lately


i've been drawing fairly frequently in my sketchbook. 
if you look through my YEARS of sketchbooks you will notice a pattern. foliage + pets. pets + foliage. 

there's something about plants -



i just like attempting to simplify a curve of a leaf or a petal in a singular contour line. 
gets me every time.
simple pleasures. 



the magnolias are blooming already. beautiful. i guess they aren't that early this year, but it's been like summer round these parts the last couple of days. i feel bad for all my mid west and east coast friends buried under mounds of snow... 


i can't believe next week is the 2nd week of school. last week was the first. every semester i forget HOW TIRED i am after the first week. all the adrenaline. all the talking.

i have the i am mean and tough speech sprinkled w/ a tad of eccentric art professor down. [i think]. every semester i get a bit more curmudgeonly. every semester i try to really exemplify the fact that i am NO NONSENSE. because really - who wants to waste their time. this time i actually read john cages/sister corita kent's 10 rules out loud. each semester i make my case even shorter. you give what you get. i take this whole art business super serious [but of course i'm more than willing to make fun of it too]. i will give to you with the same intensity you give to me. if you 1/2 ass it, so will i. in a way each of my students gets an individual and incredibly personal experience. so let's do this, right? each year they look younger. each year i feel older. and so on and so on. 

in my professional practice course they have to give short presentations on themselves/their work starting day 2. this freaks them out. but in a very good way. each semester i get giddy with their potential. it is wide open. it/they/we can go in any direction. it's all possible. and it's never the same. just like making work. even if you think you are repeating a process/technique it's actually never quite exactly the same. i think that's the big hook. 

anyway. i'm not the only one drawing round these parts. 


i happen to really love her interpretation of sponge bob. especially how she figured out how to make patrick have a pointy head. it's so direct. and squidward's tiki house is pretty darn great. 


we also collaborated. i started with this mum [yes i know foliage]


and then she went NUTS. 

OH. i was interviewed for this lovely website - she/folk. it's a woman centric space that focuses on dialogue and education. there's a lot there to peruse. 

ok. next post will be a request... [again. some of you already know about this if you follow me on instagram, but... i want to post it here too]. soon...

Comments

Anonymous said…
Great interview! What fun to draw with the little, eh?!?
emily said…
plant life! me too, as you know. sometimes i have the urge to be apologetic about my love of painting flowers, but there's something about them - the lines and colors, of course, and also the way they have life even after they've been cut, you know? and the way their beauty lingers as they fade, the fragility, the life and the death - or maybe it's one slow dying. and ellsworth kelly, yes! xo.

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