She Sure is {Sketchy} - A Return

A few months ago I had a creative crisis that resulted in the symbolic breaking of a 4b pencil over my knee. I declared myself the un-artist. It was done in an eff-this-crap kind of way.
Here's the thing -- the low down is this:
IT IS THE BEST JOB IN THE WORLD UNTIL IT SUCKS

Two months ago it sucked. I was so OVER it. I stopped blogging, I stopped drawing. I still had to go to my totally artistic job-job. While there, in one of the more creative adventures of my life, (an irony not lost on my Pratt friends) I built a video game with an amazing team of people. Other than that I declared myself NONARTIST.

My dad (a fineartist) was rather supportive. However, he also managed to piss me off by laughing at me.
--"Sorry, kid - It's too late. You're an artist. It's OK to take a break"

"NO! I am not taking a BREAK! I am DONE! I say who... I say when..."
(When I am truly lost I retreat in to quoting Pretty Woman). 

Anyway. They were right. I was wrong. I'll blog more about this later. I'm actually a driven and dedicated artist who had a total meltdown. It might help my readers to know that that stuff happens even when you're not painting starry nights or sculpting vaginas -- and on that warm and fuzzy note...

Yesterday I went to the zoo. I innocently thought I'd maybe take a pen. Then I thought I might want to take some written notes or write a letter. I'd need some paper. Last Spring Ashley Robison organized my studio to absolute dream perfection, making paper oh-so-accessible. Fine. I thought I'd tip-toe in to that scary space I haven't been in since May. She'd mounted some hanging clipboards for me up against a wall. I reached in to the room. This way I didn't have to fully cross the threshold. I ripped a pre-papered clipboard down and scampered towards the Bronx with it.

It started innocently enough. There was this polar bear. He was a show off.


I sketched him without thinking about it.

Later, on the monorail, there were some deer.

So  this just happened:

Totally understandable. 

We happened upon this expansive bramble of peacocks.


I watched them for a long time. So long, I absently doodled them on the edge of my clipboard.
Nothing wrong there. Sometimes non-artists doodle! Whatever.

We packed up at the end of a looong day of Bronxing. I stepped on the 2 train.

Then we hit 129th street. I thought, maybe I should just look at those sketches...

By the time we hit Carroll Street, things had gotten out of hand. Apparently I'm an artist, and I'm back. Expect more blogging.

(Credit for All Photos Goes to April Alvarez, my kid sister who is more than actively shutterbugging her vacation in NYC).

She Sure is {Sketchy} Field(ing) Dinosaurs

I jumped and jogged along the Chicago Waterfront's freak 70 degree magnificent mile this week. I stayed at the Chicago Essex where I swam every morning, raced instep with sailboats every evening, got schooled in bagpipe traditions in dimly lit pubs, took care of mega-business and fell madly in love with every freaking thing I came across....

I'm sure I'll be back in the windy city before we head into June. In the meantime, here's some of the blueprint babies I found on my walkabout. Seeing so many skeletons was exhilarating. Process wise, I started by sketching an accurate representation with purple ink ballpoint. I'd cop a squat and whip out a little pot of ink and a waterbrush to really bring it home. Without further ado, these are straight from the book, done whilst I floated on dinosaur cloud 9.

(Admire that sexy-sexy bandage on my thumb. If I had procured said gash in the 18th century that paper-cut would have taken care of any malady imaginable. P.S. Chicago's ER was a breezy dream when it wasn't a disappointment of 90's proportions. I did not see a single man worth of Noah Wyle's pointy nose cuteness or George Clooney's eye crinkly laugh.)

Jumping Julian Rex' development was one of the focus' of this week's sabbatical. I had no idea how much I would learn, or the fact that there are a ton of T's in the world, and not many Rex'. It makes Julian that much more special, but it also is sure to expand his social circle ;)

 

There were lots of reasons I found myself in Chicago for St. Patty's Day, but now that I'm back in my Brooklyn art studio, I have to wonder if this sketch was the main reason ;) 

Oahu Shore

Sometimes when The Duchess and I are exchanging pleasantries such as this....

