time travels

Time to play that Talking Heads song again: how did I get here?

Can it BE 30 years already? Yes, it can. I went to RISD for my 30th reunion this weekend, and while the flashbacks were few, the chance to see familiar faces was grand. My fellow time travelers, Ged Kenslea, David Hicks, and Madeline Sorel, checked in with me here.

So much is new, it was a bit disorienting. Back when we were students, Providence was a seedy mafia town. Now, it's been rebranded as the Venice of New England, or something. OMG, gondolas!

Thankfully, some things don't change. Carr Haus is still a gathering spot, where I learned to drink coffee and ponder my place in the throng. Ran into lots of classmates there, like Ron de Felice, Wendy Northrup, and Mary Maguire. Wonderful!

From there, I was determined to spend some quality time at the Edna W. Lawrence Nature Lab. Thanks to life transitions on the elder front, I've come back in possession of this drawing I did there as a freshman.

I've been marveling at the level of determination here, and it brings back tangible memories of many hours in that lab. It remains a magical cabinet of curiosities.

No matter what your intended major, every student spends time here freshman year. I did some referencing for a current project. There are live specimens, such as this turtle basking under a heat lamp.

And the forensic samples...

This one is kinda freaky.

I sketched some cool coral samples, all white now, much like living coral that is being bleached of color due to warmer waters.

I found a curious squirrel labeled "rhubarb" that needed to be drawn.

I sat across from a student, no doubt doing her nature studies assignment. The fundamentals don't change. As stated in the Nature Lab brochure:

"By exploring specimens, students can learn about design and the intersection of form and function, the integration of parts to a whole, and be inspired by the simple elegance of natural patterns. Once that students see that all plants and animals represent a solution to a series of design constraints, they may then employ aspects of nature's solution in their works."

I sketched her as she sketched. Ah, youth.

It was hard to tear myself away from a place that really brought me back in time, but I wandered about the Waterman building and ran into Doris Ruth, former CoLab Queen. She brought me to see the new wing over at the museum, where we traveled into the cosmos looking at Tristin Lowe's Lunacy, made with sewn felt.

Talk about natural inspiration. After all my contributions to the Lunar Calendar, it was a kick to be in the same room as the moon.

Here's another favorite. The exclamation point may be overused these days, but here it has the weight and meaning it deserves. Damn, forgot to find out the artist. For shame.

From there, we joined up with other classmates, including Lane Myers, who currently teaches at RISD. He gave us a tour of the new Fleet Library, impossibly swanky, but a good place to convene and catch up on the state of art education.

He led us to Thee Red Fez, an esteemed establishment where we quenched every thirst and then some.

From there, it was on to Water Fire, a spectacle of natural elements that brings out the masses.

Downside: the streets turned into a parking lot and we were rather late for our reunion dinner at the President's house. President Maeda visited our tables, and asked us all to support his effort to bring art and design into the national STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) agenda. He asked us to support a House resolution.

He's blurry in my quickie photo, but dead on sharp about bringing more creativity to education.

It was a fantastic time, reconnecting not only to classmates, but to that distant chapter of being a student immersed in exploring the world through art and art making. It's an exploration I am still on, and loving every minute. Thank you, RISD, for helping me focus my vision.

Bravo, class of 1980. You're looking goooood!

color me october

Color is such a powerful force, yet we are so often unaware of it. I love the colors of October. Recently, my illo students worked on a 10 color palette of their personal favorites, to become better acquainted with their tendencies. It was a fun exercise, and I created the one above with bits of my favorite pastel papers, as I rarely do color on a white background.

Thomas made one with paint, got frustrated, and made a collage version that better captured his taste.

Part of the exercise was to guess whose palettes were whose.  Juliana stumped us all. Her work is delicate and detailed, but this was her palette. Who knew?

Students also had to name their colors, and that was the lyrical piece: Juliana had names like "OMG coral" and "typhonic red."

Cyndi swiped her favorites from the Photoshop palettes. Hey! But, she had some of the best names, like "Connecticut Pink" and "Rubber Red."

The whole thing gave me a new eye as I set out for the next day. Thank you, ninjas! I saw a catchy color palette in this neighbor's collection of buoys...

Then, these funky mushrooms, growing in Ted's dirt side yard on the way to the beach..

And my favorite red, seen on a very weathered ferry bench at the edge of the beach wall...

You can see my red fixation in these flower boxes outside my studio window:

All this color vibration was just enough to buoy me to begin my Sketchbook Project, at last! I was having major performance anxiety, with this blank sketchbook destined for a showing in 6 cities.
Jeez, the pressure. I broke the ice on my "boys and girls" topic with one of my favorite subjects, seen here before heading out the door to middle school. Normally, I like to use smudgy materials, like charcoal or pastel, but give the nature of the handling, I opted for colored pencil.

