Promo

I just sent out an illustration promo postcard. There is a punched hole which was fun to do.
I held it up over my computer screen and the opening on the back fell over the word PLAY....its hard to see in the photo but it made me smile.

something about happy

I don't know how it works but something about making this brought me

closer to happy

or happy closer to me

more lettering magic

Studio time....letting it happen to make it happen

This week in my Studio:
 It was Wednesday and it had been awhile since I just let myself go, draw, paint, scribble without an idea as to what I wanted to create or what it was for. And I suppose I REALLY needed this because I had this surge flow through me. This glorious thank you this is what I come for, this is what I am for, this is what YES the word is for. I have had this feeling before but like I said it has been awhile to give myself free draw time. Of course now I want more. But this is what came out of those few hours I gave myself to dance my hands open to some yum yum color line fun.

           
                         these are both mixed media, watercolor, marker, oil pastels (which I just rediscovered),
                          and few pencil dashes on 22x30 rives BFK (my favorite) paper

This weeks 3 inspirations

1.  Just discovered the work of Thomas Campbell
     and found this video of him creating a mural.
     Love it, his process, his sharing, his mixing of materials, his colors, feel inspired, check him out!
     http://vimeo.com/67152221
     http://www.thomascampbell-art.com/

2. Read the book

Show your work by Austin Kleon

Hence this sharing about what inspires me.

There is so much great advice and inspiration

in this little big gem witty filled with many aha yes of course moments book. 

Thanks Austin for reminding me to open what I love 

to share it in anyway I can. 

austinkleon.com

what do I want to learn? hmmmmmm 

maybe I want to learn what it is I want to learn

that and how to create what I long to create and to know what that is

and to be able to speak it, write it, color it wildly while whistling.

3. Have been pondering over word Dharma

     and this quote "If you bring forth what is within you, it will save you; if you do not bring forth what   

     is within you, it will destroy you." Just realized this is what I want to learn, how to bring forth that which is within me. Or more basically like the above Austin is saying, get your stuff out there.

     

     Quote from a book I'm reading titled The Great Work of Your Life by Stephen Cope.

     Haven't read one of these self guiding spirit seeking books in awhile but must need it now.

http://kripalu.org/blog/thrive/2012/09/19/the-great-work-of-your-life-a-guide-for-the-journey-of-your-true-calling/

lettering fun

                       In my studio I have a few quotes hanging up for that every so often remind myself
                 what I am doing. This is one of them, think it is Rumi. Haven't really done much lettering
                    outside my sketchbook so Last night I scanned something in from a notebook and began
                                   playing around with it in Photoshop. Here is what I have so far!

Having fun with collage

every day holds little jewels

sometimes at night i search for them

  

Lilla Rogers Bootcamp KOO-KOOliscious Assignment 1

To check out the Koo-Koo Gallery go here:

http://bootcamp.lillarogers.com/bootcamp-feb-2014-gallery/

It is amazing how everyone created something different yet still Koo-Kooliscious

After I posted my first boot camp assignment it bothered me that I 

submitted it without placing the koo-koo image in

the phone case template.

So here is a quick version of what it would look

like as a phone cover. Voila!

Have a Koo-Kooliscious DAY!!!!

In the Fall I took Lilla Rogers art making course. It was really fun and helped me to create some new unexpected illustrations. I am now taking her Boot Camp online course. Our first assignment was

Coo-koo (still can't figure out how to spell that ) clocks. She gives you the mini, which is to draw, draw, draw. I love this part and could still be drawing koo-koo if there wasn't a deadline.

There are too many to show all but here are some of the drawings I did.  I began with marker black and white,

and then moved on to some collage.

Below is the final assignment which was to create a phone case.

It would have been helpful for me to place it in the phone case template. hmmmm, next time.

I decided to go with the collage feel and focus on one lovely koo-koo bird. 

As you can see I used some images

directly from my sketches. 

Looking at the sketches again I am thinking I 

want to create another one inspired by the black and white drawings.

Have a Koo-Kooliscious DAY!!!!

What is the best thing that could happen?

Facing my post it note at the bottom of my computer.

It makes me smile. Reminds me of a friend. 

 Encourages me to imagine then articulate what I imagine.

This little note some how powers me on.

New illustration

                                               been playing around with this image.
                            Have many versions in the works but here is one for the moment.

HOW WOW NOW

I signed up for this challenge. 12 x12. Write or rewrite one picture book a month for the next year. Saw it and said Yes! Didn't want to ponder too long. I will figure out the HOW as I move through the year. Coming up with ideas is not the challenge for me, but making the ideas into a physical reality is, giving them what they need in order to thrive and delight beyond my hand heart holding. So I am feeling that I will focus more on the rewrite and smarty (also known as dummy) making for this year. Making the ideas real. Real meaning, have a shape, a form, a back front, seen, heard, experienced, pages exciting between. Breathing life into them, lots of warm wonderous wacky wild WOW breath.    I don't know HOW I will get there but WOW, I am setting my heart sails into the delight of picture book readers NOW.

Old made new

                 

This is an old image that I revisited and played around with the other day.

New illustration

Sometimes I find myself quite puzzling. 

Playing around with this image today.

I am Bloom WOW Love Song Rockin pattern

Here is a pattern that I am revisiting and rockin' round with new color

Smarty

It seems I have dummies ( i mean smarties, no one likes to be called dumb) hanging around my studio. These smarties are great helpers in the process to getting a picture book idea out from my glimmering swirling head and into the world where there is a greater possibility that other hands, eyes, and hearts will have the opportunity to enjoy them too. Also, making a smarty is fun. Some magic happens, magic that involves... well I can't reveal it all just yet. But here are some images from a recent smarty. 

