Tools of the Trade

Hahaha, the pun in the title had to be done. I am starting fall classes at the SMFA (known also as simply "The Museum School" as I have just discovered). I am taking Introduction to Illustration and Intro to Adobe Illustrator. The names are similar but the classes will be quite different. So, here is the work I did in my first Illustration class-- we sketched antique tools and then used tracing paper and a variety of mediums and styles to create different effects and ways of presenting the same subject matter. I chose this tool because it kind of looks like a chicken or a lizard or a fish.

For the above sketch I made it a mythical animal head mounted on some rich safari-adventurer's mantle.

 The plaque reads, "My first kill, Zebrantalope, Kenya 1927"

I was just goofing around.

Trees and Girrrl!!! and another little piece of my soul

The weather has been beautiful and I have been spending more time out on my back porch drawing trees. Here they are!

I am also working steadily on the next chapter of Girrrl!!!, I promise. Here is one panel of which I am particularly proud. I have not put the plaid in Aaron's shirt, nor have I made it pretty in photoshop, but I think you will like it all the same..

And to finish off this post, here is another swirly thing I doodled, which I likened to the shape of my soul in another post:

Oro Making a Sock Squirrel

Art abounds at the Chateau de FuFu (our apartment) this week because not only are my housemates super artsy, but we have a house guest this week! She is Katherine, one of the Bread and Puppet Puppeteers and is in town because Bread and Puppet is putting on performances at Cyclorama here in Boston all week! Katherine is lovely and wonderful and is filling our kitchen with linoleum block prints for the cheap art bus! The other night while she was making prints, My housemate Oro/Kat (she goes by either) was sewing a stuffed squirrel made of socks and I was making a charcoal sketch of her! Ta DA!

Someday I will draw someone who is making eye contact with me. Maybe.

Accio Sketchbook

This is my most recent sketch of a friend who was patient enough to hold still for the better part of an hour so that I could draw him. I am quite pleased with how it turned out:

And on a sort-of related note, perhaps you are familiar with the art student owl meme? I came across this one this morning and it just seemed so appropriate. And, as always, I was tickled by the Harry Potter reference: