Torso Anatomy

Painting is self-discovery. Every good artist paints what he is-Jackson Pollock

As stated in an earlier post, this is the time of year for Valdosta’s Spring Into Art Show. I’ve entered it every year since 2008 and this year wasn’t any different. Although every year as produced zero awards or sales, I still enter to get my name out there. Or I’m just a glutton for punishment and love throwing away $40 for the entrance fee. Either or.

Anyhoot, yeah hoot…I love owls…I entered 2 pieces, Self Pt. 3 “Lips” and Torso Anatomy. The latter is the focus of this post as I drew Self Pt. 3 “Lips” in 2011. Not to much to say about anyway, its your standard charcoal drawing of a gigantic pair of my lips, you know the usual.

Torso Anatomy came about from a sketch I did last year. It was actually about this time last year that I was really getting into anatomy/medical illustration. So while perusing some anatomy books, I saw this really musculoskeletal (not sure if that’s a word) torso drawing. So I took that and ran with it.

Here’s the initial idea sketch

First I needed a canvas and I wanted it to be kinda big and lo and behold I had the perfect thing. In my Painting II class, we had to do self-portraits with oil paints. I had done self-portrait drawings in charcoal but never a painted one. I say this because it came out rather terrible and odd-looking. And not in the “Look-its-so-avant-garde-and-abstracted” way. It was just plain bad. I got a B on it and I’m thankful for it but I’m pretty sure I went home and wept bitterly for hours over how bad it was. That’s it on the left and yeah…its pretty terrible. Every time I looked at it, I just thought, “Man that’s a waste of a good canvas”. So I took matters in my own hand and just threw white paint all over it and covered it up completely. But because this was an oil painting and the white paint I covered it up with it was a latex based, it didn’t work as well I wanted it to in some areas, woops!

I started out with my “fresh” white canvas and the next step was to draw out my sketch on the canvas. I know not every artist does, in fact my painting teacher says only high school kids do this, oh well a high schooler be I then! I don’t do it for every piece but I wanted to this one to be as perfect as possible so yeah I sketched it out. I got to admit, working on this piece wasn’t the most pleasant experience. On top of the stress to make sure it was gonna be special enough for exhibition, I was working with oils. In 2010, I pretty much worked with oils almost day of the week, then in 2011, I did more mixed media and not as much oils. Then in 2012, I didn’t use oils any. So this was pretty much the first time I had worked with oils since mid-2011. If you’ve never worked with oils, you gotta use paint thinner or some solvent with oils. Usually with acrylics or watercolors, you just use water to wet your brush, but not with oils (they’re not the easiest medium to work with but the results are always fantastic). Anyways, my workroom a.k.a. The Cat Cave, is just an ordinary bedroom in my house. There’s a window and a vent but no fans, so its not a very well-ventilated area and that’s kind of a must-have when using paint thinner. In 2011, it began to bother me more and more about the fumes but I kept working with oils, til finally I put them away but my Torso Anatomy piece was just begging to painted in oils. So I got a flimsy little face mask that you use for when mow the yard so the grass won’t bother you. Even though I had that mask and took frequent breaks, the fumes still bothered me (yes apparently I am a delicate flower when it comes to breathing in noxious odors that could potentially cause lung problems…dramatic yes?) But I don’t learn, so I kept chugging along with my oils because I forgot how much I missed painting with them. Difficult? Yes but I love it! So I’ve decided that whenever I’m gonna use oils again, I have a screened-in porch and I’m going to work outside so I can then infect the environment with paint fumes, nature is apparently tougher than I am when it comes to weird smells.

So here’s a gallery of the steps that Torso Anatomy came into fruition:

Step 1! Here it is drawn lightly with a pencil on the canvas

Step 2: Add charcoal, then shade it like a beast

Step 3: Here’s where I was most nervous, actually adding paint, which is always mt favorite part. I was mainly nervous about getting the colors right

Step 4: The charcoal mixing with the oil gives it a nice dirty but really detailed look that I love to use over and over. I got to admit the ribs were kind of a pill to work around, I had to re-work those serveral times.

Step 5: Background. Because I love old vintage-y paintings with the yellowed sepia-toned paper, that was my thought process as to why there is a yellow background here. If you look at the dark spot near the bottom right, you’ll see what I mean about the paint coming off the canvas, sucked! I showed this pic to an artist friend to get her opinion about the background. She is quite brilliant and came up with the idea to make a dark background to match with the darker tones of the muscles…of course I missed that. As I said, she is quite brilliant. After changing the background color, it become a completely different piece…

 So all of that lead up to this final product…

Torso Anatomy 20 in x 24 in 2013 Oils & Charcoal on Canvas

So there’s another piece in the 2013 works. I put it on Facebook and a lady who goes to church said “You’re very talented but that is not cup of tea!” Which I’ll take as a compliment!

Quote The Raven….

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before-Edgar Allen Poe

I don’t if anyone lately has been watching the Fox show The Following (well duh apparently people have cos it renewed for a second season) but I have and I’m quite smitten with it. And I’m quite disgusted with the followers and Mr. Joe Carroll (he’s so arrogant and aggravating and his voice never changes tone!) cos they’re all soooo messed up! But Mr Edgar Allen is kinda the catalyst for Joe Carroll’s crazy and its not hard to see why.

I remember reading his work in these old books that my parents had. I was way to young to understand what was going on in them at the time (to be fair, my parents didn’t really care what I read or watched when I was younger and I love them for that!). I remember being intrigued with the visual-ness (yep just made up a word) of his stories.In college we had to read The Fall Of The House Of Usher and when we had to discuss it in class. There was a guy who said “I really don’t like Poe. I’ve never liked his stuff”. While this could be considered blasphemy (actually I did let out a small gasp but then again I don’t the guy was a “literature” fan at all) but I could almost, kinda see his point.

Caw I Say! Caw!!

 

 

 

Not everyone is a Poe fan and some get more distracted by his life than his writings. But to me, his writing is almost begging to be illustrated. Earlier this year, I did a piece for a friend about the Raven. But I still had another Raven piece in me. But until then here are the pieces that lead to “Quote The Raven”.

Quote The Raven: 1st Day

I started out with a charcoal drawing of the raven first of all. Its not as raven-y and sinister looking as I originally intended as it looks like a kiwi bird but I started out with charcoal on cardboard. My dad had a bunch of cardboard leftover from a job (he is a carpenter/contractor and he keeps me stocked in random supplies like paint, wood, etc) and I use it to paint on sometimes. I like it because of the printed instructions and stickers found on the cardboard. It kind of gives it a found object feeling.

QTR 2nd Phase

A method I like to do is paint white paint over charcoal. I love effect that comes from it because it spreads the charcoal around and gives it a dirty and smeared look.

3rd Phase

So basically I re-drew the raven and pretty much destroyed the smeary- dirty looking raven underneath. I don’t understand my ways either. Also I wanted to use text in here. Obviously “Nevermore” was the Raven’s cool hip catchphrase.

4th Phase…Getting close to the end!

As much as a white and black piece would probably work, I wanted to throw some red in there. I”m really hoping to do series of raven pieces and I’ll go with a more monochromatic color scheme with those. But with this one, red felt right.

So here’s the final result of “Quote The Raven…”

There we go, hopefully more to come later this year with some more ravens. Cheers to you Mr. Poe and thanks again for your cool macabre-y stories!

Spring Into Art 2013!

Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes-Oscar Wilde

Sticker tags they give and our guest so people can match our artwork to us, actually worked one year cos a random guy matched my name to a piece of mine and said how much he liked my work, woot!

So last night I took from creating masterpieces (chuckle chuckle) and went to the annual Spring Into Art Exhibition. What is Spring Into Art you ask? Its a yearly event around Valdosta (where I’m from) where local and some national artists showcase their works. Every year the Turner Center hosts a big to-do where people dress up nice and eat awesome catered food and have waaaay too much to drink, which I will encourage only if in their drunk state they buy my artwork! My friend Sarah Reynolds who rocks at realism and photography entered as well, so we went together. And you get to bring a guest, so she brought our church mutual friend Helen’s brother Mike as her guest. And I brought our other mutual church friend Amber as my guest. Me and Amber are new friends so it was fun to hang out with her in a different setting than at church. Here are some pics of our fun fun night!