Time to keep drawing. More sketches to come. Meanwhile, I'll drink the autumn colors with abandon.

here, there, everywhere

It's official! I'm getting postcards printed so the long held intention of celebrating Nest, Nook & Cranny is now gonna happen. At last. Author Susan Blackaby is coming east, and we'll meet for the first time. Can't wait! We'll do a school visit to Peaks Island Elementary and also a visit to the Portland Public Library at 3 PM on October 14. We will write, draw, and be yappish.

In other news, I am jazzed about autumn. Tis my season, y'know. It promises to be hectic. I've been all over lately, soaking up inspiration. Made a jolly good jaunt down to Boston with the ever colorful Kirsten Cappy.

We stopped at the Art Institute of Boston to see the gut-wrenching exhibit of Sue Coe's work,
The Tragedies of War. Not for the squeamish. She was a big inspiration in the early days of my editorial illustration career. There was no matching her unequivocal approach to the brutalities of the world. These political bedfellows are vintage Coe.

From there we bopped to Charlesbridge Publishing, where I picked up galleys for my next book project. Yay! Then, we schmoozed with kid lit folks at Boston Pie Company, where Mitali Perkins held court.

I found myself in a crowd of librarians, bloggers, and authors exchanging Twitter handles. Uh, my only handle was that I illustrated Mitali's Rickshaw Girl. That seemed to do the trick. I'm forever grateful for that fine story, and the chance to bring my visuals to it.

Twitter, twitter, tweet: met groovy librarians like Kara Dean and Laura Koenig, fellow fans of graphic novel for kids.

In other realms of art and performance, I brought my MECA class of illo ninjas to a tech rehearsal of The 39 Steps at Portland Stage Company. It was a good exercise in observation of choreography, framing, and the very difficult task of capturing it all, with no one standing still.

A vintage phone played a role in the action. Students Elise and Bret get ready to draw.

Here's Alysa's sketch:

And Seumas's:

 Elise drew some of the other sketchers, since we were at least sitting still.

Erica captured the director's fashion:

Seumas had a different take on him:

I myself was riveted by the leading man's pencil-thin moustache. Here's my quicky sketch.

I handed in final art a few weeks ago for 2 Pianos 4 Hands. It doesn't open for a couple of months, but here's the sneak peek.

Meanwhile, though, I've got to see The 39 Steps, with a lovely poster by my island neighbor,
Doug Smith. Although the class only saw a couple of scenes, rehearsed a ton of times, it looks to be a madcap hit!

Bravo and thanks to Portland Stage for welcoming my students!

sketchbooky

Back in the classroom at Maine College of Art, the senior illustration majors are drawing up a storm. Each was given a blank sketchbook at the end of last year, and asked to fill it during the summer. My first project this semester was for them to find some seed in there, and create a new piece. Illustrations are usually done via a series of sketchy steps. I wanted to see where we'd begin.

Joe likes to create characters and imaginary places. He chose a purple guy named "Mikey" from his sketchbook.

  

He decided to make it 3D, and photograph it.

 

Joe's got a great tactile sense to his work, something always is oozing or bubbling. Here's another page from his sketchbook, dripping with color.

 

Lori had a fun watercolor piece in her sketchbook, that pairs well with this boat.

Lori has a whimsical style, and is hungry for children's book work. She chose this sketch to work with.

She really fleshed it out for the final project, adding more detail and attitude.

Thomas is into legends, folklore, and heroic struggles. He's the only one who included the classic studies of heads, noses, hands, and feet in his sketchbook.  These are obligatory exercises in first year foundation drawing, but should be done more often, at all levels.

 

He chose an epic encounter for his project. He began with this:

He's exploring new digital skills, so went perhaps a bit too far on the final, but learned a few things in the process.

We went to see a show of drawing at the UNE Art Gallery. There was a great range of approaches, and students found something to like, some things not to like, a new interest in a particular artist, and a chance to see how artists present their work.

Yesterday we drew at Portland Stage, during a rehearsal of The 39 Steps. That was a challenge, so much action, so little time to capture it. More on that in another post!

Meanwhile, my students get under my skin, inspire me, and keep me coming back to the classroom.

ice harbor news

I met the author of Ice Harbor Mittens, Robin Hansen, for the first time on Friday when we drove together to Down East publishing in Rockport. We headed for a meeting with the publisher and sales folks to discuss publicity for our book. And here it is!  On the backseat in Robin's car, strewn with her signature mittens...

I used my island neighbors as models, and am hoping to make an island tour of Casco Bay libraries.

This is Finn, who becomes Josie in the book, an 11 year-old who wants to be a sternman on his cousin's lobster boat.

I staged my reference photos back in February, with mittens sent by Robin. Now that the weather has cooled, I can recall how chilly it really was. It was relevant immersion to walk the dog on a frosty morning and then return to my studio to make winter scenes.

Here's a scene in the book:

Editor Michael Steere took this shot of us in front of Down East's headquarters.

I'm excited we'll be seeing each other soon, plugging our book and exchanging views on coastal community life from Bath to Peaks!