work-work-work- lint roll! + Heros

Oh the fur! I am covered with it... the room is covered with it... Do they make room sized lint rollers? No matter, I have ye'ol broom and dust pan.
I'm happy with how they are turning out... each one is new, and I'm learning little things about the materials. Though I find myself, sadly, still trying to shake the world of the 'fine artist' that I was hardly ever really in... I've made only four of these little guys and a conversation with my favorite college teacher keeps tugging at the corners of my mind - he was worried that I would fall into the trap of only creating the flower pictures that I have, probably, only ever made half a dozen of... and at the time of the conversation - had only made two and just for my senior show. A show that, I hoped, would express my confusion about what made the shapes I found so pleasing 'corny' if they had eyes or 'art' if I turned them to the side and covered their faces...

I never have found answers... only the ones I've dug out of the muck of my own mind - And that is... these things are easy to like. Flowers, imps, trees, etc etc... they are easy to understand and to except. And so - they are not fine art.. heck, they are often hardly considered art.

But - and I have come to find this the most reassuring of things- all the artists whose works I've long loved - did not create works that fall into those fields of acceptance. I love Clive Barker's art work with a passion. He is shameless and he is ever ever EVER full of life and imagination and corny though it is - love. Love for creation and expression... and that comes in the form of strange and wonderful things that he -wants- people to want. He isn't holding you at bay with a stick demanding you pay him homage.

Brian Froud creates for a deity.. a force he believes calls to him - I don't have any such supernatural force to blame for my active choice to create things with pointy ears - I really really just like how they look. I do think I can blame him for it though. I blame him for a lot of my innate esthetics. Well.. I blame him and Jim Henson... and don't get me started on Jim Henson... I think his name... his work.. and his life speaks for itself. I was beyond lucky to have had a childhood so surrounded by his creative presence.

I'm proud to not fall into a world of creators that make solely for themselves.... I would be honored to, maybe, be placed in that category where all my heros meander: Imaginative fantasy (to use the Netflix genre name). Even if that means I inevitably find myself working at a bank... I'd rather have walked this path for a little while than to have lived the in the world of gallery shows and pretension. I once said - I'd rather be sweeping floors at The Creature Shop than working anywhere else... I still feel that way - geh.

Back to work! Where is that 'ol broom. ;)

New monsters/imps...

I wanted to try making some smaller monsters... so I thought I'd take the imps I sketch (which I had made into two plushies for x-mas gifts this last year... and had been rather pleased with) and make them into dolls... I think they've turned out rather well... Again - trying to balance the fantasy... But I fear - some of the sketches - when I take them closer to what could exist in this world... and we move from cute to scary rather quickly... So I stood firm and tried to keep these guys close to my sketches.

Like in this sketch... though he's slightly different... more like the Duster character... (geh! I'd better watch out... I might start putting a story together...)


It's... kinda overwhelming to sit down to something and have very little idea how it will turn out... so often though... the media itself dictates what you'll have as an end result... I suppose not knowing just what you're making can help a great deal when working with a fickle media.

Granted, dear reader - I often have no idea what I'm going to do until it's done and I've scanned it and I sit here typing about it.

It's - kind fun. But, again, rather strange and, often, overwhelming...

Good thing I work so small... what would I do with something MORE than 20 inches... no no.. I must always work small... something big would take me over.... and then where would I be?

I recall a large drawing of leaves I worked on in college (my father has it now)... I worked on it until I passed out. Woke up and sketched until I passed out again... I think this went on for two or three days. It was fun, but I can't live like that - the dishes would pile up and the food would burn...

So: Small scanner sized things... those - I will be back with soon!

A few new images...

They haven't been cleaned up.. I still need to work a bit more on a few of them before I'd call some of them done - but I wanted to share what I have so far :)

Things are coming along well... if a bit slowly (as I mentioned in my last post). I've finished this guy - I've been calling him Harbor - and I think I can surely say he's the best I've made to date. It's hard to tell from the shot, but he has hooves (which are weighted), as well as posable ears (one is pierced) and a full set of curly ram(ish) horns. I'll be taking better photos of him for Etsy later on... but the light here is so very dim and we've yet to get light bulbs (next trip out I'll try and remember).

My plan still stands to make a small army of monsters at least double that in sketches and buttons and such... So. I'll be back with ever more new things.

Hope all is well out there!

Early update...

Okay, I just can't help myself... I'm so happy to be working again! Even though... for some reason... it seems to be taking me far longer to get things done than before... maybe it's those impromptu minutes of dancing that are holding me up... but I'm just so happy.

And things are turning out well. I think I'm getting the hang, sort of, of the balance between real and fancy... what good is one without the other? It's rather difficult for me to make something that doesn't have some tiiiny chance of looking at home in the real world... outside of my sketches. Really, much of what I do draw can't really be made into 3-D figures and not turn out like some toy... and I don't want to make toys.

I hope, as I have said before, that some of this understanding transfers over to my drawing... and I think it has... but I think I could do with more. I suppose that is the fun and challenge of being a isolated artist... you have to figure out everything for yourself. For good and bad... or more often than not, in my case: furry.

See you soon!

Another Monday...

I seem to get the urge to update these on Mondays - well this and the last post, at least! So let's make that a thing, shall we? I'll regale you with the previous weeks works and perhaps muse on the potential creations of the week ahead - I think that sounds plannish.

I may have to break my promise you to last week for images of 'new' stuff... as, though my scanner is unpacked, I have no image processing software on this computer. *cringe* So, how about an image from the Alice show that you wouldn't have seen, unless you happened by some of the more awesome corners of State College, PA ;)

I'll get you at least three new Eden images next week... or mid-week, if I can manage to find anyone software to help with this tragic issue.

I have to say I am really pleased with how my work is progressing. Sometimes breaks are good for me... that or I'd forgotten I could sketch, so its like rediscovering that you can still ride a bicycle

I have a half finished monster waiting for the rest of himself.. his hooves are drying (spray paint.. can't beat it... but it does mean you have to wait... ug. waiting). The plan, as it stands, is to make a small army of monsters, a books worth of illustrations (random Eden stuff) and buttons and magnets and get them up the Etsy post-haste. Then, as the weather gets better, I shall drag my pale self out into the light of day and find out what town I've moved into - with a portfolio of new works and, I hope, find people and places as lovely as the ones I left in the last town.

*crosses fingers*

I must say... after all this time, I'm happy to find that I can still sketch... somehow I thought all these weeks of not working would have softened me a bit... but no. Still the same pointy eared, stripped socked creatures showing up on the paper... (The picture in the post is old... but the next post will have an all new one. Truly.)

This week will find me working on another commission and starting back up on my story(ies) as well as my poor neglected Etsy account. I have so much I want to do - I don't know where to start.

See you soon!