2015 Fall Class Demo

Each semester, I like to take a moment to talk about process, and finding one's own method of working. I use it as an excuse to paint some moody people. While watching the Three Lives of Thomasina (one of the best Disney film about a cat that brings a family together, through her mysterious death and reappearance), I sketched this sulky lass.

Viterbo 2015 (aka The Summer I Almost Melted To Death)

I'm slowly catching up with some posts here, and I am happily enjoying the New England fall weather. As I look back to my month of July spent with Fred Lynch, his family, and the journalistic drawing students I remember just how hot it was on those Italian streets. We had over 25 consecutive days of 95˚ F and above. Now, I am... as I like to say... a delicate flower. I need 70˚ or lower! HA! While I am complaining about the weather, I'd like to shift focus on the amazing students and fellow faculty members that made this summer one of the most memorable. I count myself blessed to be able to sit, observe, and record the comings and goings of this ancient town. Viterbo is a lively, gritty city full of tiny alleys and bizarre adventure. I just needed a few months to cool off afterward! Here are a few of the scenes I was able to capture.

Inktober and The Alien

Fall is in full swing, but temperatures are quite lovely. Perfect weather to take the saucer out a few more times before the first few flakes fall.

 My dog is quite bizarre in all senses of the word, so it only made sense to have her looming over Evergreen Street.

While I am not able to participate everyday during Inktober, I love the excuse it gives me to try something fun... and maybe a little silly!

Floral Inspiration

Today, as the temperatures struggle to go beyond 17˚, I am looking at J.J. Grandville's Les Fleurs Animées. I was able to purchase this book for my husband at Christmas along with another featuring his amazing ink work. Grandville's characters and scenes border on the absurd but always have such an amazing accuracy of personality and expression.

J.J. Grandville was born at Nancy, in northeastern France, to an artistic and theatrical family. The name "Grandville" was his grandparents' professional stage name. Grandville received his first instruction in drawing from his father, a painter of miniatures. At the age of twenty-one he moved to Paris, and soon afterwards published collection of lithographs. Grandville's ability for political provocation made his work much in demand. He worked in a wide variety of formats, from his first job illustrating the parlor game Old Maid, to illustrated newspaper strips of which he was a master. One of Grandville's supreme achievements, at a time when French printing technology was ascendant, was Les Fleurs Animées, a series of images that are both poetic and satirical. But perhaps his most original contribution to the illustrated book form was L'Autre Monde, which approaches the status of pure surrealism, despite being conceived in a pre-Freudian age. Leading members of the Surrealist movement such as André Breton and Georges Bataille recognised in Grandville a significant precursor and inspiration for the movement. The rock band Queen used part of his artwork for the cover and backcover of their 1991 album Innuendo. Even they knew how awesome Grandville's work was!