Here our Motley Crue! From left to right, there’s your fearless blog writer, my friend Sarah, Amber, and Mike…and yes a random gorilla and parrot…they totally photobombed our picture!

There’s my name in the program, always awesome

I’ve entered every since 2008 and guess how many times I’ve placed in the top or sold?? None! Yeah I’m that good! My mom says I should quit worrying about entering because its a waste of money. Lets just I haven’t found my niche when it comes to entering exhibitions. And not to sound pretentious (which of course is going to sound pretentious now) but the art that is really appreciated in Spring Into Art is not the areas that I specialize in doing. My moms also says I should stop with the skeletons and start doing flowers and landscapes. Then I could sell. And some days I think about that. Should I just do art that I know will sell? Don’t get me wrong, I could do pretty beach scene and daisies. I could do it to death but the thing I don’t enjoy doing it. So there’s that balance of do I really want to be an unknown artist with all this work piled up that doesn’t sell? Or do I want to work on stuff that could be financially good but boring?

The crowd was stupid busy! And they all felt the need to stop and talk in front of the art, that’s what the middle of the room is for!

Its so funny because every year I also enter the DrawProject. Its a silent auction and if your piece is bought, the money goes toward a Valdosta State University (where I went to college, go Blazers!) scholarship. It turns out every year for the past 3 years I’ve entered my pieces have sold but I don’t get the money! I’m glad it goes to a worthy cause but its the one exhibition where I succeed at but my reward is going towards helping other art students which is all well and good. Plus that means 4 different people have bought my drawings, woot! Anyhoo…

Usually I’m not one for desserts but this stuff was flippin’ delicious! They had a cheesecake that was so good it made you want to slap somebody!

As for the Spring Into Art crowd, I haven’t found that certain itch that needs to be scratched. Apparently other people have and it makes me wonder if I were to do exactly what they do, if I would get the same rewards? Questions questions! Me and my friend have planned to do flower pieces for next year’s exhibit and see what happens. We will not ignored dang it! I’m not going to say its not a little discouraging to have entered 5 years in a row and not receive anything but I did get a “thank you” from the Turner Center people which I’ve never gotten before, score! Here’s the rest of our night:

Here’s my Self Pt. 3 “Lips” piece, I was pretty pleased with how this one came out. Its part of a series of self portraits of me and my parts (nothing obscene though, nobody wants to see that!

Here’s my other piece, Torso Anatomy. There’s hopefully gonna be an upcoming blog about the fruition of this piece.

And what better way to end the night than the synchronized harassment of the gorilla?!

Anyways hope you enjoyed our exploits at the Turner Center Spring Into Art Exhibition, here’s hoping next year will be just as fun and hopefully successful!

Phantom 1

“Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly”-Morticia Adams

So here I am apologizing again for my clear lack of blogging and keeping people informed about my art. Super duper sorry again! But I think this time, I have an excuse. I’ve actually been productive! Yes since my last blog (1^st of March, yeah) I’ve been working on like 7 different pieces. Some involve organs, skeletons, text, washy watercolors and other fun ingredients. I also took a trip to Home Depot for some heavier duty art supplies. The weather is getting more Spring-like here so I’m getting ready to start some big art projects in the great outdoors a.k.a. Inside my screened in porch. I bought some luan board panels, spray paint, paint thinner, paint samples, big brushes, a paint respirator mask (apparently I’m a delicate flower when it comes to breathing around oil paint and paint thinner fumes, so problem solved!).

So what am I blogging about now? Good question cos I temporarily went on a tangent…oh yeah…So I’ve decided to write a blog about each piece that I worked on. Add some background info and my thought and work process that went into it. I’ve already blogged about 2 pieces that I’ve done this year so this blog is dedicated to my third completed. I have to say completed because at one point I would be working on 4 different pieces at once. The blogs will correspond to which ones were finished first.