Me: you know there's a taylor swift video, and also an episode of "The Secret Life of an American Teenager' - in which both girls are singing into the non-brush end of their hairbrushes
TheDuchess: yes! totally bass ackwards.
Me: thank you!
TheDuchess: it makes NOOOO sense
Me: totally counter-intuitive and uncool looking
TheDuchess): agreed, kids these days...
Me: you give me peace of mind
TheDuchess: anytime...

I truly feel like we are meant for better things... talk show things... reality television things.... luckily those things (or better things) come to those who wait. The Duchess and I have returned to the East Coast, well rested and tan after a thrilling and long Hawaiian vacation in a house worthy of prime time fist bumps.

If I were in a reality television series I would like to only live in Hawaii, exactly as and where I did for a blissful looong vacation in October. I'm still in recovery mode. What do you mean if it starts to rain I can't just enclose the patio and go back to my People magazine for ten minutes before I open the panoramic doors to bask in the sun and the sand?? What do you mean no one has made me a pre-bed MaiTai??

It's been rough.

I like these photos, even the ones that were taken with a salt covered lens. I look at them fondly from my Brooklyn apartment where I am wearing double socks. They remind me that once, I was truly, wildly and completely baller.

We're back to blogging. Sabbatical over.

Seattle Days Drifting Away

It is a little known fact that nestled up along the region of America
nom'ed 'The Greater Northwest' lies an enchanted "Emerald City".

Two weeks ago I spent a blithe four days cozied up with The Benevolent Queen of all Bethtopia. There was dark chocolate to eat, animals to pet, REVENGE to watch and oceanfront strolling to be had for all. I finally crossed Puget Sound, a place I had never seen but have long loved. (Thank You Cynthia Voight

Beth and I spent the first two days of my indulgent Washington adventure with our asses stapled to her cozy little couch and the next two eating every cheese product we could find at the Pike Place Market.

It was wonderful. I couldn't remember the last time I'd been allowed such complete luxury. 

We ate out. We stayed in. We talked until our faces turned blue from forgetting to breathe.

We channeled magic and danced in the firelight cast by a glade of lanterns unlike anything I have ever seen.

Once Molly finally deigned to be my friend the couch got even cozier. I totally appreciate her willingness to extend her paw in friendship, even when it was scary to let some one new and unknown in to her doggy heart.

I had the chance to finally meet the famous Flossy. She is even better than previously anticipated. Man that girl can stink-eye. The Kahuku girl in me was impressed. Please, note this picture is taken on a completely different night, although I'm not sure if I had moved from the couch since the above photo was taken.

Oh wait, I take that back. This photo was taken after our divine dinner that we made from scratch. The domestic culinary goddess' that we are created something entirely new, 'Scrambled Eggs and Green Salad'. We ate fresh tomatoes from the garden and reveled in our brilliance. Everything I ate in Washington was a delight to the pallet.
 ...............................................
I got to see Seattle all proper like too. Beth is a Pike Place market superstar (a boy even hollered her name as we forced down fresh peaches from his cart after eating our weight in lunch-like things). Is it any wonder what with licensing designs like these?!

This first leg of my gargantuan trip of wonder, relaxation and spiritual happiness was exactly what the doctor ordered -- maybe for all of us. It was such loveliness to just be.  Beth and I are kindred.  I always believe that when you're lucky enough to find the people you just click with you need to force them to spend all day with you for days on end.

This trip was bliss. Special thanks to every member of this little family for making my Washington dreamz come true. Mad props to husband-guy too for letting me come and kidnap his wifey for days and days. That man is so too cool for school (in the best ways).

On my last day in Seattle, i turned a corner and there it was....

and keeping with the theme of my wildly indulgent and lengthy sabbatical...
that wish was a wish that came true too....

Cow Country

And I'm back.