Degree Project

Harpy

Siren

Arachne

Self Portrait

Reviews are finally over! This is my Degree project as it stands now. I want to add more embroidery to the first three pieces for sure, the last one is completely finished. The top two pieces were selected as the ones that I'll show in the final gallery in February.

Time for an art dump

Please, tell me it will be ok.

See.

The Ghost of Bobby Dunbar

Bunch of random stuff that I took pictures of in the high-res 2D photolab.

It's almost time for me to go back home to Arizona, which is a really nice feeling. I'm ready to get out of here for a while and just be with my family and old friends.

Degree Project Peek

Sneek peek here of my last painting for my degree project. It's coming along and I'd say that its about 85% there. My god, I'm so excited to be nearing completion. My book structure is also done, so that means that all I have to finish are the 3D pieces and the printouts of the images and then I'm DONE with my DP! 

Great times have been had recently in the studio as well: Carrying around Tony on my back, babysitting drunk people, watching my guy friends do kissing dances at each other, and of course the never ending slew of bad movies that comes with 24 hour access. 

Blue Eyed Soul

Blue Eyed Soul

This was an assignment from my color class with Bob in which we had to create an illustration based on a song. The song had to have a color in the title, and we had to integrate that color as the dominant one in the composition.

I immediately chose "Blue Eyed Soul" by Wilco and just loved working on the assignment.  I suppose it's because the song is one of my favorite ones, Bob is an awesome teacher, and I've reached complete comfort and happiness in painting with acrylic. 

Anyway, I love this one. 

"You've got a blue-eyed soul/ And if you don't let it show/ It'll leave you, you won't even know/ Without your blue-eyed soul.

Can you keep it simple? Can you let the snare crack?/ Can you let it move without holding back?/ Are you afraid to let it go/ Without your blue-eyed soul?

You're gonna lose control/ You're gonna lose control/ Without your blue-eyed soul." -Wilco, A.M. 

Another Eolune flyer

Favorite thing of mine that I've ever painted

I was pretty psyched when Corey and David asked me to do another flyer for their band Eolune.

I've known the guys since middle school and since their first effort to form a band (in the good old days they were called "Norf").

This show is Halloween themed and, as you can see, I had a lot of fun with it.

Acrylic on black illustration board.

Final for Eolune Flyer

I enjoy elephants

Im actually pretty pleased with how this final came out, and am also incredibly happy that Adam loaned me his scanner and computer in a pinch.

I hope the boys like it. It's a throw back to their old days when they were in highschool, had higher voices, and their name was based on the incorrect pronunciation of the world "North."

Doing this flyer made me feel old. 

thumbnails for Eolune

Junior Reviews!

So, reviews went pretty well this semester. Got all of the commentary that I expected to get, and have been ordered to work on my color. The wall looked pretty nice to me, though, I felt I represented the way that I work pretty well... and I apparently enjoy drawing hearts a lot. I also like scratch board and circular compositions. Yaaay.

Been working on this one for a while and it's still a work in progress. I thought it would be a good idea to put it up, as its one of the largest pieces I've done in a long time. About 3.5 feet by 5 feet. Bob Maloney gave me some good feedback on it, and by his suggestion I'm going to try to make it as detailed as is humanly possible. All in all I really like it.

Though this one was probably the most daunting task that I gave myself for the semester, it was also the most rewarding and the most fun. I absolutely love working in scratch board, so I had a lot of fun just doing this (hand cramp and all). Basically I planned out a concert that would be the best thing to ever happen to me, i.e. Ben Folds and Damon Gough (better known as Badly Drawn Boy) collaborating in concert. Both of them have incredibly heart felt lyrics, passion, and absolutely charming geekiness to them. It would definitely be a dream concert... too bad it will only ever happen in my brain... oh well.

This was from one of our open drawing sessions from this year, run by the lovely Mister Reusch. Probably one of the best models we had all year in terms of her poses, her ability to hold them, and her attention to our directions. I got a few good portraits of her, so that made me happy.

Another pose of the same model.


What artist doesn't like doing self portraits. I considered using this one for a different project, but felt that it worked relatively well as a stand alone. I liked the composition too. I also really really like my Indiana Jones-esque scar on my chin, if you've seen any other self portraits I've done, you already know this.