The third piece Phantom 1 started like this. One night in church, I was sketching (and yes I was paying attention! Sometimes I tend to listen better when I’m doodling) in my little black sketch that I’ve had for like 4 years cos it still notes from college in it.

So this is the initial drawing:

I showed it to my brother and asked “Isn’t it adorable??” His face said no but his mouth no as well.

So about a week later I got my ink pen stylus thing (the quill pen like thing, I don’t know the name of it, man I suck at art vocabulary!), some India ink, and paper. I did some scratchy lines here and there forming my little Phantom. With ink, I like to keep a brush (paint not hairbrush, although I’m in constant need of one) beside me cos I like to work water into wet ink and it’ll basically work for me then I use the brush to manipulate it. So enough about that here’s the final product:

So yeah there it is, I’m really hoping to make a series of Phantoms. I’ve got some big ideas coming up and hopefully they’ll pan out. Hope you enjoyed this and any comments and critiques are always helpful or just general “what’s up!” comments work too! Kid C out!

Left Maxillae, Side Skull, Henry Gray

Art like morality consists of drawing the line somewhere-G.K. Chesterton

So this is the probably the most productive I’ve ever been blogging, two in one week..what?! So as promised in my last post here is the story of the other art piece I did this month. While on a mixed media piece, I got a sudden burst of creation and started another drawing. It was a charcoal anatomy illustration to go along with my ongoing anatomy series. Its a depiction of the left maxillae of a skull with part of it opened up. I found a picture of it in an old anatomy & physiology book that my best friend acquired at a garage sale. She bought a box of random books and this was in there. Its really old and cool and the pages are falling out and it smells nice and vintage-y and its been quickly became one of my favorite books. Anyways, this post is supposed to be a drawing, so here’s the progression of it started:

My first initial sketch from the book

The very very beginning, yes I’ll admit it looks caveman-like

Step 3, Shading!

More shading, and no I can’t describe what kind of nose bridge that is

Ooh darkness creepin’ in!

The almost final step…

So in a lot of my artwork, I like to include text and especially in my anatomy works. I just included just few terms for which parts are which. See, its art and educational! Here’s the final result:

Title: Left Maxillae, Side Skull 18 in x 24 in, 2013 Charcoal on Paper
Voila! If you look closely you can see the text written in the black with white charcoal pencil

Well, there’s that. I just hope I can keep the momentum going and keep producing and also keep the blogging up! I’ll leave this note with you all as to why me and any other person who feels the need to create does so:

Found online, wrote by Cristian Mihai

  On a random note, I dreamed a dream…that my life would a musical…just for one day!

The Start Of Some Sort Of Mania…

“The scariest moment is always just before you start”-Stephen KIng

Ok so 2013 is going pretty darn good, can’t complain, actually I will…later on. At the moment, my goal to blog more about my art and art related issues, has been a bust. I had the bestest of intentions to blog at least once a week, but sadly you see this is the first one I’ve done and it’s what the 30 of January? Wow, yeah I’m that good.

Anyhoo, its supposedly January here in south Georgia (I have to specify south Georgia, because weather-wise its so darn different than north Georgia’s weather) and its been about 75 degrees. Its like spring! I only mention this because the weather kinda affects my mood. While I do prefer warmer weather, when its winter it would be good to be a little cold! Plus I just bought a puffy vest and I wanna wear at least once before the hot weather gets here. (Another) Plus I love drinking coffee when its cold, although I do tend to drink it in the summer too, yeah even though that makes some people gag.

Anyhoo…again, the real reason for this blog, back to the art! I’ve completed 2 pieces already this year (one was personal and the other was my first commission of the year, woot!) but before then I was wracked with some serious blockage (not writer’s block but I guess you’d call it art block). I had all these ideas but none were even close enough to come into fruition, major source of grrrrr! So I took my little sketchbook with me, even to church (I promise I was listening!) but I’d doodle little things here and there to no avail. 

