Throwback Thursday #30 – A Reason to Sing

“A Reason to Sing”, Ink, 2015

In 2015 I was 36 and still working at the church where I work presently. I was approached by one of our worship leaders who was planning a night of worship and wanted to put together an artsy video as part of the evening. The theme of the night was “A Reason to Sing” and they they threw out some ideas to me and they knew they wanted it to somehow depict the cross, but showing the hope of the empty tomb of Christ. Since it was a video I knew it need to be a time lapse of me drawing which, in my opinion, isn’t always as cool as it sounds. I’ve seen artists doing cool things with their art in different videos on the internet and it seems to me the most interesting ones are ones that have a surprise revealed at the end. I thought about how I could do this and had the idea of the tomb image slowly appearing as I worked on drawing the wood grains on the end of a foreshortened beam of the cross. The weak part in this pieces is that the image of the tomb isn’t nearly as iconic as the cross itself and so it can take a while to really understand what I’m drawing. Overall though, the video turned out pretty close to what I had envisioned. Watch the video here:

 

Throwback Thursday #29 – Ice Cream Head Girl

“Ice Cream Head Girl”, pencil, 2014

In 2014, I was 34 and as always I had a sketchbook with me for meeting notes…well, let’s be honest, these sketchbooks were more for doodling with an occasional note taken. They were great for sudden ideas that I needed to roughly sketch in the moment.

“Ice Cream Head Girl” was such a sketch. Now and then when I see certain hairdos on women, their hair looks so shapeable and when it’s done a certain way it makes me think of ice cream. I finally decided to sketch this thought out. One day this could make a really cool finished piece, especially for ice cream lovers!

Throwback Thursday #28 – Marlee

Marlee, Fine Liner, 2013

In 2013 I was 34 and I was approached by my boss’s wife to do a drawing of their family dog, Marlee, who had just died. They wanted me to do it for their son who was visiting for Christmas from the Navy. I was given a photograph and started right away. I did a rough sketch in pencil and then finished the drawing in fine liner.

I never heard what their son thought of the drawing, but I hope it remains a good memorial for their beloved pet.

 

 

Throwback Thursday #27 – Seed

“Seed”, guache, 2012.

In 2012, I was 32 and still showing artwork at The Raw Canvas. Part of being a member of the Raw Canvas meant meeting together to plan first friday show themes. Each show, the owner, Justin, would choose a different member to design the posters for advertising and this time it was my turn. That spring our show’s theme was “Seed” and the members, always wanting to push the gallery toward the extreme, edgy and riské, wanted something having to do with a vagina (something about the seed of life). I was very uncomfortable with painting any nudity, particularly a female’s privates. I gave them a few sketches of ideas and tried to persuade them to accept something a little less overtly provocative. I had seen something online of a woman under ground as a seed sprouting into a plant above ground and did my own version of it. The Raw Canvas members loved this piece and I so I began work on the final in which I experimented with guache. I discovered I really like working in guache (or gouache)!

Here is how the poster turned out:

 

 

The Perpetual Hydration Machine