Watercolors and Modeling

Versus Lion 2006

Watercolor on paper, 22" X 30"

I made some progress on the Versus project (BTW it’s “midterms” for my self imposed “spring semester”, Ill be using this week to chart my progress towards my goals) by completing the watercolor of the Lion attacking the Astronaut. The watercolor step is a bit unusual for me, (so much so that I dropped about $40 getting tubes of new watercolor paint to replace my old, dried ones) because I usually just start painting and do most of the work on the canvas. But this helped me find the flaws in the composition…like the lion’s other ear, the way the claws should rip into the spacesuit, the way the spacesuit needs to lay. I’ve discovered that I do really well reproducing something I have a model for, (i.e. direct observations, or photos) but when I have to “fill in the blanks” I start getting a “cartoony” result. I was aiming for a pretty realistic rendering for the “Versus” project, but unless I take the extra step and pose a model in a silver jacket, I wont ever get the spacesuit to look right. The watercolor has helped to define the problem in more than one way. The conflict here is between a “generalized” or “cartoony” look and a “specific” or “realistic” look. I may have to make a cut paper version of this series to help get me back to the type of look I was getting with my Winter Self Portrait.

I have some more of the Versus project drawings in the hopper…up next: Woman, Octopus, Robot…

1/4" Scale Model "sketch" for Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat

My “Joseph and the…” meeting went pretty well. Above is a phone pic of the model. I needed to build a model in order to convey the idea that the “fans” open up like a gate to reveal Egypt (or the Elvis Pharaoh, as the case may be). I have another two weeks to crank out the final plans to give to the shop…then it’s on to “Fiddler….”

Went to 80’s anti-prom at the Black Cat on Saturday, I forgot how much I love that goofy music…

The meeting with Lobs and Gabe went well. I am going to illustrate the comic that Gabe will eventually write. The whole thing will then be used as a flyer for the show. It doesn’t provide for a way to get paid for the work, but I am working on how to make that happen…I also committed myself to converting my “wheel of misfortune” into a spinning-knife-throw-human-target. It will give me a chance to do some welding…

The Remastered show looks like it might actually happen. I need to get on top of that…I don’t have the excuse of it being “political art” this time….