Here’s my main supply station, its actually organized but it doesn’t last too long

So about 10 into the new year, I went to Hobby Lobby and did some heavy re-stocking of some supplies. Some acrylic paint (I’m stocked to the gills with oils and watercolors), a new sketchbook, brushes, paper, canvas, pens, etc. So there was no excuse to not get any work done. But the lazy human part of me (yes according to my brother I am an android) still didn’t want to get anything done. So long story short (actually this is the longer version cos there’s still more to add) a Facebook friend requested me do a piece for her. I got really excited and started to work immediately on it. She had seen a piece that I had done before called Nevermore based on you guessed it Mr. Poe. So I re-did the piece to make it more dark, creepy, and macabre, which is what she wanted (plus it kinda what I do best )

Here’s the end product: so

Quote The Raven…Caw, caw!

So also at the same time of working on this little beauty, I got another spurt of inspiration and decided to start back to my anatomical works. More to come on that one. So after these 2 works came into fruition a couple of weeks ago, it seems that I’ve hit another another wall (not literally, although I have done that before too). This year I’ve been watching Fringe (awesome!) and reading The Hunger Games trilogy. and wishing I was as smart as Dr. Walter Bishop 

Dr. Walter Bishop, mad scientist extraordinaire!

and as resourceful as Katniss Everdeen. I mention them because they are currently buzzing in my head along with a million other ideas for art. So in the midst of all of this I’ve acquired an imaginary thought board. Michael Kors did a demo of a thought board on Project Runway showing how he took one idea (Doris Day) and turned it into a clothing collection. I thought it was pretty cool. So after seeing that, I try and do this when I’m thinking about some projects I’d like to do. Whether just in my head or I have enough printer ink, I’ll print some things out. Currently in my head, along with Fringe and The Hunger Games, are medical illustrations, Bible verses (namely Jeremiah 17:9 and Matthew 10: 26), Henry Gray, Edgar Allen Poe, science and scientific pioneers, and my new art supplies. Here are some pics of things that have got me in the mood in my work room a.k.a. The Cat Cave:

My 2 new anatomy books, coooooool!

My thought board, or actually thought pile

And of course my Mr. Coffee

So that’s some major buzzing going on! It feels like I’m on a cliff and all these yummy ideas are swimming beneath me. All I need is a good hard push for me to start working like I’ve contracted some sort of madness. My kingdom for a pensieve from Harry Potter!

It’s The Most Wonderful…Busiest…Colorful…Bustling Time Of Year! Pt. 2

Anyways…it’s always super duper busy time of year, what with the shopping, the cooking, the decorating, the celebrating, the togetherness, the eating (the best part), etc. At the moment, it’s two weeks until Christmas Eve, I’m eating a fudge coconut snack bar, and listening to my Pandora Christmas station.* I’m also thinking of about all the extra stuff I’ve put on my plate to complete before Christmas. I’ve got three different projects going on in addition little things to finish all in about two weeks. Go me.

Project 1. Christmas Cards

This year I decided to do some hand painted Christmas cards, so I started designing them about two weeks ago.  Then I had to settle on designs, decide how many to do, cut them out, sketch them out, get them ready to be painted, and then finally paint them. It’s the last part that I’m at. I’ve got eighteen drawn out cards that are screaming at me to be painted. Here’s a few examples of them:

Just a few and once they’re painted, they’ll spring to life with Christmas festive-ness! I’ll be sure to post the finished products.

Project 2: DrawProject

Every year, our local art gallery The Annette Howell Turner Center For The Arts puts on a show where artists submit drawing based on their interpretations of what they think drawing is. Its a silent auction that raises scholarship money for the VSU Art Department. I’ve submitted into it for the last three or four years and thank the good Lord that the submission date was later this year! I’ve been at a complete loss as to what to enter in for the last two weeks. I had been thinking but nothing seemed to be good. Thank goodness I had a breakthrough this past weekend because the deadline is the 21st of December. Then it was feast or famine because then I had too many ideas but today I narrowed it down to one definitive choice. The hardest part of coming up with something is over. Now comes the easy part of actually working on it. Here’s the idea I’m going with:

Yes I realize it looks a little juvenile but it’s going places! The Bible verse Revelations 6:8 was the inspiration for it. It will a grey tone drawing with the text “Behold a pale horse” at the bottom. More to come on the finished product.