Hm, I look a bit trashed in this picture. Hilarious.

Annd that's it for my Junior year. All of it ended off with seeing my man's final improv show (which was awesome), grabbing burgers with my friends, enjoying a nice cold beer, and celebrating my boyfriend's new job.

Thank God that it's over, I'm ready to go home and hang out with my mom.

Life couldn't be better.

DP: Harpy Mask

At my college we have degree projects, equivalent to a thesis. My subject is the female monsters of Greek mythology. As part of this assignment, I am doing mixed media illustrations (mostly acrylic paint and wood-burning) with mask components.

This is the mask for the Harpy, modeled by and molded for the lovely Carly.

I find myself almost creepily enjoying the time of year right before finals.
The time is frustrating, time consuming, and exhausting, yet I feel so incredibly rewarded by all of my hard work. The knowledge that I am pretty severely busting my ass and working into the wee hours of almost every night makes me feel somehow accomplished.
All of my friends and I talk about the time spent in the studio, complaining about the hours upon hours which we could've spent sleeping, but also kind of using the hours as bragging rights.
You know why I'm badass? This week I've had one meal a day consisting of either salad, soup, or peanut butter and honey sammiches (yes, sammiches). I have either completed or fine tuned 10 projects. I have worked part time at my infuriatingly dull retail job. And I have gotten between 2 to 4 hours of sleep every night. Sure I feel a little bit like I'm going to die. But I also feel pretty damned hard core.

The saddest and most precious thing of all, though, is that ten years from now, when I look back on these days and sleepless nights, I will smile to myself and think what a great time I had.

I'm going to miss Bamcat throwing things because she's so tired, and Alex and I laughing our asses off at it because we're tired too.
I'll miss talking to Adam about our violent delinquent pasts.
I'll miss making fun of people with Luc.
I'll miss the freaking potluck dinners with almost nothing but carbs.
Jesus, I'll even miss falling asleep on the uncomfortable flame resistant furniture.
But mostly I'll miss the sense of comfort that everyone is going through the exact same thing.

Sitting Bull

This was done for my illustration III class as an assignment about a social activist. I chose to depict Sitting Bull and put emphasis on his connection to and respect for the Earth. I wanted to make the statement that he left a mark upon this world, much like the foot print of any animal. He donated his life's energy, much in the same way that an eagle sheds its feathers and a deer sheds its antlers: his spirit was a gift, but it came so naturally to him to give it for his people. He was a truly beautiful man.

Stipple portrait

We had a stippling assignment in my black and white illustration class which had to be a portrait of someone important to us with at least three different elements in it that meant something about their character. I decided to be the ambitious jerk of the class and did mine on a wood panel with a wood burner. The man in the picture is my dad, he's a pretty cool dude.

Huzzah, for things!

So yeah, its 2:30 in the morning and I'm sitting here making a blog instead of going to sleep.
"Why?" You ask?
In actuality you're probably wondering why its this that Im doing instead of a variety of other interesting, important, or responsible things. For instance, I could be watching more episodes of Arrested Development, searching for new webcomics, or possibly even doing something that doesn't make me into a giant geek. Or I could be working on sketches or research for my degree project (what my school calls a thesis). Or I could even just be getting a reasonable amount of sleep so that tomorrow when I go to the Museum of Science with my boyfriend, I'm not a crabby sleep-deprived mess.

... "Why?" You ask?
1) I, like many of my art school cohorts, am a bit of an insomniac.
2) I really need to get my good work out into the world in a way that is not deviant art.
3) I enjoy typing.

So there it is.

Recently, I've been making myself feel a little down just in the slump that is the closing of my junior year at college. It's getting to the point where I'm ready for break: the assignments are a bit stagnant because its not yet time to stress about finals, yet everyone I know is stressed out anyway due to the realization that we are all dangerously close to being real people (i.e. graduating and going out into the world to be shredded to pieces by people saying "What? We can't afford to pay you for making the world pretty. The economy is WAY too shitty for you to be successful as an artist." This particular day dream is usually followed by this person laughing me directly out of their office).
In all honesty, I'm excited to get out of school and work. Being a student is alright for another year, making minimum wage at an art supply store and getting beers with my friends on monday nights is fun for now, but I really look forward to the point when (hopefully) doing what I enjoy can manage to pay my bills.
I suppose that if I could have one wish, it would be to reach the point where life is stable and predictable as soon as possible. That I get out of college, become a teacher, get a little cruddy house in Natick or something and get some bunnies, then kitties, and maybe a husband and some kids down the line.

