's controlled burning of oil slicks. This environmental disaster is beyond belief. To learn about the Sea Turtle Restoration Project.
I was on a big M.C. Escher kick while designing this title, here are todays sketches for a new Lynda.com DVD release, Revit 3. This application can be purchased within the suite of AutoCAD. Revit is purpose-built for building information modeling (BIM), Autodesk® Revit® Architecture building design software that helps architects and designers capture and analyze early concepts, and then better maintain designs through documentation and construction. Users will enjoy a more collaborative, integrated building design process by sharing essential BIM data with the partners, and use BIM workflows to help drive more efficient sustainable design analysis, clash detection, construction planning, and material fabrication. Hmm, I wonder which sketch they will pick?
The New York Society of Illustrators informed me that this piece created for SooJin Buzelli at Plansponsor Magazine from the Editorial show has been selected for this years Illustrators 52 traveling show. This exhibition will be touring different galleries and schools across the United States. The tour dates are from September 2010 through July 2011.
This will be a big week for Lynda.com DVD covers. Here is a detail from my Perl 5 cover I finished last week and today I will be starting the final art for SharePoint 2007 Designer and Word 2010 and design work on SharePoint 2010. Thank you, Lynda.com for all of the fun jobs.
This week I will be making more progress on this family portrait. This is my first commission for a family portrait and I am having a blast!. This is an oil painting and it is big, 24"x31".
The Society of Illustrators is preparing a show with an environmental theme EARTH: Fragile Planet and I have been selected as one of the artists to participate in the show. The exhibit will be divided into 5 sections: Air, Earth, Water, Energy and Wildlife. I have been selected to create a piece responding to the Energy theme and I am honored and excited to get started on the piece. This show is Curated by Gregory Manchess and Jack Unruh with Co-curators Tara Jacoby and Kate Feirtag. This show is scheduled for June 3, 2010 through July 31, 2010.