Project 3: Mandi

My best friend’s sister contacted me last month about wanting me to do a special Christmas present for her mom. My best friend Mandi who was killed two years ago in a car crash and her sister wanted me to do a piece based on her for a Christmas present for her mom. Naturally I wanted to do the piece for her mom since their family means so much to me. Then I had a moment of hesitation of “oh my goodness what I am I gonna do to make it super special because it has to be perfect for Mrs. Brenda!”. Then that passed then it went as it usually does into “what am I going to do? How am I going to do it? What materials do I want to use? etc”. So I’ve settled on a text based piece with one of her quotes that she always used “She flies with her own wings”. Here’s the tentative design for it:

Yes I’m realize I’m going literal with the wings but like the other projects, the design phase is always rough looking.

So that’s where my head is at the moment. Sounds like a lot (and it kind of is) but that’s how I work best. For me as an artist, the hardest part is pinpointing and deciding on a final thought to bring to life as an art piece. But once I have the ideas, I usually work fast in completing a project. That is how I worked in college with my art assignments and apparently it has followed me into my working life

So that’s that. Not to mention painting some picture frames for other presents, finishing my shopping, actually completing the projects, sending off the Christmas cards, dropping off my drawing at the gallery, meeting up with friends, watching all my favorite Christmas movies and specials, and did I mention a fruitcake must be made at some point?

*On a random tangent, the Christmas song “It’s Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas” has no meaning here in south Georgia. It’s been in the high 70′s to 80′s this past week! So the Christmasy cold season has been a little hard to come by. Fingers crossed it’ll change soon!

Also a self-promotion note, I’ve been busy also creating some other online accounts to show my work. Here’s a list of where all you can find me online:

Etsy Shop

Flickr Account

Behance Online Portfolio

Facebook C Is For Cathy art page

 

 

It’s The Most Wonderful…Busiest…Colorful…Bustling Time Of Year! Pt. 1 (An Apology)

So I am apologizing to my blog world for posting a couple of posts then basically abandoning it! Poor deprived thing. Good thing my blog wasn’t a fish, it would have kicked the bucket about a month and a half ago. I’ve been thinking lately why I even started this blog. Its intention was to share with people online what I do artistically (and anything that struck my fancy) in order to get some exposure about my art. But like with a lot of stuff I start, I stop it or I forget to keep it updated. So no more of that! I realize it’s not the new year yet but I’m resolving right now to treat my poor blog like a living breathing organism and give it love and attention and some pretty things. I’ve been doing sketches daily for the past two months and my intention was to post them. At the moment, I’m on the cusp of some new year-end projects and what better time to re-start my blogging habits. So more to come very very soon!

A New Design

So God has smiled on me with my art career as of late. First of all I have a buyer for one of my artworks. I have a Facebook page here where all my pieces are displayed and a friend of  mine found one she liked and decided she wanted to buy it, score!

So this little one will be getting a new home pretty soon!

And this second part of my recent art opportunity is courtesy once again of C Is For Cathy FB page. A friend that I went to high school is a musician and plays guitar and banjo. So after he browsed my FB art page, I get a message from him wanting me to design something for his banjo head.

Not his banjo but the part of the banjo that I would be painting on

So naturally I was stoked to start working on that but then panic set in as to what I wanted to put on there! So after mulling it over a while, I decided to do something in the vein of the recent anatomical work I’ve been doing. Here are the 2 ideas I came up with. I showed them to him and he liked them both:

Heart sketch, it’ll be all nice and colored red and black!

Here’s the second one, it accidentally came out pink but it’ll probably be red & black too

I think once I actually get a hold of the banjo, then I’ll be able to decide which design I want to go with. And actually the thing I’m most excited about the exposure I hope to get from the guy playing the banjo in front of people and people seeing my artwork!

So that’s what going down at the moment

The Others

After posting my last post, it occurred to me that I should post the first 3 anatomy illustrations in the series. So here are the first 3 that go along with Superficial Muscles Of The Head And Neck.