Lost Poster

An assignment for Nick Edlund, which was a poster for Lost: A Pop Opera. This assignment was really fun mostly due to the subject matter, which was really goulish and awesome. I tend to gravitate toward creepy subjects, which is weird being such an almost abnormally chipper person...

But yeah, the story behind this poster was a character who would apparently play his fiddle in order to put rattle snakes to sleep, and subsequently smash them to death. He was then found in the desert dead and covered in snake bites, and his ghost is supposedly heard playing his fiddle some nights.

The finished version of the poster (which the lab monitor unfortunately deleted) was a colored version of this with text on the side. :(

Kiss Me, Kate Publicity

Ah, the joys of MIT Musical Theatre. This was a fun project to work on, mostly because no one really made me change much about it apart from the positioning of text and a few color things. It was a pretty easy assignment from the Guild, though I wish that it had been more organized, or I suppose I wish that I had just decided to be the Publicity Manager and Designer as opposed to just the Designer. It all worked out for the best in the end though...

I really need to do these things for a pay check from now on.

Chris' Tattoo

Tattoo designed for my friend Chris. It's a bit of a weird one, I don't know how his artist managed to make it flow well on his chest as it's just a big rectangle. I liked working on the skull though. Anatomy is fun.

For Meghan

I did this a while ago as a birthday present for Meghan, a girl that I have known since I was in the first grade. We were children together, and were best friends up until we got separated by my going to the private school that my mom taught at when we went to middle school.

We still talk on occasion, I get the random birthday email or nostalgic conversation. The inspiration for this piece was pretty miraculous though, as I had a dream about she and I meeting up and talking about our lives on the swing-set at our old school, and she called me the following day to explain the same dream back to me.

I feel bad about this piece because I still have it in my apartment, waiting to be sent to her.

self portrait.

This was done as a cathartic piece, but also as fulfillment for another assignment for Wiseman. This one had to be with different hand gestures.

I got the assignment mere days after I got the news that my uncle Randy had passed away from a heart attack, and I finished it the day after I flew back from his funeral. All in all it was a really fucked up experience, but a good one for inspiration in my art nonetheless.

Looking back on it now, the piece really still serves as pretty evocative in terms of how I still feel when I look at it.

My only regret is that my roommate at the time dropped her bike on it one day, leaving the smudge mark on the forehead, which I couldn't erase or effectively cover up with more colored pencil.

Lateral Head Anatomy

Also from olden times, I did this for Robin Wiseman's class as an assignment showing the muscular and skeletal anatomy of the head and neck. I based it on that image that most frat boys have hanging up in their rooms, "The Kiss" by Chalkin (its of girls lying on a bed in underwear kissing, whoo lesbians).
I thought it was an interesting direction to take such a medical/sterile illustrations and turn it into something with more meaning and emotion.

Back in the long long ago/before times when I would go to MIT and hang out every weekend, my friend Raph was still an electronic engineering student there. He has since gone on to rock stardom in California with his band Dizzy Balloon (they're pretty good, they won a battle of the bands and opened for the Killers). Anywho, I made him this three paneled birthday present basically just asking "what's your favorite animal and what's your favorite color"

Those were good times, it makes me feel old.

The Maxx

Back in the nineties, Sam Keith wrote this awesome comic book called "The Maxx" which basically chronicled the life of this guy who lived in alternate realities, protecting the same woman in both. In one life, he was a homeless man, wearing a purple costume and living in a box in New York city, and the woman he was protecting was his social worker. In the other reality, he was this heroic monster, fighting strange monsters in the outback, and the woman he protected was a jungle queen. It was an interesting, depressing comic book which was then turned into an animated series on MTV (remember when MTV was good?)
Sophomore year we were assigned to do a sculpture based on a two dimensional image, so I did the Maxx. It was a good time and turned out pretty rockin.

Unitown Logo

A logo for a diversity seminar that my mother directed.

The Traveler

I did this for a friend of mine, KC when he was writing a script involving a man who wore a wolf mask.