Your Heart is as Black as Night

I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas!

I was contacted by fellow illustrator Philippe Debongnie to collaborate with his blog Jazz and Draw. It was an honor to be contacted by him, and I'm grateful for the opportunity! It was a wonderful present to see my contribution posted recently.

I can't remember anymore how I stumbled across Melody Gardot's music due to my incredible memory, but I'm glad I did because I love her deep, husky voice. Not only that, her story is amazing - music has literally saved her life. You can read about it here.

Your Heart is as Black as Night.

7.25 x 10" watercolor paper.

Graphite + acrylic.

I may not be able to post until next year, so if not I wish you all a safe, happy new year! See you in 2012~

And while we're at it

I made a gif showing the process of my previous painting, 'You're In Love Again.' First gif I ever made!

Boy

I did an accompanying piece to the 'Girl' portrait I did earlier.

Boy.

4 x 5" Stonehenge paper.

Graphite + acrylic.

I think they make a rather cute little pair :]

You're In Love Again

I've been working on this on and off for quite a while, letting it sit around my workspace in various stages of completion.

This piece was inspired by Jacob Borshard's song 'You're In Love Again.' It's a bittersweet song about being on the unfortunate end (angle?) of a love triangle featuring a ukelele! Nice to hear the instrument being used in a different style than Hawaiian music, like I'm used to.

In Victorian times, the yellow rose symbolized jealousy, but now it can also be interpreted as a sign of friendship or sympathy. Ivy is associated with fidelity, friendship, affection, survival, and determination.

You're In Love Again.

10 x 14" watercolor paper.

Graphite + acrylic.

I also entered it as a CD mock-up for Laminate's Most Wanted 2 inspired by James Jean and Lori Earley. Please take a look at the amazing entries (including one by my friend Sunny Gu) and vote here!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone's having a great Thanksgiving!

I've been kind of restless lately, hopping from project to project.

Since Black Friday is, well, tomorrow, I'm going to say... I have a weakness for accessories – rings, earrings, necklaces, and so on. It's terrible, and of course I magically find things I like at inopportune times. Here are some recent acquisitions:

Is anyone going to attempt to shop tomorrow? I'm amazed people were camping out at the beginning of this week to get deals...

Persephone

8 x 10" Arches paper.

Graphite + acrylic.

--

Persephone became Queen of the Underworld when Hades, god of the Underworld, kidnapped her. He burst out of the Underworld on a chariot, grabbing her while she was picking Narcissus flowers. Persephone's mother Demeter, goddess of harvest, was distraught and searched everywhere for her daughter. She refused to allow anything to grow on the earth until Zeus stopped avoiding her questions and helped her.

Zeus, not wanting everything to be destroyed, demanded that Hades return Persephone. As she was leaving, Hades offered her a pomegranate, which she ate the seeds of before returning to the surface. Whether or not she was tricked depends on what translation you read, but since she ate food from the Underworld, she would have to return to the Underworld three months out of the year. This, according the the mythology, is what causes the changes in seasons.

This is a pretty basic summary. You can read a more thorough version of the story here.

The pomegranate itself has polarizing meanings across cultures, from the fruit of the dead to symbolizing good health and fertility.

--

I also drew from this video, which I advise you not to watch if you're sensitive to potentially disturbing imagery of a gory, violent, sexual kind. Or if you're not into music erring on the 'loud' side (sorry, I'm not so good at the genre thing).

Er... well I guess the preview shot on this video kind of says it all.

Happy Halloween everyone ;]

Little Portrait III

4 x 5" Stonehenge paper.

Graphite + acrylic.

Chasing Shadows

3.5 x 5" Stonehenge.

Graphite + acrylic.

I've been liking how the cuts, materials, and silhouettes of clothing are playing with what's hidden, what's visible, and what's suggested.

WeLoveFine! T-shirt

Remember those little hint pictures? They were for WeLoveFine!'s steampunk T-shirt design competition. Here is my submission:

Admittedly I'm not an expert on the steampunk style, but I did some research and I grew up on Hayao Miyazaki's films – I would watch My Neighbor Totoro repeatedly when I was little. I always think of his beautiful flying scenes (hence the Laputa: Castle in the Sky and Howl's Moving Castle images) and the thoughtful design of all the machinery. I read in an interview he tends to include at least one scene of flying because it's a form of liberation, and I'm inclined to agree :]

You can vote and see more of the awesome designs here.

Quick little portrait II

Here is yet another little portrait I did. I made myself use only colors I typically wouldn't think of using for skin tone, and I think it turned out well :]

3.5 x 5" Stonehenge paper.

Graphite, acrylic, digital.

And here is a sneak peek of references for an upcoming idea. What could all of these things mean? Hmm...

source

source

source

source

source

via tumblr

P.S. I just noticed that I typo'd the last portrait post. I know how to spell... yes...

Alaska

Here are some photos from my visit to Alaska.

Watched salmon trying to swim upstream

Some didn't make it, though.

Mendenhall Glacier

Hubbard Glacier

Saw some brown bears at Fortress of the Bear

Saw many beautiful birds at the Raptor Center

This little owl was so cute; it would peek one eye open at me, then go back to sleeping.

There are so so many more, but I think I've spammed enough. Everywhere you went, there was amazing scenery to photograph and clear air to breathe.

Absent

I won't have access to a computer next week, so no post.

Here's some very quick sketches I did for Flamingo Magazine: link

Take care of yourselves, everyone :]

Quick little portrait

3 x 5" Stonehenge paper.

Graphite + acrylic.

Editorial: The Online Looking Glass

Jeez, I honestly thought I'd been keeping up with my one update a week on this blog... but then looked at the date and realized I messed up.

I hope a sexy lady will make up for it...?

Based on the Op-Ed article "The Online Looking Glass" by Ross Douthat.

You can read the article here.

8 x 10" Bristol paper.

Graphite + digital.

Some things.

This past Saturday was the opening of Tran Nguyen's "The Synapse Between Here and There" + David Bray's "Return of Bad Wisdom" at Thinkspace Gallery as well as Andrew Hem's "Cold Water" at LeBasse Projects. My camera can't really do the pieces justice, so if it's at all possible, go to the galleries and take a look in-person.

So here's some pictures of livestock they had nearby. I'm still not totally sure what it was about, but there was a lot of interesting organic products available.

In other news, I did a little piece for Amelia's Magazine's article about the upcoming Tasseomancy album release. I recommend going and checking out their music, it's very soothing and haunting.

You can read the article here.

Here's another in-progress shot of the larger piece I'm working on. I still haven't abandoned it...!

Portrait :: 京 + WIP

I am currently working on another piece, but I did a small painting with the leftover colors on my palette. I had to replace the paper and since the colors floating around weren't going to be used on the painting in progress, why waste it?

... Which turned into a portrait of Kyo with the look from 'The Final.'

京

3.69 x 4.4" Stonehenge paper.

Graphite + acrylic.

And here's a little WIP shot ::

What Comes Out

I've had some metallic copper paint lying around, so I made this quick little painting to test it out.

The paint's rather nice, although since it has glittery particles in it the particles settle into the water bucket and the brush. So use a separate brush + bucket unless you don't mind all the other colors and stuff being sparkly ★

I'm glad my scanner was able to pick up the metallic paint

Shiny ☆

The invert looks nice too :]

What Comes Out

4.4 x 5.5" Stonehenge.

Red Col-Erase + acrylic.