These pages ( in no particular order) are from a picture book titled "The Sock Mess Monster". 

If you would like to see the whole Sock Mess Smarty, please email me, and I will slip into some comfy foot wear, hop on my horse and gallop over to the mail box pronto. Enjoy!!!!!!!

sketch, pistachio heads

i found this collage sketch for some pistachio head people, yep their heads are pistachio shells. 

Lilla Rogers class week 5

Thank U(niverse). That's how I feel right now. Nothing happened, I just feel that way. Gratitude is a practice I practice. Sometimes I have to evoke the feeling, steer my heart in that awesome feeling direction, and sometimes, that feeling swings through me as if it came from somewhere so WOW that WOW doesn't even capture it. I love the feeling gratitude creates in my body. That is why I practice it, for the feeling. A little bit like a gratitude feeling junkie, once you  experience a dose of it, you want others to feel it too, you want the world to know this feeling. This golden buddha in the image below was given to me years ago by someone who I barely knew. It sits in my room and every morning I look and for a millisecond or a full second I stand and say in some way with my being, Thank u.

This week the assignment was to be abundant with images inspired from things we collect, love, have.
At first I thought, I don't really collect that much, I live in a small brooklyn apartment with kids, I am always tossing stuff. But then I realized that isn't fully true. I have little collections, gathered here and there, quietly offering their inspiration whenever I need it. 

Collage

sometimes I make things and I just don't no what to do with them. Actually not sometimes but a lot of times. These things hang around my studio or my apartment and I pick them up look at them put them down walk by them and go hmmmm, i like this but what should I do with it. Here is one of those things that has been sitting on my dresser greeting me every morning for a few months.

Lilla Rogers Week 4

by my front door I have a little quote from a tea bag taped with a glitter owl sticker to the wall. It is a constant reminder. "On with the dance. Let joy be unconfined." And in my studio recently I must have read a quote from William Carlos Williams that I scribbled in marker and taped up. It too is a reminder for creative living. "But only the dance is sure. Make it your own. Who can tell what is to come of it?" I often forget, but I also often remember, the Dance knows more then I do. 

I just have to let the dancer know I am here.

The assignment this week was to make a collage, use a quote or words, 

some flower element, and assigned colors, yeah I love my colors. Here are two collages.

Lilla Rogers class Week 3

I am still really enjoying this class. Kind of wished I did it years ago. But I suppose I wasn't open or ready or attracting it to my process then. Every assignment feels like something I want to do. This one was picture books, which I have been pursuing for awhile. After the last assignment, I learned I have the tendency to stray and play too much outside the guidelines. I decided to play within more this time, and really wanted to work with the story. Here is the cover I came up with for the "The Language of the Birds." I realized after I posted it, that I forgot the second THE in the title. Perhaps that was me  subconsciously editing.

Lilla Rogers class week 2

I am sooooo loving this class. This week the assignment was to design plates with a Bromeliad (flower) theme. I drew like crazy the first day. I think in the end I went a little too far off the theme when I found myself drawing tails, animal tails, lion cat animal tails, and lion cat crowns. No- these aren't exactly flowers but drawing the flowers reminded me of the lion cat tails and lion cat crowns so I suppose that is ok. Anyway, I would love to make more of these, possibly a collection of 8 (my favorite number) and see them in stores somewhere glorious.  That would be fun. Really fun. Until then I will make more.
And if u, universe...want to dance, lets see your magic moves!

New Editorial illustration

Berry Good Time

I am taking an online class with the agent Lilla Rogers, and so far it is really fun. 

It is inspiring my work in new directions. This image is from the first assignment to design a bolt fabric with a kitchen vintage feel. I still want to tweak things but for now this is what I created.

As I was playing around, I couldn't resist adding a little story element.

Can you see a story here? 

LOVE IT!!!!!

Just saw this video of true imagination having it's delight. If you haven't already seen this boy and his cardboard arcade check it out now! It will brighten your day and make you want to play.

www.cainesarcade.com

http://www.cardboardchallenge.com

I also love his list for anyone in the creative business. 

Right now I am gravitating to number 4.  

5 Lessons (on a Barf Bag) for Entrepreneurs: 

1. Be nice to customers.
2. Do a business that is fun.
3. Do not give up. (Caine circled and underlined this one three times)
4. Start with what you have.
5. Use recycled stuff.

Beyond Imagination

When I go to sit and create something without an idea for what I want to create but instead with a feeling, I am always joyously surprised with what arrives. I love these moments. I could have never imagined this drawing before I sat down to draw in my sketchbook. The drawing made it, not me or my imagining what to draw. When I get stuck creatively I think of these glorious moments and invite them to shower my life, flow through my hands, appear like an easy river dance. Yep, yep, yep, Did I mention I  love these moments. They are my reminders, my guidelines, my thank you very much universe, I will accept that gift you just gave to me because it is awesomely beyond anything I could have ever imagined on my own.

eye dance

i found this scan of a drawing i did in my sketchbook.

have been playing with it a bit this afternoon adding color.

the colors remind me of the last weeks i've spent at the beach, sand, sun, sky, oh and a few ocean splashes too. 

silkscreen gone wild

                                            I just couldn't stop printing with different silkscreens,
                                     some stamps, some paint, and marker and collage thrown in.
                                                       This is my version to some summer fun.

pattern time

     I am playing around with this pattern.